Rayon and Rockets
At my house, the only time of year more stressful than Back-To-School in the fall is School-Letting-Out in the spring. My Teacher husband and my Student children pretty much cease to function in any meaningful way, and we are so awash in school-related commitments that we meet ourselves coming and going.
How appropriate, then, that while our heads are barely above water socially, the weather here is in full Monsoon, to match. I know I will be complaining and missing the cool rain when it's miserable in August, but I could do with a bit of brightness at the moment, to cheer me up.
Forecast for Fairview: Wet, Wetter, Wettest. Primordial rain forest. Blah Blah Blah.
I resolve to make my own sunshine:
Ain't it sparkly? It's so slinky and sexy - Absolutely screams "Take Me Out To Dinner!" I hear and obey.
The day I bought this skein, another lady bought the same yarn in a different colorway. We helped each other pick, and laughed about who should get which color. They had only one skein in each. Because I was traveling, I knew I wouldn't be using mine any time soon and decided to wait till I got home to wind it. Oh Ye Merciful Yarn Gods, Thou art, occasionally, good to me!
The other lady elected to have her skein wound by the two gentlemen working at the store. Why two? Because by the time all of her 550 slippery, sparkly, rayon yards had backlashed and slipped down around the bases of both swift and winder, that's how many people it took to untangle the mess. I chatted and knitted, there in the store, for about two hours, watching the horrible process out of the corner of my eye. Then I heard there was a shoe sale across the street and had to leave on an emergency recon mission (and lo, there were cute clogs).
When I got back an hour later, the would-be winders were still at it, while that poor lady was stranded there waiting to reclaim her yarn. Here's the best part: Another customer in the shop mentioned to me that the woman who so patiently was waiting for the guys to hand over her yarn is an actual rocket scientist. That's right. She could not only legitimately verify that ball-winding is not rocket science; She probably had worked out about fifty ways to solve the problem while she waited. But she never said a word, or tried to hurry them up. Just patiently waited, without any signs of the stress and/or agony I was showing. And it wasn't even my yarn. This lady was an island of calm, while I developed an eye twitch.
The winding was still in process when I left the store, fully four hours after the debacle began. I will remember my friend the rocket scientist for as long as I live when I think about patience. I should get some of that. And Soon.
Today I'm going to attempt to wind my own 550 yards of slippery gorgeousness, using only two hands and my own swift and winder. I'm pretty scared. O benevolent Yarn Gods, bestow your favor upon this skein and let it tangle not! I have neither the patience, nor the mental fortitude of a rocket scientist. If things go sideways, I don't really like my chances.