Red Cedar

I would have never remembered to post here today if it wasn’t for another blogger who posts on Fridays. Her post reminded me that it’s the end of the week (and a long weekend for me). Somehow I’ve been drifting along this week, the days slipping by without getting much done. Suddenly it’s Friday and I don’t have much to show for myself!

Last Friday was Brian’s birthday which is where the photo above comes from. We slipped off to a little secret beach spot and had a picnic which included iced tea in china cups. The weather was really on side and it inspired us to commit to trying to get out somewhere together – for a picnic, kayak, walk – at least once a week this summer. We’ve fallen into a routine since moving here of spending most of joint time at home, which was never the case when we lived in the city. Difference in an urban area is there are all sorts of places to go and have dinner, drinks, etc. Where we are, it’s outdoors or nothing – save for a handful of restaurants and a new food truck that just opened up.

The fantastic weather has brought a bounty of local food back into production and this week I got my first community-supported agriculture box of the season from the farm down the road. That is probably the most excitement I’ve had in ages. Neighbours! Conversation! Bags of Greens! I now have enough rhubarb to make my first batch of rhubarb ketchup for the season which will be one of my projects this weekend coming up.

In the textile studio this week I’ve been working on samples. Over the last several years of weaving, I’ve somehow not made napkins yet, even though we use cloth napkins every day at the dinner table. There are lots of recommended patterns out there for napkins, but I have discovered recently that I get a lot more enjoyment out of a project when I figure it out on my own from beginning to end. So I got to sampling this week, with various permutations of cotton, linen, and cottolin (a blend of cotton and linen) and I’ve decided on napkins in the three primary colours with a cottolin warp and a 9/2 linen weft – sett at 18 epi with 2 dents skipped every inch. If you don’t weave, I know that sounds like a foreign language – but what it translates to is a napkins that is floaty and rustic at the same time. You’ll see when I show them to you when they are done.

For my next project I’m putting on a set of tea towels in blue and white. This project is straight out of a pattern inspired by Finnish weaving, and I’ve noticed how reluctant I am to get on with it. It’s what has made me realize that 90% of weaving fun is designing my own fabric and projects to go with them. I see all these amazing fabrics on Instagram and in magazines and I think I want to replicate them, but what I really want is to be inspired to create something new. Even a basic plain weave napkin can be “new” when I make all the choices – yarn type for warp, yarn type for weft, spacing in the reed, how hard I “beat” the fabric, how I finish the item and so on. Because of all those factors, the chances are good that when I experiment with all the variables I will end up with a fabric I’ve never encountered before – and that is interesting to me.

I have made a couple of investments this week in loom-land. I mentioned last week the 20+ system which I went ahead and ordered this week (an extra cheque came in for some weekend union work which gave me to boost to go through with it). I should have that delivered and installed by the end of June. I also decided to try out something called a warp wrench – which is made by some enterprising weavers in Wisconsin – it is supposed to help tension a warp during wind-on so no extra hands are needed. The current iteration of the warp wrench will fit my small loom, so I thought to give it a try. I won’t put long warps on at the moment due to difficulty keeping tension during the wind-on – but this tool might allow me to put on the 13-yard warp I have stashed in a cupboard finally!

I think the only thing really inspiring me at the moment is weaving – everything else just makes me feel tired. I’m not sure why the malaise when it comes to writing and music, but it’s where I’m at right now. Even as I commit to putting in the time for practice – which is how I get through these times without giving everything up (except sometimes I do give everything up) – it feels like a lot of effort and I don’t feel like I’m making any headway. At least with weaving I can *see* the progress on the loom as I work. And even when I’m exhausted from working all day, I can still sit down and thread a few strands into the heddles, something that writing doesn’t allow for. When I’m tired, my output on that front is zero.

With the long weekend ahead of me I’m hoping for some sleeping in and some outdoor visiting with folks in addition to lots of time in the studio and garden. I’m in need of something for sure, and I’m pretty sure I’ll find it in one of those places! At least the weather looks to be fantastic and Brian will be home from the city soon to eat homemade pizza with me.

The first time I was invited to a Jewish Passover Seder twenty-five years ago, I was struck by the traditions of welcoming that open and close the ceremonial part of the dinner. The first is the invitation for the stranger to join the table, accompanied by an opening of the front door. The second is the invitation to the prophet Elijah, who has a place set for him at the table and a glass of wine poured. At this recitation, the household door is opened again, an invitation to the prophet to take his place at the table. The Seder recounts the flight of the Jewish people from persecution, wandering in the desert as refugees from slavery in Egypt. As people who have experienced the pain of being “unwanted refugees”, it is no wonder one of their central rituals involves welcoming in strangers and blessed ones alike.

