Visiting Home

We went back to Maine again this week. Thing One has been given the chance to return and live with friends for senior year. While this means giving him up a year early, in a sense, it's also something I'm really glad to do. Thing One has always been there for his mom and sibs, always helped out, and it's good to be able to let him have this opportunity. And The Girl, I'm sure, was especially thrilled at his return.

So back we drove, with the temperature becoming cooler as we headed farther north and east. It was a bit odd to see the first hints of trees beginning change

when back on the plains it was still sticky and humid and most definitely clinging to late summer.

But even the slightly cooler temps did not stop us from having fun on the lake

or hooking up with lots of friends (each day culminating into three nights of grilling out, each with different sets of people, each getting larger as we went)

and it especially didn't stop us from visiting our beloved Korner Knitters,

where the awesome Darrin waits to help all and sundry.

(I also found the name of the cotton from which I made my Christmas stocking, but for which I'd lost the ball bands. It's Cascade Pima Tencel 030 Natural and 2493 Purple--Rav will now be updated.)

We found out right before we left Maine our house bid back in the Midwest had fallen through. The ex-wife had accepted the offer, but the ex-husband didn't. That was a bit of a bummer, but we tried to stay philosophical about it, even as we said goodbye to Thing One (very odd that; as he said, I don't think it really dawned on him that we would be half a country apart).

Despite all that, we said our final goodbye, then got on the rotary, took the proper road off it, and headed south.

It was then that the cell phone rang.

"---? It's D-- from ---College. Are you still in Maine?"

"Well, sort of. We're just leaving."

"I know this is short notice, but could you come interview? Tomorrow?"

It's a wonder I didn't drive off the road right then and there. This was a college I had applied to before, but one which kept reorganizing and canceling its positions (which you kind of begin to see as a sign, you know?). The last position, which dealt with providing support services to at-risk and learning disabled students, was right up my alley and I'd applied once again. D and I had talked several times, and she had shown interest in interviewing me, but hadn't returned my call before I went to Maine. I assumed this meant there wasn't a chance and hadn't bothered to bring my suit along. I pointed this out to her.

"Oh we don't care. Interview in your summer clothes; that's fine. We'll put you up in a hotel up here and get you some dinner. Do you need someone to watch the kids? It'll be a three-tier, two-hour interview, you know."

Somewhat dazed, I accepted the interview and we turned around and headed farther north into Maine, rather than south.

That night the kids played in the pool and I made phone calls back west, letting everyone know we would be behind schedule on our return and why.

The next day I went through round one and round two of the interview process trying hard to forget that I was in sandals, the comfy pants I wear kayaking on cool mornings, and one of the few nice tops I'd packed (slightly wrinkled). I also tried to piece together my brain enough to give semi-coherent answers; three nights of visiting with friends means not much sleep, you know?

By the time I got to the last interview, I was breathing an internal sigh of relief. One more battery of questions and then I should know in a couple of days how I did. Either way, I already had a job in the Midwest, so I was set.

This is what I got instead of questions.

"Look, we don't feel the need to beat around the bush or make you wait. We know you'll have decisions to make, so we just want to offer you the job."

Being my ever suave self, I replied, "Are you sure you don't want to ask me more questions first?"

They didn't. Instead, they said they would give me a couple of days to decide whether or not I wanted to be with them, rather than the other way around.

The kids and I left in daze. After months and moths of not being able to find anything, I suddenly had two jobs (well, a job and an offer) instead of none. That's a bit shocking, quite honestly.

Heading south, I decided there was only one thing to do. We stopped here.

The lady who owns this shop is on Rav as myarns (that link will only work if you are a Ravelry member, btw)

and we met in the stormy weather fanatics group. She had told me to come on by if ever I got the chance to interview at that college north of her.

So we went by. I fell instantly in love with the place. The store is everything a LYS should be, lots of great selection and many friendly people hanging out in rockers, knitting and talking. I chatted with them while I picked up a skein of beautiful, hand-dyed-in-Maine sock yarn, which will either be used in Leyburn or in Northern Lights. The color changes might be too quick for Northern Lights, though, so I may have to go back to Marnacook one day and get another skein by that same dyer, as she had several others with longer color runs.

The bright colors were a bit outside my norm ("Those are SO not jewel tones or solids mom! What happened to you?" was how Thing Two oh so kindly put it.) but they are beautiful and fun and I needed a bright pick me up to shock my senses out of their benumbed state. (Note: it's French Twist from French Hill Farm and I still love the colors, no matter how different they are from my norm.)

