Portrait in Linen

Now that I’m initiated, focus is on the first serious project–a yellow blankie for Sister’s apartment-warming gift.

Poor girl has bungeed from absolute rock bottom to very-near-okay in 24 hours. Midnight emergency room visit (dragged kicking and screaming) in suicidal stupor, and a day later, a new car, new apartment, and new independence, which will hopefully be a thrust toward health. A blankie is the very least she needs right now, but it is an item of comfort, a token of love, a little keepsake to remember a fragile-but-God-wrought turning point…and in her favorite color.

• circular needles - 15
• 3 skeins Lion Homespun “Lemonade” (388)
• basic garter stitch

Certain I’ll need more yarn; the blankie is turning out to be much longer than I anticipated.  I didn’t want it to be too small, so I think I overcompensated and made it too long.  It’s okay, though.  Large is good, too.

Still don’t have any understanding of the world of yarn yet, and how that world relates to the world of needles.  But I’ll learn by doing.  Each project will introduce a new aspect I hadn’t thought of, and the guidebooks do well to tell me exactly what gauge yarn, what size needles I need to use.

Reminds me of teaching myself portraiture.  “Invented” tools to solve problems that came up along the way, then later discovered there were tools for those purposes already on the market.  For instance, I used to use twisted up pieces of tissue paper for smudging and blending, then discovered tortillions.

With knitting, I got to a stopping point and thought, “Hmm, it would be so great if I had some little ball of something to stick on the ends of the needles so my stitches won’t slip off.”  I see this problem is solved.

Have no use for “gauges” or “stitch counters” or those more “advanced” things yet.  Of course, I want to try something a little more challenging after the blankie is done, but I’m not sure what yet.

I knit with a giggle in my spirit.  Sister asked what I was making, and I said, “I don’t know.”  She commented on the color and said she’d love to have whatever it turns out to be, simply because it’s yellow.  She may in truth know what I’m doing, but she’s very gracious and feigns ignorance.

Whether or not she knows, both of us will be so tickled when it’s done and given and received.  I can’t always be there to hug her and love her and comfort her when she’s hurting, but the blankie can be.

Results of Knifty Knitter frenzy one week ago…

Plain, unadorned beanies (no brim) for each and every kid. In addition, knitted two more hats–one for sister, one for cousin–with brims. Seven hats in three days. Still, “loom knitting” didn’t feel as “serious” as “real knitting.”

A week later…

I can proudly proclaim that I now know how to knit.

It was desperation that drove me to Barnes & Noble for a late-night purchase–A Stitch of One’s Own–not because a flip-through revealed it was especially idiot-friendly, but because needles and yarn were included, and Hobby Lobby was closed. It was an epitomical act of impulse, but it was worth it, because I can now “knit” and “purl.”

I have “knitted” and “purled” about twelve inches of clumsy, elementary practice stitches, riddled with holes, uneven lines, and loose loops. But the weave holds, and the product is indeed recognizable “fabric.”

It is a momentous occasion. Oddly (and laughably), I enjoy a silly new sense of pride and worthiness, feel a little closer to the iconic “warm, lovely Mother figure” that seems to grace the mantel of my mind, the image of “success” that is both a dream and a lie, because it is Perfection, which is non-existent, and vain in the shadow of a woman’s true value.

It doesn’t take much reflection to dismiss the illusion that I am somehow closer to “good” because I can knit. Once reset in a right mind, I consider the blessing of this newfound knowledge.

The possibilities are endless. I envision all the warm wool socks I’ll make for winter; the rich, comfy throw that will be so loved and worn over the years as it lies over my lap and through project and project; the holiday shawls that will drape the girls’ shoulders in family portraits. Little pieces of love put to everyday use.

There is something so soft and humble about knitting. It brings to mind love and sacrifice, of time and of mind. This is why you wear an ugly old knit sweater your mother gave you–because you know the extraordinary power of love that comes in the wearing.

Is this what is knitting? Being empowered with another way to express a deep, outflowing love? Is this why it feels so right to a Mother? a Grandmother? Because it’s another way to give?

“Communicate or Disintegrate.”  God’s timing is perfect.  I listened to Adrian Roger’s message this morning, and I’ll listen to it again tomorrow morning.  I not only need to hear it more than once–I need to hear it continually.

I have all day to pray about this before he gets home.  I’m not expecting a miraculous change, but I can pray to be warm and affectionate, attentive, already expecting nothing in return–but not as thanklessness, but as a seed just planted.

It hurts my pride so much that this is so affecting.  I say, “I don’t care, I don’t care, I don’t care that he’s gone.”  But the honest truth is that I can hardly bear this.

What am I afraid of?

Afraid he’s getting attention from other females and enjoying it. I’m sure–almost 100% certain–that he gets that from somewhere.  And I resent it, because my attention is ineffective and meaningless.

And I resent it because he practically ignores me.  Which leads me to question my worth to him.

He says, “I don’t know what I’d do without you.”  But I know it’s not me he appreciates.  It’s simply the security of my presence.