As a young social justice activist, I was moved to learn of a tradition that encoded the act of making space for the wandering soul in need. It defies “charitable” giving (a hierarchy which I despise); it is not the act of setting food outside one’s door or dropping a couple of cans into a hamper on the way out of the grocery, which is so often where our notions of giving end. The opening of one’s door and home is an act of solidarity and intimacy. It is to join another as an equal at the same table, and participate together in a ritual of sharing and nourishment.

After that first seder, I thought about that type of invitation a lot and how to bring it into my own practice of potlucks and household gatherings. At that stage of my life, I lived with a changing cast of roommates who all cooked for each other and friends regularly. There was almost always a stranger at the table (or sitting on the floor in the living room) back then. I lived most of my life by this admired principle. But as I’ve grown older, my life has become more private and to some degree more constricted by work and a need for order. In middle-age, my husband and I do not live in a way that invites people randomly into our home though we both live with the expectation that someone might just show up – having come from households where that happened (we both grew up in families that took people in – it’s how I ended up with a “foster” brother).

In pre-Covid times, we hosted large dinners at our home with some regularity. Given our very loose invitation policy and the fact people ask to bring a friend, or cancel at the last minute, errant place settings frequently end up on the table. When a gathering is particularly sizable, we put on an extra setting or two intentionally, just in case we miscounted our numbers. Brian and I refer to this the place for Elijah, in the nod to the tradition of inviting in both stranger and prophet (who may be one and the same – prophets do not always come in a guise we recognize). It’s a symbol of our approach to both hosting and helping, something that shows up in our daily practice of making enough food at every dinnertime so an unexpected guest can be fed, and the fact we keep a spare room ready for overnight guests.

We don’t do this out of “kindness” or charity, but frankly, because it’s a joyful way to live. To shout over the fence at a neighbour walking by to join us for dinner is to enliven the day with unexpected company. To have a guest bring an add-on is to meet someone new and expand our circle. To hear about the struggles of others is to widen our compassion and empathy for those living in different circumstances. To fire up the oven to cook and bake for others is to warm the house. For all of the quiet days Brian and I choose to live together, we welcome the chaotic ones even when they are inconvenient or a bit messy. It’s one of the things I value most about our life together – the willingness on both our parts to attempt a response to what life is asking of us rather than shutting the door because it is too much.

Covid has made it difficult to imagine inviting in friends, let alone strangers. But the needs of others persist, for community, kinship, and help in getting by. As things start to shift over the next few months, I hope we can collectively let go of some of the fear and start letting people back into our lives. We have found it difficult to live with a mostly-closed door in the last year, not because we want to get on with shopping and international travel, but because our lives are poorer for the strangers we have not met and the friends we haven’t broken bread with in all this time. After this first shot we are opening our door little by little, in hope that by autumn we are flinging it wide open for a 30-person Thanksgiving feast!

I know that summertime is not really here yet (we still have June-uary to get through), but the last few days have been turning towards summer and it’s a very welcome change after a coldish April.

I’m having a hard time separating the days from each other lately. It seems to me that the last month has gone by in a single block of time and I’m not sure how that’s happened. It seems sudden that the days are really long, the garden demands daily watering, and it’s light enough in the mornings to consider going for a run before work (to beat the heat). I suppose this is why I document here, so that I have a record even during the times when I am not paying that much attention.

The most exciting thing that’s happened in the last week is that we got vaccinated on Sunday! First shot of Moderna is done, and while we did have some side effects (sore arm, exhaustion), I’m feeling back to normal and much better about the future. Apparently 50% of the province has now had their first shot, with a lot of people still in the queue to receive theirs. I won’t be surprised if that number is 60% by the end of the month and that is trending towards herd immunity and a resumption of normal life by the fall when we all get our second shots. Though many people have reported feeling relieved at getting their vaccination shot, I have to admit that my reaction in the hour that followed was more one of frustration. We’ve been waiting so long, and some part of me wanted things to be different *right away*. But of course, they weren’t and so we went back home and our lives have continued along in quarantine, something that I’m definitely reaching the end of my patience with.

My workouts this week were definitely impacted by the shot. I didn’t have one at all on Monday. Tuesday I went for a run and my app showed me that I “worked harder than normal” (according to heart rate) even though my pace was significantly slower. I’ve managed to get through the last two days of strength workouts, but only by taking maximum rests in between sets. It’s interesting because in my daily life, I don’t feel much of a different in energy levels, but in my workouts I’ve noticed a downshift. It’s not something I’m concerned about because I know that as my immune system processes the input, things will return fully to normal.

