Satisfaction

The beginning of the end...this is the last of the painted warps for scarves and it is now officially 'done'.  Weaving, that is.

Thinking a lot about Life and whatnot.  In the 1960's the Rolling Stones famously sang You Can't Get No Satisfaction.  For a while I believed that.  If anyone had told me that whether or not I was happy was based on the choices I would make, I would likely have sneered.  Happiness wasn't a choice - either Life was Good and you were, or Life was Awful and you weren't.

Well several decades have passed since then and I now realize that whether or not one is happy is, in very large measure, down to choice.

Come March of next year it will be 40 years since I made the fateful decision to give up everything I had been doing and become a weaver.  I don't know why I knew that was a good choice but what I discovered was that - while I'm 'poor' financially - I was to become rich beyond my expectations in terms of satisfaction.  Indeed, in that most rare of coins - happiness.

Weaving came to me at the persistent efforts of the universe, who obviously knew better than I did what I needed.  What I discovered was that weaving wasn't just about taking threads and making cloth.  Or, not just.

Weaving satisfies the creative thinker, the planner, the control freak, the mechanic, the athlete/dancer, the teacher/mentor, the author.  I even discovered the joy of certain parts of mathematics, much to my never ending surprise!  Weaving satisfies the tactile, the visual, the imagination, the physical.

I discovered that my path in life up to that fateful moment had laid the foundation for me to leap into weaving with gusto.  I had even taken classes in high school that proved invaluable - Law 11, Office Practices, Typing.

With writing came a computer - eventually - and my typing skills stood me in good stead.  Bookkeeping?  I could set up my own ledger and double entry bookkeeping system so that I could track my own financial records.  I could make up class handouts.  Eventually even self-publish a book.  Several 'books'.

Being self-employed allowed me to set my own hours (way too many, usually!), take time off when I wanted to, accept commissions or refuse them based on my desire to do that - or not - or the state of my health.

At my age, many people have much bigger pension funds and way more material goods.  But I've had experiences that they have not, met people I would never have met in an 'ordinary' job.

If I were to be told that this is the end of life, I would be sad - mostly because I have so much yarn, so many more ideas I would like to bring into being.  But ultimately I have lived my life in such a way as to say that I have had a great deal of satisfaction.

Yes, there have been pot holes.  Yes, I have some regrets.  But it has been a full and active life.  And I am satisfied.  So there, Mick Jagger!