“Maybe that’s enlightenment enough: to know that there is no final resting place of the mind; no moment of smug clarity. Perhaps wisdom...is realizing how small I am, and unwise, and how far I have yet to go." - Anthony Bourdain
Phix's Curiosity: what sparks my interest
Watch this space to see what's sparked my interest this week. A random grab bag of delights!
I have more things in my world that I'm curious about, want to do, dig into, etc, than I have hours in the day to do... I started oyster mushrooms again, and they're doing their thing (MUSHROOMMUSHROOM!). I have fiber things that I will wait until later to address. I have various fun projects at work.
Medusa's Garden
When you need every one and everything around you to just stop.
Content Warning: suicide. If you don't want to read this section, skip to Ariadne's Yarn. <3 It's totally OK, I get it. But I'm still gonna write about it.
So. Kate Spade. Anthony Bourdain. Same week. I'm not much of a fashion plate, but I know that a lot of people really liked Kate and her stuff. It made me sad, for various reasons... And then there's Anthony. His death was a lot more difficult. Where Kate made me sad, Anthony's passing felt like a shock wave, and another one, and another one, opening up layers of previous losses. It was really hard.
It's a reminder to me that grief never actually really goes away. There's just a new normal, and that sense of normalcy can slip at any given moment. And it's ok. It's ok to be tender, it's ok to feel all the open spaces loved ones have left, it's ok to just let all the feels wash over and take a day or two days or three days or more, it's ok.
An early initial thought I had was that I'd start a business with bath bombs and bubble baths and other nice "self care" things. As it turned out, the more I thought and read about self care, the more it dawned on me that self care can only happen in a community that creates space for someone to *do* self care. Self care doesn't just happen. If you have no one to take care of the other stuff while you take a break, that means that adding self care into that routine is just one more thing on the list...
Anthony Bourdain traveled all over the world, and in his own backyard, and wherever he went, he seemed to make friends and have conversations, and created a comfortable sense of small world community. Sometimes you need the world to stop coming at you, and it's your community - if you can reach out to them for help - who can help hold it at bay while you do what you need to do to recover. To take a shower or bath, to sit and stare out the window with a cup of tea, to cross those errands that you need to do *for you* off your list, whatever it is that in your moment of need that you need to do. Your community can help you create your healing space.
The other thing I am reminded of - and I learned this the hard way through significant burnout a few years back - is... check on your strong friends, who are doing all the things, rocking their worlds, who seem to have their acts together, ducks in a row, and cats herded & all going the same direction. Everything can look amazing on the surface, but as I wandered the work halls way too late at night, making sure everything looked amazing, putting out fires for people, making sure everyone else was taken care of... I wasn't doing that great at all. I wouldn't have told you either. Because I was invested in maintaining the image of everything being amazing. But I'd have been relieved to have someone make time for lunch, or even just notice that I was carrying a lot of weight.
Reach out, check in, connect, get a great handbag, and eat good food with old and new friends.
And if you need it - National Suicide Prevention Hotline - Call 1-800-273-8255. Text HOME to 741741 in the US.
Ariadne's Yarn: playing with threads
What I'm up to with fiber and possibly how mythology and stories all tie together.
Y'all. Not only am I knitting a silk & baby camel scarf that is the softest thing in the entire world, yes, even softer than kittens, but my drum carder arrived in the mail today! EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE! I will probably not regret the drum carder. I *may* regret that I just bought five pounds of unwashed Black Welsh Mountain sheep wool. Time will tell... But... for $8/lb... When usually it's $2-3/ounce... well... what's a girl to do?
Mythic Librarian: the art of arranging a life
Thoughts on ontology and ways to organize a life.
“Travel changes you. As you move through this life and this world you change things slightly, you leave marks behind, however small. And in return, life - and travel - leaves marks on you. Most of the time, those marks - on your body or on your heart - are beautiful. Often, though, they hurt.”
- Anthony Bourdain.
With love, and structure, and organization, and curiosity - may Ariadne's ball of yarn guide you through the labyrinth safely until next time!