Rocky Mountain High

Tomorrow morning DH and I are getting on a plane with Baby L and heading to Denver!  This trip marks a lot of firsts:

1.  My first vacation during the summer ever in my entire working-adult life!  I have worked for the same company since 1992.  Until this year, my job was very spring and summer-intensive, forcing me to take all of my vacation time in the fall or winter every year.  Now I have a new position, and I plan to take as much of my vacation time as possible between now and the end of August.  First Denver, then Virginia in late July, then various trips to the beach in Maine and Connecticut.

2.  My first time packing for an airplane trip that includes a baby!  I traveled so much for work over the past decade and a half that I became very good at and in fact complacent about packing half-assed at the last possible minute.  I prided myself on this.  This time it’s a whole new ballgame.  I have lists.  I have piles.  I have back-up lists and back-up piles.  I have 3 suitcases lined up and ready to be filled.  I have the third load of laundry of the day so far in the dryer.  Phew.

3.  My first time flying with a baby!  This worries me not.  If all of Baby L’s other life experiences so far in her short 10 months on the planet are a good predictor of what’s to come, she’ll be a happy, cheerful kid on the plane.  If not…  oh, well.  I’ve had my fair share of long flights next to or near an unhappy, unpleasant baby, and I figure the universe owes me some payback, in the unlikely event of my daughter having a meltdown.

Now, I am under no illusions that I will be able to get any knitting or reading done on the plane, even if Baby L is a dream-come-true.  But, just in case, I am bringing something to knit:

And something to read:

Although, more likely I’ll be reading this instead, over and over again:

 

Happy 4th of July!

 

 

Well, it’s about time…

Took me awhile to get up-to-speed with the rest of you bloggy people, but here I am.  So, what’s it all about?  Well, as most of you know, I’m *ahem* quite fond of yarn.  What most of you might NOT know is that I used to be equally, if not more, obsessed with books.  When I discovered knitting, my reading life suffered a bit, as is to be expected when one finds a new addictive hobby.  Can’t do both at once, unfortunately.  Then, two more things interfered with my book-aholism:  First, pregnancy turned my brain a little mushy and made me incapable of staying awake long enough to finish a page.  Second, new motherhood made my brain even more mushy and even more incapable of staying awake to read.  Lately, though, something’s been happening.  I find that my bedside table is once again supporting a dangerous tower of books.  I find myself daydreaming about the book I’m reading even when I’m not reading it.  I find myself choosing to read over knitting sometimes.  In short, books are back, baby!

So, who knows what I’ll end up writing about here.  Certainly there’ll be knitting, but I’d also like to offer up some thoughts on books and poetry from time to time.  And to kick things off, let me tell you what happened last night, as an illustration of one of the many reasons why I love to read:

I’ve been reading David Sedaris’ newest book of essays, When You Are Engulfed in Flames.  He’s been one of my favorite authors for years.  He’s hilarious and witty and bitingly on-target with his observations of life and people.  One of the essays tells about an elderly man’s battle against some mice that had infested his home.  He fumigated, the mice fled the house and took up shelter in a pile of leaves, the man quickly lit the pile of leaves on fire to incinerate the mice (and the leaves)… and one mouse, aflame, ran blazing from the leaf pile directly back into the house, burning it to the ground. 

Now, the essay is about a lot of other things (as David Sedaris’ essays always are), but this immediately reminded me of a poem by one of my favorite poets, Billy Collins, called “The Country.”  Which is also about a mouse committing arson, this time by dragging a strike-anywhere match along a wooden beam.  (Neither of these sounds very amusing, I realize, but I urge you to read them both and you’ll see…  I can’t post them here without violating copyrights.)  Anyway, so I started thinking, “Of course David Sedaris must love Billy Collin’s poetry – they have the same sense of humor!”

So as soon as I finished the Sedaris essay, I went and dug out my Billy Collins books and read poetry for the rest of the evening.  David Sedaris made me go find Billy Collins.  And that is one reason why I love books.