Topsy

The photo is a scanning electron microscope image of a single silk filament.  It is finer than a hair and deceptively strong.

Our world, our society is made up of strands of connections in so many ways.  None of us is singular.  We all interact with others, sometimes forming close bonds with them, sometimes lives becoming twined with another.  As the silk filaments are grouped together, they grow first into a yarn, then several of these yarns may be twisted into something larger - and even stronger - than just itself, all on it's own.

Well, my project has done much the same thing.

It started with an idea.  An idea that grew and expanded, originally from fewer than 100 pages to now?  Potentially over 200.  It has grown with the input and energy of others.  First my alpha readers who gave me crucial feedback.  And I continued to add information as I thought of other things that really needed to be between the covers of one book.

Much of what I know I have learned by trying things.  Sometimes I failed.  And rather spectacularly at that.  But each failure was just another step on the journey of learning.

I always thought of Edison who, when asked how it felt to fail to find a filament for the light bulb more than 600 times responded that he had not failed!  He had found 600 plus ways of NOT making a light bulb filament!

Today I worked on the bibliography.  Ms Editor has already begun pulling book titles out of the manuscript but that was just the tip of the iceberg.  So today I rummaged through my library and tried to format the information in a way that would cause the least amount of work for her.  I'm not sure I entirely understood her directions, but I worked on it for nearly 90 minutes and ended up with another page - more with the actual font that will be used.

So the book grew by at least another two pages, just today.

And that didn't include any magazine articles, DVD's or other media.  Which I am still thinking about and may - or may not - include.

However, when I talk about the input others have had into this project?  I must also acknowledge all the people I have learned from.  All the class instructors, the authors, the workshop/seminar leaders, the people who exhibited their textiles at conferences and who talked with me over meals.  My friends who contributed projects for illustration and inspiration.

All of those people are also a part of this project.

Learning a craft is seldom done without some sort of input from others.  And with their contribution to my foundation of knowledge, this publication is growing.  Just like Topsy.