Voting for Hope

Change is never easy, especially when that change is something that comes from outside of yourself, so to speak.

I found myself musing to a friend on what is to come in my life.  As best I can tell, of course, because the future isn't here yet.

We are half way through July of this year, and I am about 7 months away from a massive change in my life - shutting down my business.

It was not a change I was prepared to make but outside 'forces' have managed to convince me that it is time.  Beyond time, really.  I just wasn't emotionally prepared for it.

Shutting down a business is not a small task.  There are things that have to happen.  Contracts to fulfill.  Obligations to others to honour.

When it comes to the business - so much in the way of details.  Things that have to happen to make it official.  Every one of which is done reluctantly.  Because emotionally I was not, am not, ready to do it.

However I am working on acceptance.  I am 'here', now.  This is what I can - or cannot - do.  Things may change.  I might change my mind as to what I can manage.  Or cannot.

Next year is a big 0 type birthday coming up.  I had hoped to teach until I was 75 - and I still hope to be able to do that for Olds.  But every year is a new assessment of where I am, what I can - and cannot - do.

As the AVL comes apart I repeatedly ask myself why I am buying a new loom.  Especially a rather expensive one.  As I set my thoughts down to share with my friend I shared the fact that buying the loom is a vote for the future, a vote for hope.  I  made the decision to buy the loom before I decided to shut down the business and I did think about cancelling the order.  Except that I am not 'done' weaving.  Yet.  I still have ideas I want to bring into material form (pun alert - well intended).  I can still educate through the written word and one of the ways to do that is to explore further.  Follow rabbit holes I had to turn away from before I'd rummaged in them completely. 

I still love weaving - all of it, from planning the cloth, dressing the loom, throwing the shuttle, watching the web transform during wet finishing.

No, I won't have the big industrial steam press after this year, but I do still have the small flat bed press that we used for easily 20 years before acquiring the big press.

Not doing craft fairs anymore means that I won't need to weave to the production levels needed to stock a booth, but that doesn't mean that I won't want to make useful things, either for gifts, or donations.  I can still sell through the guild booth or on consignment, which will hopefully bring in a little money to pay for materials, if needed.  Or trips to conferences, should I desire to go to one.  Or take a workshop!  Yes, I still learn!  I still get inspired by others and the paths they are following. 

It was brilliant to be able to take a workshop with Bonnie Inouye a few years back.  I came home all inspired and then couldn't do anything with that dip into the material she presented because Life Happened.

I have the booklet she handed out as part of her workshop and I still would love to investigate those techniques further.  With the Megado, I can do that.  With the four shaft Fanny?  Not so much.

As I deal with muscle pain and the prospect of potentially more to come with the next cancer drug, the Megado will allow me to keep weaving because it doesn't require so much physical effort. 

The thing I am dealing with right now, mostly, is how long it is taking me to 'bounce back' from the latest round of physical challenges.  Previously I have been able to slowly but surely regain nearly all I had lost - through the adverse drug effects, the broken ankle, the chemo, the bypass surgery.  But this time?  It's been almost six months since I stopped taking the cancer drug, and I'm still dealing with muscle pain.  Granted it is about half of what it was when I stopped taking the drug, but it just keeps on and on.  Knowing that it could begin all over again with the next drug?  Dismaying, to say the least.

So even though the decision to shut the business wasn't what I was emotionally ready to do?  I look ahead, not knowing what will happen in 7 months, just knowing that it is the right decision.  It is the correct decision. 

And buying the loom is my straw of  hope that I will persist.