I don’t have any new weaving to show off this week since I’ve been winding some new warps and working on re-tying the treadles on my Berga Savonia loom (for the billionth time – my approach keeps changing). I am looking at investing in a bit of equipment to assist the tie-up since I’ve never met a loom that has a more awkward position for the treadle tie-up (you literally have to sit in the loom, under the beamed warp in order to reach the lamms and treadles). You can see from this picture, a tall person would be very cramped (you have to sit on the back of the treadles underneath the warp which you can see running across the top as a white line)! But even for a short person like me, my hips do not like being scrunched up in there for too long. There is a system called the 20+ which changes the tie-up position from inside the loom to the back of the loom. It’s called the 20+ because it’s said to add twenty years to your weaving life. A lot of people end up leaving weaving because it’s too hard to get under the loom, down on the floor as they age. This device brings the tie-up to the back of the loom so that the weaver can sit on a stool and do the tie-up with more ease. I love everything about the Berga Savonia loom except its treadle tie-up, so it seems like a no-brainer to sort that out and make my weaving life easier – once I save up the money I’m going for it.

It’s Brian’s birthday today and so I’m skipping out of work early and have planned a picnic at the beach for this afternoon. Though it’s a bit windy, the weather seems to require that we get away from our desks to enjoy it and I’ve planned super-yummy foods to take with us, including mini-apple pies, pesto pasta salad, and ham and brie sandwiches. He’s turning 49 today and our hope is that by his real milestone birthday next year, we’ll be able to throw some kind of great party – but for this year we’ll enjoy what we have available which is miles of beautiful beaches and good weather. Can’t really complain about that.

This week has been all over the place in terms of time and routine. A bit of time off, some (more) dental appointments, and then full days of online union convention yesterday, today and tomorrow. While I am glad I took a day and half off at the beginning of the week, the rest of the changed schedule reminds me just how much of a creature of habit I am. I’ve been eating at weird times and working out in the morning instead of the afternoons. I’ve been having difficulty finding the energy to write and play music in the last couple of days especially.

And yet, it’s been a fairly productive week all round. I did manage to record three violin tracks on Saturday and Sunday for my husband Brian’s new album, and listening back to them, I feel pretty good about what I did – both in terms of how I divided the recordings up for a more professional approach, and also the parts I picked out to go with the tracks already laid down. I have been playing my violin steadily now since December, 3 or 4 times per week, the longest run of regular practice I have had in fifteen years.

I had almost forgotten what it’s like to play freely, without hesitation and stiffness – but it’s coming back to me now as my joints become more fluid and the instrument more of an extension of my feeling-self again. I’m not sure I will ever get back the dexterity I had when younger, but can tell you that the nascent arthritis in my hands has completely disappeared since January. At the very least, playing will keep my hands flexible longer. Sometimes the issue with dexterity isn’t so much the joints themselves, but the connection between my brain and body, and that’s something I know has gotten slower with age. The muscle memory doesn’t lock in quite as quickly as it once did.

Besides that productivity, I finished weaving and hemming the hand towels that were on the loom last week, and warped again with what I think will be a table runner (pictured at the top). Having Monday and Tuesday morning off work really put a dent in a number of small projects around the studio, and I even got started on a bit of sewing for the first time in awhile. Studio time has been mostly flow-state lately, with one project morphing into the next, and tidying going on simultaneously so that things really keep moving. I wish it was always so easy!

I’m looking forward to my next projects which include experiments in weaving linen, some more tea towel gifts, getting the big loom up and running with shawls (treadle cords retied and we’re a go), and an overshot project in silk.

I think I mentioned a couple of weeks ago that I’ve returned to running – just a couple of times per week, but I’m enjoying the bit I’ve been fitting in. I’ve also made some new fitness goals for the spring/summer – to push my power-lifts up in density, to get additional outdoor activity in every week, and to stretch for at least five minutes aftder every strength workout. My strength training the last couple of weeks has been fairly intense, but I am very satisfied to complete the workouts. Ever since I started doing Stronger by the Day about five months ago, I’ve really noticed big differences in my body composition. I look the same to folks on the outside, but my muscles are much more present and defined. I find it hard to show this stuff off because I’m not much of a muscle-flexer, but its real and I can link my growth in muscle over the last eighteen months to better posture, better metabolic rate, and more stamina overall. I just finished reading the book Exercised by David Lieberman and it was one of the best books I’ve read about why we resist exercise (evolution, obviously), but what it does for us – especially as we age. It’s some of the best work I’ve read about fitness and evolution, science-based and not at all faddish.

Union convention continues through the weekend so I am definitely tied to my desk when I’m not playing for the next few days – but then next week is back to my regularly scheduled life.