Knitting for Espionage – Article

For my fellow yarn and needle folk who know what knitting is really about.

http://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/knitting-spies-wwi-wwii 

Autumn Moon

September and I’m editing the story – the book – the novel – the whatever – aka Butterfly Coffee. Third in to fourth round. A change of main character, of emphasis. It has been helpful to have others crit my work and me. Asking me why I am compelled to tell this story, what I can do to improve it and me.

It’s not been an easy process. I lost it once. Retrieved some of it. Some of it written by hand or printed. This turned out to be a blessing as it made me evolve the tale, it made me let go. and I do not let go easily, of anything.

I had a bit of a scare this week and was sent to hospital where I spent the day being shunted around on a wheel chair ( I could have walked!), monitored here and there, waiting for results. Eventually they let me away – they could let go – ruling out another escalating MI. The pain, they concluded, was muscular – not my heart, but other muscles. Asked if I had taken painkillers I replied no. So they stuffed some in my pocket and home I went – on the bus! I wondered if knitting could have done it. I certainly don’t do many strenuous weight-lifting style things any more. No more logs to stack!

It dawned on me as I sat in a corridor that my father died of his second heart attack on 24th September – six months after his first, the same hospital. Let’s not go there, hey. I went to visit his grave today – he’s looking pretty much okay, says all is fine. the aroma of Turkish coffee and Woodbines lingered, as always. I came across the artist Alexandra Dvornikova recently – this image reminds me of me and my father. He was definitely a bear, a very protective one.

http://reino.tumblr.com/post/147697826902

I like the transition from summer salads to autumn vegetables – red cabbage for coleslaws, a hearty green cabbage salad, nuts and apples, soups, casseroles, crumbles. I am in a purple mood – my knitting is all purples at the moment, I’m liking purple fruit and vegetables too!

From wildgreensandsardines.blogspot.com

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I’m also interested in playing a balalaika – giving it a shot – if I can. I’m learning Italian again, watching Samurai films, exploring Nordic patterns. Books – arriving in the post from far away places. The Slavic in me is a strong force, a flow I have to go with. My father knew what he was doing when he taught me so much before I went to school. It’s always left me straddling two worlds and having an interest in many places and cultures.  I have come to accept that’s how I am. Many not few.

There ends my weekend burbling. Why do I write here? I write everywhere. This is only one part of the story!

Balalaika come to me…

Holocaust Memorial Day

 

Seventy years.

Over the decades the stories and memories become deeper.

The first German lesson. Did anyone know any. Yes, I said:

Nichts rauchen

Nichts essen

Nichts wasser

How did I know?

They were in camps in the war.

We bend, but we do not break.

We live to sing and dance

We live with libraries in our souls.

You are as big on the inside as the universe is on the outside.

Make a library in your heart for everyone.

Work does not make free. It enslaves us. Love makes us free.

Expression makes us free. The wind makes us free.

Always and forever we will sing and dance.

Be humble for you are made of earth

Be noble for you are made of stars