Unpacking and shaking everything free

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Parts of my home still look like the interior of a moving van, but there are a couple of rooms where only one or two boxes remain. I have not yet woven. I feel too compelled to unpack.

How did all this stuff fit into the Aerie? It was a careful balancing act, and much of it arrived bit by bit, fitting into specific spaces. This house is beautiful but difficult. There are more windows than walls, and far fewer closets. I have twice as much space, but I am still figuring out how to use it.

I have decided that the loom belongs in the living room. I could have chosen the studio, another huge window-filled room off the master bedroom, but I was struck by the intimate view of the woods that the living room has. The house nestles into the hillside, and the woods begin just beyond the windows.

 

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The next way station

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I am going home, at long last, to the Misted Hills.

You know that I often talk about the way that weaving doesn’t begin with the first throw of the shuttle. It begins with the first glimmer of an idea.

So does this homecoming. Where did it begin? There was the night in Soho when I wandered into a little Tibetan shop and bought a lock shaped like a fish. This, I promised myself, was the lock for my potting shed door. Of course I had no potting shed, but I suddenly had the promise of one.

I may stay there for one or two years, living somewhat reclusively in this hilltop retreat. The past few weeks have been the steepest part of the journey, and I know I am almost there. I have to hold on to what energy remains, to get myself there. So much of my personal energy has gone into it, melting obstacles in my path and generally forcing communication despite Mercury retrograde.

Away from the loom

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I have been away from the loom for a couple of weeks.  The journey is unfolding in strange and unexpected ways. The carefully planned expedition has turned into an adventure that has fallen from the sky, tumbling me out of my dreams and into a new reality.

Prophetically, I wrote in mid-january that I did not want to arrive half-naked and shivering at my destination. I wanted to weave my way home. Yet, here I am packing boxes and making whirlwind visits to to secure my future in the place where I belong. I am wide awake and no longer dreaming. I can weave when I get there. My black rags may have to clothe me for a while longer, but I am on the journey home.

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In Buddhism, those who are on the path of the bodhisattva, those who strive to live in the moment and ease the suffering of the world, are said to be awake.

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I leave you with a small glimpse of my misted hills. In winter, so many of the colors are just memories, but I stood at the window for a long time, drinking in the view until the sun set behind me.

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just weaving

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Today, I am Just Weaving, letting the shuttle mesmerize me, letting go of everything. It’s warm and sunny in the Aerie, my studio in the trees. My Birmans, Edelweiss and newly-arrived Magic, are getting along like they have lived together forever, not just for one scant week. Even the Red-breasted Nuthatch is back at the feeders, after several weeks absence.

Exhale slowly and breathe in. Let the shuttle fly back and forth. This is all that there is.

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Fulfilling a promise

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I’ve been so busy weaving that I forgot to realize that I am fulfilling a promise I made to myself when I first set up my floor loom.

This project, Dreaming myself Awake, is the ten yard black warp that I promised myself in 1985.

Except that it it has a few purple stripes in it. Except that it’s 14 yards long.

Numbers have always been a bit ethereal to me. I have no idea why I’ve believed all these years that my warping board measures a ten yard warp. Maybe because it should. Maybe because when I was a costumer and was buying fabric to have in stock in the studio, I always bought a ten-yard length. Maybe because it’s an easy and comfortable number.

Does it matter?

Not really. The piece of cloth I am weaving was always too long for the garment I have in  mind. Now, its just that much longer. The ten yard promise was just my way of saying a long piece of cloth that could be as many things as it wanted to be. It is beginning as a complex tapestry of more than thirty different yarns. It may end as something completely different.

I think I’ve completed two yards of cloth. There’s much more fun ahead of me.

Keep on with your dreams.———————-

three-day studio retreat

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In a last-minute change of plans, Edelweiss kitty and I are not going away for the weekend. I am having a three-day studio retreat instead. This retreat may not be as self-contained as most, as I have not prepared any food, gathered any supplies, or set my intentions in advance. Usually I have some idea of what is going to happen before I begin. This will be refreshing and different. I’ve even arranged to spend some social time with two other fiberistas. Retreats do not have to be solitary events, and taking small amounts of time to discuss and share can enhance the experience.