He says it’s because I’m moody.  So often, I’m moody because I’m trying to cope with being ignored and neglected.

I don’t strive for perfection to his pleasure.  He seems to fail to notice any difference if I’m on top of the world or beneath it.  So I ask myself, “Why try?  Why pay any mind at all to whether or not he’s happy or satisfied?”

Because God would have me do it despite any discontent I may have.  Because love must conceive before it flourishes.  And it must conceive somewhere.  Is this for what a woman is purposed?  To birth love?

They say a wife must create a home in which her husband desires to dwell.  Where he finds respite, where he feels welcome.  This is so hard to do when I’m angry and bitter, tired of trying, weary of the absence of reward from him.  Thankless devotion.

I wrote him a heartfelt message for Valentine’s Day, and he didn’t even acknowledge it.  I wonder why I even wrote it.

And what to say of sex?  Except that I feel used.  Utterly.  Suspect he’s thinking of a dozen other things that have nothing to do with me.  Things he’s sought to “wet his eyes,” so to speak.  And then he can take it out–every single disgusting, unfaithful fantasy–on me.  He can hide my face, replace me with any image he chooses, and there I am to facilitate, like a blow-up doll.

I long for right things, good things.  I want so much for him to desire purity and sanctity for us–real authenticity.  But I’m afraid we have very different ideas of what authenticity is.

I believe he desires stability and normality.  A mean definition.  The comfortable common.

I desire a family broken and dedicated to God, blameless in commitment and surrender.  I think all of that is foolishness to him.

What do I pray for?  For me?  For him?  For us?  How do I invest my petitions?

I’ve been the fool–proud, resentful, condemning, weak, self-pitying.  I have not demonstrated strength or wisdom to any degree.  I’ve only revealed how petty I truly am.  I cannot expect selflessness to come from selfishness.

What does it mean to be truly broken?  To truly love as God intended?

I must first realize I am not a victim.  I am a failure at least to the degree that I accuse him to be.  I am all the more responsible for our unrest, because God’s granted me the knowledge of grace, forgiveness, and salvation, yet I flaunt it with vanity, pride, and judgment.

Should I pity him?  Would that not be disrespect?

I try to crawl into his mind, his loneliness, his losses, his isolation, his continuous struggle to find some self-respect, some peace.  But all I find there is pride, denial, deceit.  All ways in which he copes with his unhappiness.  And I know all too well I don’t have the power to melt it all away.

Does God wait for me to soften my heart?  To accept the pain?  To resign to the emptiness, accept it, and give everything I have to fill it with His light?

What does He have me to do?

It hurts, God.  It kills me to give in, to open myself up to rejection and utility.  It hurts, it injures my self-respect, denies me of my self-worth.  Can the awareness of my worth to You cover all that?  Can you give me enough strength and self-respect in You to bear me through?

“One more time….”  Do it, the right thing, and when I feel I just can’t go on, say, “I can do this one more time.”

It’s okay to cry to God.  It’s okay to run back to Him again and again and tell Him how much it hurts, how awful I feel, how angry I am, how used I feel I’ve become.

I should love him, appreciate him, provide for him, help him, anticipate his needs, serve him, because this is His will.  And if I spend a lifetime unloved, I will have served His purpose, because work in Him brings forth fruit.  God does not lie.

The light will be out in five minutes.  I must be reminded what love endures.

Shore sands shifting, shaving away grain faces, new glass plane.
New wind blows through, mist, spray, pained body, palm fronds.
New water, new waves, break, spread smooth drinking dunes.
Wash away weak, retreat, leave; white bleach fragments, shards.
Sea breathes deep, tumbling cry, drown low hollow moans.
And I–coward and curled.
Jagged rock tops are dry.

He’s gone for the night.  I’ve felt 60-below all day, ever since I woke up.  Like I’m at the bottom of the sea, weighed down by the Rock of Gibraltar.

Another painful contrast of gorgeous afternoon sun and a thick, foggy consciousness.  Levels took a swan dive overnight.

I’ve kept quiet most of the day.  Like keeping myself in “safety mode,” so there are no hair triggers.  It brings the rest of the house near the depths where I am, but at least it’s better than civil war.

I resent medication for chronic condition.  It’s a perpetual expense, an ever recurring inconvenience, for relatively infrequent dramatic episodes.     One either resigns to an unchanging, flat-line existence, or lives in constant apprehension for the next major dip.  Which is the lesser evil?

I wish I had a free pass for these kinds of days.  Turn in my card and then spend the day locked up in the bedroom so the rest of the family can carry on with normality, without the disruptive presence of the undead.

I’ll go to bed early tonight, with a sleep aid, and pray I wake up feeling the newness of tomorrow.  The kids deserve the full joy of the sunshine, and he deserves some authentic peace before the next long haul.

Gotta start somewhere, though I admit I vacillated between joy in the business/productivity, and embarrassment that I had to start at the very basic bottom instead of picking it up after just looking at it. (What kind of lesson am I teaching there, expecting to be good at something by default???)

We’ve had the Knifty Knitter kit since before Christmas, and I finally opened it yesterday. I tried