This is it: it is now late in the evening, I have a huge pot of soup cooking on the stove waiting for me to sample it, and there are fireworks (already) going off outside in my neighborhood. 2020 is finally drawing to a close. This has been a pretty difficult year, to say the least, for me and almost everyone that I know. You all know the highlights: pandemic, civil unrest, economic uncertainty, political craziness, and looming threats on the horizon. For me it was also a year of struggle with systemic sclerosis and the loss of a beloved pet. Unbelievably, I had resolved to make weekly posts to my blog to chronicle this year that can only be considered historic at this point. I still have to read all of the year’s posts again to select highlights, but to be frank once I start to list them all it’s going to be a little overwhelming. Let’s just ignore all the icky things that have gone on in 2020 and focus on closing down the year.
Faced with just a few days left in the 2020 I decided to polish off a couple of unfinished projects and books. I pulled out the knitting project bags and discovered a pair of unfinished fingertipless gloves… totally doable, I told myself.
One finished mitt was in the bag with the start of the second mitt, but since I had been making the pattern up as I went along it was a little bit of a challenge to find my way. Eventually, by counting rows and hunting for some notes that I put into a journal I managed to finish up the second mitt on Tuesday. Pretty snazzy, huh?! I’ve been wearing the mitts in bed while reading in the evenings and they are just the perfect things to keep my hands warm while sipping herbal tea and flipping pages. My Ravelry project notes are here.
I also took the last few days of the year to finish up a couple of books that I started months ago.
You know, I couldn’t have chosen better books to end of the year if I had tried. This is a year where many of us have had to reevaluate our choices and priorities. I don’t know about you, but I have thrown away so much stuff that I didn’t need any more, made changes to my home that made it more comfortable and user friendly, and returned to cooking from scratch like I used to decades ago. I am making do with the things that I already have, and am developing new coping strategies. It’s been a stretch at times, and some of the changes that I had to make this year took some time, but I got there.
Now, imagine that the world as you knew it fell out from under you and you are forced to run for your life with your 8 year old son in a matter of moments. Your family is gone, your resources are few, and you don’t really know how to do it, but you need to flee to a foreign nation to seek refuge: your picture is being broadcast through social media and there is a bounty on your life. You are now caught up in a migration north with other desperate refugees stalked by ruthless predators and constant threats, but also helped by kind people who reach out to you and your son on the journey. At the end, in order to reach safety, you place yourself and your son in the hands of a coyote to take you across the border with a small group of other travelers; not everyone will survive the journey, but if you do you have a chance for a simple life of decency and safety. That pretty much is the plot of American Dirt. All of a sudden, the horribleness of 2020 didn’t seem all that bad when faced with a situation such as this. This book was very well written and I am so glad that I read it now.
The Glass Hotel is another book that had languished on my Kindle for months, but now that I’ve read it I feel like it is a treasure. It is kind of a quirky book, with a cast of characters who are interconnected in ways that aren’t obvious at first, with a plot that bounces back and forth in time as the events and connections are woven to create the fabric of the story. It is a book about a Ponzi scheme, ghosts, an isolated hotel in the Pacific northwest, choices, opportunities, consequences, and what is important in life. This is a book that I’m going to be thinking about for a long time, and one that I’m so glad I read this week at the end of a very, very crazy year.
So that is that. There’s only an hour left in the year, and the soup is smelling really good. I have one, and only one knitting WIP to carry forward into the new year, and it is a really cheerful one. Behold, the Secret Life of Cats (and dogz) by Sharon from Security (Casapinka).
These are the wildest colors that I have every knitted together, but this is a knitting adventure and a really fun way to end the year. Hannah has been hanging out with me all evening as I’ve been listening to The Glass Hotel and knitting away and we’re making a lot of progress. I have to laugh to myself about the yarns I selected: Dream in Color, Teenybutton Studio, Chasing Rabbits, and Hedgehog Fibres. Yep. I definitely did dream in color when I put this combo together, and what is up with the fox, rabbits, and hedgehog? This is the Secret Life of Cats (and dogz), but somehow all of those other animals snuck in too. It is hard to not be cheerful facing the new year when working with all of this fun! My Ravelry notes are here.
Let me close out the year with this picture of my favorite African violet from the indoor garden. Look at this little guy, covered with new blooms and promise for a great new year.
Happy New Year, everyone!!
Please stay safe.
Read a little, knit a little, and garden like your heart can’t live without it.
And wear your mask!!
Yarn, Books & Roses 