From the monthly archives:

August 2010

Writers or Knitters: You’ve Got To Have The Right Tools

29.08.2010

I went on a spree yesterday—I bought the ball winder I’ve had my eye on. And I found a great swift, too. The ball winder winds skeins of yarn into a center-pull ball, and the swift is the twirly-thing with long arms (don’t you love technical language?) that holds the wool around the pegs. After [...]

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On a Rainy, Mary Oliver Morning…

22.08.2010

Lately, I’ve been drawn to re-reading Mary Oliver’s poems. Maybe drawn is too subtle. Pulled with a force that is both unknown and a touch frightening is more accurate. My old copy of her New and Selected Poems (Beacon Press, 1992) opens on its own to several poems. The spine is cracked at “Morning Poem,” [...]

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That First Step

12.08.2010

There’s this scene in one of the Indiana Jones movies where our hero has to cross a gorge, only there’s no bridge. One step, and he’s a goner. That’s how I feel about writing sometimes—no bridge, no path, no way across. Then I remember the rest of that scene when Indie—after much inner conflict—musters the [...]

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Dear Elizabeth Zimmermann…

09.08.2010

Today, 8/9/10, would have been Elizabeth Zimmermann’s 100th birthday. If you’re a knitter, this is a day to celebrate a woman who gave so many of us permission to knit. And like many others, I owe her so much… I learned how to knit by watching my mother when I was around seven. It was [...]

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