My father comments: Some people will go to great lengths and expense to maintain their image of themselves.
It’s not unusual.
A Thing A Day
If you met me in person, you would think, what a modern, independent woman that is. And it’s true, I am that: college educated, successful in my career, with a kitchen full of stainless steel small electrics.
Yet in some ways, I am hopelessly old-fashioned. I save letters, for example – or at least I did until people stopped sending the handwritten variety. Now I just save letters from my one aunt who refuses to get a computer.
I have boxes of letters, and I’m glad of it, because when I need to, I can go through a box and see and hear my grandfather again, through his handwritten words to me, usually written on the back of a photograph.One such letter, which I’ve read over and over, goes as follows:
I’m sorry to hear that you don’t like school. Never let a day go by that you don’t learn something.
I was about eight when he wrote that, and he died when I was ten. I remember him often, and think of those words equally often.
So I find myself now mired in legal paperwork and bills but also, oddly enough, periods in which I suddenly seem to have a lot more free time than I’ve seemed to have for a very long time – I’m guessing eight years, but it might be longer, because at the time I met The Departed I was a single, commuting parent of a toddler. Which is to say, it’s been a very long time since I’ve found free time. Mostly, for a very long time, I’ve createdfree time, usually accompanied by a heaping helping of guilt for spending the precious commodity on myself when I had so many other things I should be doing, not usually for myself.It’s a strange phenomenon, and has cost me some sleep.
But then when I was done not sleeping, I remembered a whole bunch of things I really liked doing, and a whole bunch of things I’d always wanted to do or know how to do. Watching old movies: I have long lists of yet-unseen classics. Photography – not snapshots of kids, but really seeing and capturing the details of the world around me. And then there’s knitting.
My grandmother tried to teach me to knit when I was nine – a failed effort that resulted in a small, deformed doll blanket and a lifetime spent wishing I knew how to knit but too afraid to venture forth and fail, again. But these days, we have YouTube, which is full of handy-dandy tutorials, so I bought a pair of needles and one Sunday morning, sat down with some pink yarn and my iPad and … Cast on. And knit a row. And then another row.
And I learned something: I can knit. Not well, but hey. I didn’t put anyone’s eye out.
I posted my picture of my two rows on Facebook, and learned something else: I have very encouraging friends, many of whom are also knitters.
And something else: it gets a lot easier when you use the right size needles.
So I started practicing and then I started really knitting, making a scarf that wasn’t a screaming success but wasn’t a total catastrophe either, although The Child pronounced it “too small” and declined to wear it. But I was undeterred, as I found the whole knitting thing oddly therapeutic, and better yet, didn’t require quite as much focus as reading, my previous hobby, which I seem unable to do recently, probably due to having so much else on my mind, or else sleep deprivation, depending on the day.
I’ve got a lot on my mind, and have done a lot of knitting. If you picture me kind of like a soon-to-be-twice-divorced Madam DeFarge, knitting long scarves with the names of ex husbands worked into the rows, you’d be kind of right – except my knitting isn’t that good, so I’m not up to names yet.
They’re there in spirit.
I’m sleeping much better lately, and finding I enjoy my quiet, yarny evenings. I’ve learned something relatively big – how to knit – but it’s really composed of a lot of little things I’ve learned every day: How to cast on, how to choose needles, how to read a pattern.
Another memory of my grandfather that I carry with me is a little one: He showed me how to pare an apple. He showed me all the steps – the peeling and trimming – and then we ate the apple together, quietly. I might have been three or four at the time. A small, simple treasure.
Every morning that I get up and do something – almost anything, really – I learn something. Usually, it is less of a searing insight and more of a pared apple. But pared apples are delicious, if you take the time to savor them – and even better if you share them.
Metaphor: Marriage Is a Restaurant
Question: Have you ever been to a restaurant that someone recommended to you, but you didn’t like it?
You know what I mean. You read a glowing review of the place. Friends of yours went there and raved about it. You went to the restaurant, and all around you were people happily enjoying their meals.
The entree you wanted was sold out, and your waiter was surly. You didn’t stay for dessert, and the bill was for ten times what any sane person would pay for a meal.
Okay, so maybe it was just one bad night, right?
So, you go back to the restaurant, because the waiter was probably in a bad mood because the head chef was out sick. I mean, it could happen, right?
You go back. It must be you. I mean, everyone says this place is the best.
The second time, your appetizer is cold and your drinks are watered down.
Now, maybe you just ordered the wrong drink or didn’t realize that particular appetizer was meant to be served cold – after all, who really understands molecular gastronomy, anyway? But again, you’ve skipped dessert and the bill is outrageous by any standard.
A sane person would stop dining at such a restaurant.
I’m sane.
The question is, where do I eat now?
