Posts Tagged ‘woodstove’
creating my niche
create: 1: to bring into existence;
2a: to invest with a new form, office or rank;
2b: to produce or bring about by a course of action or behavior;
3: cause or occasion;
4a: to produce through imaginative skill;
4b: design.
– Webster’s Dictionary
I am very interested in creative endeavors and I like being creative. I am happiest when I am writing, painting, drawing, sewing, weaving, knitting, and so on.
Although I best like to write, I find creative activities substitute for one another. For example, when I am not writing for an extended period of time, I am often embedded in some other activity, such as painting.
Weaving exemplifies the lure of my various creative undertakings. The producing requires knowledge and skill, and builds confidence. The process is enjoyable and time is made available for thought and concentration. The threads and fabrics are luxurious to the touch and the colors are bright and joyful. When I am finished a project, I am so proud of the resulting textile, I want to show the world.
My loom is a simple floor loom, 24 inch wide. I bought it at a country auction, about 20 years ago. My sister and I were among the stragglers at the auction, trying to outlast a heavy rain. In the corner we saw a bundle of varnished wood and some metal parts. “I think that’s a loom”, whispered my savvy sister. When the item came up for auction, there were few bidders remaining, and no one know just what ‘it’ was. At $25, it was a huge bargain.
My loom and I have not been steady company. It takes forever to install the warp threads, and sometimes weaving is hard on my back. But the fabrics we make together, my loom and I, are beautiful and comfortable and good for the soul.
What creative endeavors shape your niche space? What materials do you use and what do you love about them?
~
~
yellow line
~
the road is fabric
weave of asphalt
ditch and yellow line
warp of guard rail
fence and heddle
~
trees in plantations
lines on the hayfield
shadows on road
hip and curve of the earth
weft as she turns in her sleep
~
shuttle piloted
through landscape
and watershed
textile in folds
texture the yearn of the loom
~
faults in the granite
potholes in pavement
rifts in the fabric
where weavers might falter
revisit work of earlier times
~
learning the lesson
taught by the loom
~
choose your weft wisely
balance color and texture
maintain your tension
fix mistakes as you go
~
rest when your back hurts
~
listen
to the whisper
of weave
of yellow line
~
~
All my best,
staying at home, staying safe,
Jane Tims
the yellow line
my ideal niche
I have a picture of the late Tasha Tudor, the children’s author and illustrator, standing in her hermit’s weeds, clutching an armload of branches for the woodstove. Her lined face and straightforward relationship with nature exactly describe my wished-for niche.
I imagine myself as living with the land, growing all my own vegetables, foraging for food I cannot grow, living off the ‘grid’ with solar panels and wood fires, pumping my water from a dug well, patching my roof with pitch from the spruce trees… you are getting the picture. I do few of these things. My garden is pitiful, no sensible fish would attach to my line, and I have to keep a few litres of water in containers in case my electricity-dependant water pump succumbs to a power outage.
The niche I actually occupy is satisfactory when measured by many standards. It falls short of my ideal, but I am not willing to sacrifice. Even in the simple matter of the woodstove, I have only achieved partial success. We have pleasant fires in the autumn when the days are getting cold. But in winter, I rely on electricity to keep me warm.
wood gathered for winter
If my ideal niche is not possible, I do find joy in the bits I have achieved. I think of my successful row of beans, my healthy crop of mint, my knitting of socks in winter, and my walks in the grey woods, as a ‘close approximation’ of my ideal. I admit that I would like to leave my cosy electricity-dependant niche, and acknowledgement frees me to stay.
'Odd Socks' ... I knit them all winter...
I accept the truth … the ideal niche is a difficult goal. It takes determination and stamina to achieve.
a close approximation
~
Dolbear’s Law states: the number of chirps a cricket makes in fifteen seconds, plus forty, is a close approximation of the temperature on a summer night
~
warm September evening
I sit on the stoop consider
the timid wind chime the silent screen door
the unmetered patter of rain
~
soothing after a month of dry
~
the rain picks a song
over stones on the river
dolce vivace
dolce
vivace
~
where does my mantra take me?
~
away, to the songs of a summer night
at the back door on the concrete step
where crickets sing from cracks in the sidewalk
~
strung together patio lanterns
notes from a Spanish guitar
the insect refrain
~
behind me light from the kitchen
potatoes at boil the voice of my sister
the tap of her shoe
~
beside me the metal rail rings at my touch
cool on a night so hot and so dry
the pavement cracks
~
out in the yard the insect chorus
~
dolce
vivace
~
molto vivace
~
chirps
too quick
to count
~
Published as: ‘threshold’, Spring 1997, Pottersfield Portfolio 17 (3)
(revised)
© Jane Tims
'summer night at the back door'
