deadlines
I finished up one sweater and one hat for the Afghans for Afghans March 1 campaign:
Those plus a pair of socks, also for A4A, are my knitting olympics project. The Olympics are over on Sunday, but it occurred to me earlier this week that I have to send everything today at the very latest in order to make the deadline in San Francisco, where the knitted items for Afghanistan are being collected. So I shall be sending off one sweater and one hat, and slogging through the rest of the socks this weekend to save them for another campaign. I admit I'm losing steam, but I do want to finish.
I have been gorging on TV, watching the Olympics every night, and I have to admit I get sucked into the drama, the personal stories, the excitement of all the racing and competition. Figure skating in particular has got me thinking about what it means to work really hard and devote your life's work to something most people don't really understand or pay much attention to most of the time. As a musician, I get it - sort of. Obviously, I'm not out there competing for world fame and glory (I never had that kind of talent or inclination), but I know what it's like - albeit on a much smaller scale - to work for months on a single performance and either nail it or not, to be evaluated and picked apart, and sometimes congratulated.
It's been a rather frustrating week for me for reasons completely unrelated to knitting. I think I forgot how much time and work it takes to learn a difficult piece of music (or three) not only adequately, but well. I can do it because I have to, but it's not easy when my attention is constantly pulled between piano and kids and housework and making dinner every night. I am still knitting plenty, though, because I can't practice when the kids are asleep at night...so that's when I knit.
Those plus a pair of socks, also for A4A, are my knitting olympics project. The Olympics are over on Sunday, but it occurred to me earlier this week that I have to send everything today at the very latest in order to make the deadline in San Francisco, where the knitted items for Afghanistan are being collected. So I shall be sending off one sweater and one hat, and slogging through the rest of the socks this weekend to save them for another campaign. I admit I'm losing steam, but I do want to finish.
I have been gorging on TV, watching the Olympics every night, and I have to admit I get sucked into the drama, the personal stories, the excitement of all the racing and competition. Figure skating in particular has got me thinking about what it means to work really hard and devote your life's work to something most people don't really understand or pay much attention to most of the time. As a musician, I get it - sort of. Obviously, I'm not out there competing for world fame and glory (I never had that kind of talent or inclination), but I know what it's like - albeit on a much smaller scale - to work for months on a single performance and either nail it or not, to be evaluated and picked apart, and sometimes congratulated.
It's been a rather frustrating week for me for reasons completely unrelated to knitting. I think I forgot how much time and work it takes to learn a difficult piece of music (or three) not only adequately, but well. I can do it because I have to, but it's not easy when my attention is constantly pulled between piano and kids and housework and making dinner every night. I am still knitting plenty, though, because I can't practice when the kids are asleep at night...so that's when I knit.
Comments