Early Summer Knits 2009

I've been decidedly not online - or even much in the house - lately.

A few weekends with my parents, my grandmother, biking and some playing in the community garden (I had fresh strawberries with lunch today!)

Actually lots of gardening - I learned to shape boxwood and privet hedge with my father, planted annuals and fought a good fight against their rhododendrons.

I also started a few summer knit projects - I can't begin to describe my love for the cotton cami I finished - I wear it almost every evening and want at least 20 more.

So... I stopped at French Creek Fiber Arts in Avon and picked up some delicious cotton yarn the color of French Lilac... only 3 skeins, but enough to make something delicate and lacy... so I flipped through my books and decided on a piece with a knitted bodice and sewn skirt. I chose white linen for the skirting, hoping it will rumple in a perfectly imperfect manner.

Unlike most knitted pieces, the pattern calls for interfacing on these to hold the shape and provide some modicum of modesty (and support, it seems). I still have to make the piece that these attach to, and then I get to play with the fabric.



For kicks, I decided to line them with pale blue satin.
Decadent, no?



Now that I've got a little something started for warm summer evenings, I needed a good sailing jumper... made of cheap acrylic (i.e. "of dinosaurs") from Stephanie Japel's basic raglan recipe - I actually swatched this and am making it to measure!

Coincidence

We got the Javelin on Sunday, delivered on its trailer (which was put on a trailer - how meta).
We cleaned it up with broom, power-washer, eco-friendly soap and gallons of elbow grease, making it look much better and showing that for 10 years in the elements, it has held up quite well.

At various times in the past 10 years that I've waited to work in this boat, I've asked around about this model and whether there are folks in the area who are familiar with it. I never got much of a response and, at one point, it was suggested I sell it and buy a model that people use at local yacht clubs.

Just this past year, a few coincidences came together to make this project seem positively Providencial...

• The doctor at the clinic next door is a member of the same board I belong to, and we work on the same community garden. At a board meeting he asked if I would be continuing in the garden this summer and I answered that I would, but that I planned to restore a sailboat with much of my free time.
• Not only does the doctor sail, but he sails the same model - and has since offered to copy the owner's manual (something I do not have).
• The best blog online outlining a sailboat restoration is one about a Javelin. An older model, but still essentially the same.
• I have long tried to find a friend who would be willing to let me use their garage for this project - and I found one - a friend who has not only offered his garage, but his tools and his efforts - making this exponentially easier.
  
• The blog - which is not necessarily local - lists the address of a Javelin "guru," and he happens to live 3.5 miles from where I am working on the boat.

I search online to find those people from across the nation and across the world who may have information and it turns out the one person who can help the most lives within biking distance of the one person who provided the place necessary to complete a project that's been on hold for over 10 years.

It simply strikes me as... almost too perfect.

But I'm at a place in my life where "too perfect" is a perfectly acceptable way to be.

Truly shared space

Given my attentiveness to the responsibility of sharing space, I love this article found by Bakaitis.com.

I had heard about the Shared Space philosophy on NPR in 2003 or 04 (I recall a long discussion about this concept with someone I really need to track down again) and loved the idea of no rules creating hyper-awareness.

It's sort of like the rules of water.
On the water, the right of way goes to the vessel that cannot change course as quickly.
Speedboats must yield to sailboats.
Jet skis to kayaks.
And EVERYBODY yields to freighters.

For the most part, not knowing what someone else is going to do (or even knowing if they are aware of the rules) makes you a hell of a lot more aware and careful. Add to that a lack of "lanes," since on open water there are infinite navigational options.

I think our reliance on lanes and lights creates a false since of safety... which means less attention is paid.

So yeah, make downtown Cleveland a Shared Space, I'm up for the experiment...

UPDATE: As an aside regarding safety and attentiveness, there was this great New Yorker essay about SUVs from 2004. It talked about the assumed safety that drivers feel due to the womb-like nature of the vehicles. One of the ideas it posed was to not worry about the small, fast two-seaters on the road, since due to their size and lack of height, they must be more attentive drivers than those in high, well-upholstered behemoths (Buick Braggadocio, anyone?). The concept of safe=distracted really resonated with me at the time. Especially since I was making a daily commute on 480... I always felt like a bug between the 18 wheelers and SUVs, on the verge of SQUISH at any moment.

Frustrating evening

So the thing about crewing for someone you don't know is that you DON'T KNOW THEM.
You don't know their style, you don't know their temper and you don't know their boat.
A good skipper would ask you what you usually do when you sail, what you're good at, and take your skills and put them to use.
What I got tonight was NOT a good skipper.
This was a women's race - male coaches allowed - so the boat owner had his 20 year old daughter at the helm.
Except he didn't let her lead, make decisions or follow her gut.
What we had was an unctuous man barking orders to a daughter unable to tell him to go to hell and take the lead.
He was unclear, unfocused and put the entire crew in positions to fail.
Add to those conditions almost no wind, which frustrates most racers.
I don't mind it - things go slower, are less panicky and generally a good way to enjoy the water.
But tonight, it just heightened anxiety and made things worse.

What I LIKE about situations like tonight are that I realize what good fortune I have to sail with the team I'm with on Wed'y nights. Also, it's a great way to practice patience and "rising above."
So tonight, I rose above.
I got yelled at.
Verbally abused.
Blamed for their piss poor leadership and communication.
And I rose above.
When we came back to the clubhouse I bought the crew their dinner.
Except the skipper and his daughter - I think they knew better than to stick around.

So the night ended well.
Until I decided to take East Ninth south at 10:10...
Cops were redirecting traffic onto EUCLID.
Tore up, slow ass, nasty Euclid (Fireworks at the Jake).
What should have been a 5 minute zip took 20.

Then I got to the hill that leads to Tremont through the Flats.
And just as I got down to the W. 3rd bridge, the god-damn lights started flashing and the bridge started to come down.
For some reason, that bridge takes more time to descend than it takes for the barge/freighter to go through the winding Cuyahoga. It comes down a little.. and it goes back up. It comes down a little more.... and goes back up.

So I did a bad-ass frustrated cranky driver U-turn and blasted up the hill a bit to get to the 'hood past Tower City.

I did get to Tremont, but at the top of the hill into the neighborhood, they're tearing up the on ramp to 90, so they have crabby construction workers on the night shift driving big trucks willy nilly and parking them perpendicular to lanes and making it just... inhospitable, I guess.

And, of course, it was Art Walk night in the neighborhood, which means all the people from all the suburbs come to my usually quiet street and take all the parking.

But by then I was so beyond frustrated, I couldn't gather the strength to write something snarky in the dust on the BMW with the licence plate that read "BEAMER."
Nice, Chad.
Or is it Josh.

Whatever.

Way to overcompensate....

My ASS is CLAMMY

We sailed.
We raced.
Great start.
Found the best wind.
Fought the chop.
Were 3-4 boat lengths ahead of our nearest competitor.
Upwind we trimmed well, gained more lead.
Reached the mark.
Came about.
Knot in the line.
I dumped the Main when I was supposed to keep it taut.
They went wing and wing.
We reached.
They got 10-12 boat lengths.
We came in second.
Fish tacos and beer.
Order restored.

And thanks to all the waves, my ASS is still CLAMMY.