Serene scenes

A bit of news: I have knit one sock.

It's made with gooshy worsted yarn in beautiful rainbow shades of purple.

I want to wear this one sock all the time and everywhere but know it won't be satisfying until I've knit the second one. But I've done some preliminary tests, and boy does it feel nice.

In order to knit the second one, what I need is a free Friday night and a good station on Pandora. That's how this first one went down: no plans to go out all weekend and my Nick Drake station, plus a freshly rearranged living room to give me new views of this place where I live.

It was serene. I even had a recent delivery of produce and a well-stocked pantry to provide all the sustenance I needed.

Doesn't it make sense that when you hear music like this, you want to sit around and focus on the fundamentals?

Something happened to me in college where I always felt that if I didn't have plans on a Friday night, I better darn well make some. It wasn't always that way, though. In junior high and high school, I secretly loved having nothing to do on a Friday night. I went out with my friends, sure, but oftentimes a Friday night would find me in my room making mixtapes to play in my car, sticking glow-in-the-dark stars on my ceiling, reorganizing my desk, writing in my journal, paging through YM magazine (whatever happened to that teen mag?), making collages, talking on the phone and falling asleep on my floor while listening to my latest Columbia House selection. Maybe watching some Unsolved Mysteries and 20/20, and a little TGIF, too.

Friday nights.

Glorious nights.

And I remembered all that a couple weeks ago when I headed straight to the yarn store on Friday after work. I had this wonderful feeling of not having to do anything but knit a sock that evening, if that's what I wanted to do. Which was what I did. Or started to do, at least. It wasn't about being lazy or antisocial, but about doing only what struck my fancy and what felt just right. Kind of like that one time I ducked out of a gathering early to go home and make granola.

We need people and fellowship as much as we need quiet times and restoration.

Another thing I know: socks need partners. I'm working on it.