So, I have three or four days to decided. Do we stay in the metro area we were finally trying to make into a home, or do we go back to the adopted state we had called home for almost ten years?

Six months ago, there would have been no competition. Now, it's a harder call.

We're going to be doing a lot of talking about it all as we head back to the city.

Trading One Stick for Another

The retreat didn't make me homesick after all.

True, there are lots of trees, just like in Maine. But they are different trees (well, some of them, anyway). There are more birch than I was used to in southern Maine (though farther north in Maine there are some nice stands of them). More deciduous and less evergreen. More...something. I don't know how to describe it. The best I can say is that they shared the same sense of isolation, even if they did not give it to me in the same way.

There were two cabins at the retreat. One was the main house, the other this:

I stole the newly made window seat in the above bay window for my bed

so I could fall asleep watching the moonlight on the water. And when I woke up to see this:

I knew that I hadn't chosen wrongly in ignoring the bedrooms. I let the fog lift a little, since I hadn't paddled this lake before and didn't know what to expect. Then I slipped into the mist.

The lake was smallish and comfortable.

I didn't get close to the loons, but I saw this eagle when it was in flight. (Jean took the wonderful picture of it.)

Probably the freakiest thing was being able to paddle in this:

(Well, really, the night looked more like this

but either Jean or Deanne did something cool with the filter on the shot that one of them took, so I just had to add the blue night pic as well. In reality, it was as inky black as you see above.)

There is no way you would catch me paddling on a lake in Maine in the dark, no matter how good the moonlight (Oh all right, maybe I would paddle during full moon on a lake I knew well. Maybe.).

In Maine there are these things called boulders. In the lakes. Sometimes scraping the kayak bottom if you misjudge the depth of the water when looking down into it. So night-time kayaking in Maine (for people like me, anyway) is a no-no.

The other big difference in the lakes is the amount of vegetation. The bottom of Maine lakes look like this (unless there is milfoil present)

while here I found plants like this:

and this:

and this:

and even more in the still water over by the beaver dam.*

I have to say that I actually felt pretty content to have traded this stick

for this one.

(Besides, I got crochet time in while lazing on the end of the dock in the late afternoon sun, so all is well.)

*Note to anyone paddling late at night on a beaver-inhabited lake. The loud, crashing splash you may hear while paddling by yourself on the darkest part of the lake is not the entry of a crazed moose into the water, intent upon kayak attacking, nor is the belly flop of an inordinately large bear mistaking you for a floating snack. It's simply one fat beaver slapping his tail on the water.

Little twit about scared me to death, let me tell you.

City Sheep & General Rambles

I don't know where this particular breed of sheep hails from, as Thing 2 sent the pictures on to me, but I sooo want some!




(Methinks you can click to embiggen. If so, you definitely should.)



But hey, these are the only sheep I can see getting past the neighbors in the metro area without them complaining that loud, bleaty animals are keeping them up nights (though they'd be quieter than a dog AND would keep my grass trimmed). I mean, I'd be cutting my coat to fit the cloth, right? Right.


And right now I should be knitting up a storm for baby/toddler presents when we go back out to Maine at the end of the month. Cecelia's bunny has only a bit of a dress done, nothing else. Lief's BSJ yarn just arrived from Germany (and not at the address at which I am now residing so must touch base and try to get it--sigh) so I've not cast on so much as a stitch and end of the month is heading up to smack me in the face right quick. Basically, much to get done.


But what am I doing? Figuring out the layout of my new classroom (in my head, mind you), attempting to avoid throwing all the knitting to the wind completely and trying out my new Tunisian crochet hooks (just arrived after a long and harrowing trip, but that's another post), realizing that now that I'm back on a good connection I really have nothing interesting to post (Irony, irony; though if I started that baby blanket with the new hooks I could. Gah! Must. Resist. Temptation.) and counting down the days until teacher retreat, which happens to be on a lake away up north. That idea is making me and my kayak very, very happy.



I don't care if the kayak has nothing to do with lesson plans. It wants to go, so it's going. No one in their right minds will be up at 6:00 a.m. to lesson plan anyway (and if they are, then I'm going to seriously freak) so the kayak and I will be free to hit the water.

Everyone says farther north looks more like home (Maine). I wonder if that will be a relief to city-bound me or if it will make me homesick?

Oh, that's a question I really don't need to ponder. Someone tell me from where those sheep hail (knowing my luck, AT & T owns them) and meanwhile, I'm back to knitting a bunny skirt...