Emily's the knitter, Clare's the spinner, and we both like cocktails!

Sunday 13 August 2006

Wondering

Somehow, listening to Brenda on the Craftsanity podcast a few days ago has left me feeling i want to make big changes in my life. I have a problem with procrastinating, which in part is my nature, but maybe (I now think) also because I'm not quite living the life I'd like to be. Lots of things are right - C for one, friends, house, where we live. BUT I'm not sure I want to be spending as much time at work as I do, and I know I want a different sort of day-to-day life.

I want to do some of the creative stuff I spend so much time thinking about. And live more straightforwardly - because I have a car, which I drive to work every day (I am a GP) I tend to have already set off in it before I have even thought of cycling. I used to cycle everywhere around Bristol as a teenager/ when I worked as an auxiliary nurse. And it's much hillier there! One of my colleagues recently had a semi-breakdown, and opted out of partnership for 3 months. He was able to pay his mortgage by locuming at the out of hours service. the appeal of that is not having things hanging over me - when finished, I'd be finished.

But all this - to do what? I want to explore more knitting, and I've found a couple of places I could do the City and Guilds maybe 7922. This course involves exploring inspiration, research, materials and techniques, presentation, specifically looking at colour, line, texture, shape, form. the two places I am thinking of are Distanceknitting, Fiona Morris's organisation. She does both a correspondence course, and also a course where you go to Lewes (near Brighton) for monthly Saturdays. The other organisation is WS touchbase, where Lorraine McClean teaches by correspondence, but there is the opportunity to attend monthly craft days with them in Dorchester (near where an aunt lives). Loraine' McClean's work appeals to me more, (that's a link to the Loose Threads textiles group of which she is a part). fiona Morris is harder to get by ggogling,as there seem to be 2 knitters of note with the same name in the UK. The one that teaches is the one who has designs in Knitting magazine, and I don't much like that, or find her designs appeal much to me (though they are interesting).

But who knows which would be the better teacher? Or if I have time for this at all - if I finish the essay (on mortality) that I should be doing right now for my MA in Med Humanities, then I'll be starting the dissertation in November, and I guess that's probably enough.

More cogitations to come, but have remembered essay....!

2 comments:

Piglottie said...

Best thing I ever did was to 'downsize' our life and give myself more time to do the things I actually want to do, rather than the things I felt I had to do. Plus teaching had left me sucked dry and frazzled! Its not as difficult or as scary as I first thought, and its not the unobtainable luxury some people think it is - you just need to re-evaluate priorities and the financial side of things. We live a much simpler, less materialistic life now but are so much happier. Life's too short! Good luck with whatever decision you make.

Alice said...

Yep, my OH quit his job in London, and with it, the 4 hrs of commuting each day, in order to start his own business. It's been hard. It's still hard but he couldn't have lived his life knowing he didn't give it a try. And it's working, slowly but surely. I echo what Piglottie says.

Which is more important to you? Which would make you happier and more fulfilled? You don't have to do anything you don't really, really want to. It's your choice and it sounds like you have excellent support, anyway!

But OMG - I didn't know about these knitting courses. I almost daren't look them up in case one of them looks ideal. Wow, learning an art-form properly, from a technical point of view. I'd love it. Aaaahhh! (loudly).