(no subject)

[oyceter]

It is so fun just paging through all the unfulfilled Yuletide requests from last year. Fic ideas galore! And I don't even write fic, although the list sorely tempts me. Plus, it's just fun seeing what goes through people's minds.

I had my first good non-stressful day in three weeks. Murphy still seems to be having lots and lots of fun wreaking totaly havoc on my life, but that's ok. I get to see rachelmanija on Friday and masqthephlsphr and mamculuna Thurs! Joy! I had to keep reminding myself to just sing along with my mix CDs in the car and not to watch the clock and get irritated by traffic. Plus, Vienna Teng's "Shasta" was playing, and it's one of my favorite driving songs, and I sang very loudly and out of tune and cared not at all. My windshield bounces my voice back to me and makes me sound very good. Well, to me at least. I try not to inflict it on too many passengers ;).

Also, I spent a good two hours at my bi-weekly knitting circle (I have two knitting circles, that's how big of a yarn geek I am) and came out blissfully relaxed from conversation and just the happiness of a straight two hours knitting and crocheting. And I was thinking during the drive home how wonderful it was to have yarn through my fingers and to make it into things and the sheer joy of having things come together because of something my fingers were doing. I always think back to Orson Scott Card's Alvin Maker series; in the first book, Alvin mentions something about the magic of making things keeping the Unmaker at bay, even if it's little grass baskets, even if everything will eventually be unmade. I doubt I'm doing anything half so noble or grand, but there's something very firmly satisfying about knowing that I am making. Doesn't quite matter what, or how well, just that I am.

On another note, it is very much fall now. I don't quite know what happened in the past two days, but there's a definite bite to the air that wasn't there a week before; everything smells like fall. And my fingers are getting stiff just sitting here and typing this, which means I need to knit myself fingerless gloves ^_^. I wore boots to work for the past two days, and my leather jacket! Fall indeed.

And I'm wearing dress pants again, instead of cute skirts and bitty mules and/or flip-flops. It's funny -- I only really noticed how different my boots made me feel today, when I was striding with determination down the hallway, taking huge steps. When I'm in mules, I sort of walk more femininely (is that even a word?); I can hear them click and slap against my feet, and when I'm in skirts, I can feel them sway around my legs. I love that. And flip-flops make me sort of flap about with big duck feet. Boots apparently make me determined. It's fun!

I know people mock California for not having real seasons, but it does! Well, at least it does at my company campus -- I've already spotted three trees which are in that awkward stage of molting, half green, half red, probably waiting desperately for the day they'll burst metaphorically into flame and stun everyone. And the trees around the cafeteria will soon be turning brilliantly red as well, and the gingkos in the park right across the street by the library will soon be turning bright gold.

Last year I remember one day in which the falling leaves, coin yellow and fan shaped, made a beautiful circle around the tree, borders slowly fading into the green grass. I tried taking a picture with my phone cam, but it couldn't capture the brightness and the contrast. I did what any sensible person would do and shuffled my feet through it, and back again, and then several times around, then kicked up leaves every chance I got just to hear the crinkles and to see them float back down in flurries.

I am very sensible, really.

Comments

[cychi.livejournal.com]

I think you are more sensible than most =). Those less sensible will never get to play with leaves!

[londonkds.livejournal.com]

One of my pure personal squicks is the feeling of something flapping round my heel. I can't bear wearing shoes that aren't attached there, even just to potter round the house.

[minnow1212.livejournal.com]

Yay knitting :)

[mamculuna.livejournal.com]

Is rachelmanija in the Bay Area these days?

To me, the great seasonal change in California is the wet/dry cycle, which is just as dramatic as the cold/warm one, in a different way. This is my favorite time of year here, just before the rain, but I love late winter and early spring, too, when everything is so lush and green.

[masqthephlsphr.livejournal.com]

The only people who mock California for not having seasons are people who care about seasons. 3/4ths of the world do not have the seasons these people think are the natural order of things.

[rachelmanija.livejournal.com]

I'm visiting this weekend, and then for almost a week in the last week of October-- first a non-public event, and then a signing in Mountain View and Yaoi-Con.

[mamculuna.livejournal.com]

I'm in Berkeley until Sunday night--I'll talk with Joyce/Oyeceter tomorrow and see where you're appearing in Mountain View. Fear my commitments to the folks I'm visiting make make it not possible, sigh--but will give it a good try.

[mamculuna.livejournal.com]

I'm in Berkeley until Sunday night--I'll talk with Joyce/Oyeceter tomorrow and see where you're appearing in Mountain View. Fear my commitments to the folks I'm visiting make make it not possible, sigh--but will give it a good try.

[wisewoman.livejournal.com]

One of my favorite quotes:

"The Mother has but one law; 'Create; make as I do make.' Obedience in this law is the deepest obedience and the worthiest worship of Her. Make, transform one substance into another, press form into chaos, mold material into spiritual reality--fashion potential into actual, change one form of energy into another, transmute blood into milk, clay into vessel, feeling into movement, wind into song, egg into child, fiber into cloth, stone into crystal, memory into image, body into worship."
Meinrad Craighead
transformative artist,
former Catholic nun

;o)

[rachelmanija.livejournal.com]

No, sorry, I meant that I have a non-public event this weekend, and then will return to SF for a week at the end of October for the Mountain View signing on October 25, followed by Yaoi-Con. This weekend is going to be pretty tight, I'm afraid, but if you'll be around the Bay Area next weekend it would be a better time to meet up.

[mamculuna.livejournal.com]

Too bad. I won't be here then--headed back to SC. Oh, well--maybe some other time. Hope all goes well. Can't wait to read it--see my post.