I am still going to write up my intentions in a retreat plan, otherwise the weekend may disintegrate into mundane tasks. I am keeping with the theme of awakening, which resounds with me in both creative and spiritual ways.

Suddenly Awake

a three-day studio retreat

Intention

I have been given the gift of three days, and my studio is filled with works-in-progress and some new opportunities. In this retreat, I will leap, unprepared, into new techniques, and use them to complement my works-in-progress. I am suddenly awake to all the possibilities and eager to explore new things. I see my works-in-progress as living, changing projects and give myself permission to bring my new experiences to them.

Day 1-Indigo

  • Opening meditation
  • Explore an indigo vat–mix an indigo dye vat, and while the chemical reduction is taking place, collect yarn, fiber and fabric to be dyed. Try plant and animal fibers, and use wooden templates and rubber bands to make simple shibori patterns on fabric.
  • Weaving–continue to weave Dreaming Myself Awake and incorporate any Saori technique that reflects what is on my mind today.
  • Journaling
  • Evening meditation

Day 2-Spinning

  • Morning meditation
  • Spin samples of the fiber that was dyed on Day 1
  • Spin samples of fibers that used to be difficult to spin. How do they spin now?
  • Explore a new art yarn technique
  • Weaving–continue to weave Dreaming Myself Awake and incorporate any Saori technique that reflects what is on my mind today.
  • Journaling
  • Knitting and dinner with Stephanie at 6:30
  • Evening meditation

Day 3-Indigo

  • Morning meditation
  • Explore the possibilities of over-dying colored fabric, yarn and fiber.
  • Weaving–continue to weave Dreaming Myself Awake and incorporate any Saori technique that reflects what is on my mind today.
  • Fiber swap and (TBD) with Jo
  • Journaling
  • Closing meditation

See you in a few days–I’m on retreat!

Lightly woven

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I couldn’t end the day under the weight of just plain words. Instead, have a breeze. A zephyr. A bit of lightly woven fabric to float past your eyes, tickle your nose, and flow into your heart.

IMG_0634I am particularly tickled by the streamers of sari silk ribbon. It’s important for cloth to flutter like the tail of a kite. Like a banner in the wind.

 

You’ve seen what I am weaving, and now some thoughts on why

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This part of my life feels like a long and slow transition.  I know that in a couple of years, I am planning to move back to the country. I’m going to give up the job and and live a simpler, more contemplative life. I can see a few friends shaking their heads and wondering how. I already live a life that most people think is simple and contemplative, but I am in a location that is losing its appeal as each day goes by.  I am tired of roads clogged with cars and more tired of being surrounded by heedless people rushing so much to the next thing that they never experience the present moment.

Where I see the transition happening most is in the things I own, especially clothing and household goods. I don’t want to buy anything unless it will serve a dual purpose, for now and then, for here and there. I want to gradually use up all that no longer serves me, and not replace it with more of the same. I want to step out of this current way of living, leaving behind a pile of worn out black clothing, like the cocoon of some strange moth. I want to wear wrinkly linen dusters in spring and baggy woolen tunics in winter.

I do not want to arrive then and there, half naked and shivering. I need clothing for the journey and for the arrival, things that will be gently worn but not worn out.

I feel like I need to set out with a trunk filled with clothing and dish towels, cushion covers and blankets–all home made.  Much hand spun. LIke a bride setting out into her marriage, with her dowry chest. Only I will be a mature woman journeying into the rest of my life, with my trunk packed full of slow cloth.

This is the awakening that Dreaming Myself Awake represents.

I think I know why I am not just going to leave tomorrow. I still have many things to learn. It’s a well-kept secret that I don’t really know how to cook. I know how to heat up lots of things and make them taste original and exciting, but I only know how to make a few things from scratch. I make a wicked good pasta bake, but I don’t know how to make a tomato sauce that tastes like the one in the jar. I may find time to learn how to make slow food, but the weaving comes first.

I don’t know how to weave dish towels either, or how to select the right yarn for them. I am not sure I want to spin cotton or linen, but I need to understand the yarn and how it weaves.

Can I keep myself in hand-knit socks, or will they wear out before the next pairs are done?

Questions are good, because they lead to answers. Transitions are good, because I will arrive slowly and gently at where I want to be, step by mindful step.