At some point in every spring, I feel as if I am living in an Wolfgang Laib installation like the one shown in this video:
Made with the medium of hazelnut pollen, the piece was installed at the Museum of Modern Art in 2013, and it evokes for me, spring in North Carolina.
It begins imperceptibly, a sneeze here, an extra layer of “dust” there. Then it reaches a tipping point, and suddenly the world is awash in yellow as it was today:
I had wanted to take a photo of my efforts and progress on a “new” project which isn’t really a “new” project, but is rather a companion pieces to this child’s granny square blanket that I recently completed:
I had been working out the details of of a blanket for her brother, and I had a swatch I wanted to document.
But before I dared to set anything on the porch to be photographed, I had to do what I could to sweep away the pollen.
The sweeping is, on one level, pyrrhic, but if I don’t sweep, then even more of the pollen will make it’s way into my house, and since my house is not a museum, the pollen is not an artistic medium, it is simply the debris of spring.
Broom in hand, I channeled my maternal grandmother, and eventually, I had a spot clear enough to set down the crochet granny rectangle I was working on.
I had made two others, but each had, in some way, missed the mark.
I felt a little silly working one rectangle and then another; a voice nagged at me that I was being “too picky.”
I ignored the voice, and when I got to my third attempt, I was glad I had persisted:
I had a design I could live with for the next fort-eight rounds or so, and with that, I began working from my stash of greens and blues, and got this far before the day ended:
To an outside observer, my attempts at crochet perfection might seem silly, or somehow misplace or misguided, but with the many hours I will spend crocheting this project, the extra hour or two spent laying the groundwork to create a design I will enjoy making, are well worth it.
You are so right in taking the time, the extra hour or two laying the most pleasing groundwork. I can think of many times when starting a project, that the first half dozen starts, maybe more, were false ones. Larger hook? Different color? Three stitches here or maybe four? Spreading it out and looking, checking, feeling, seeing – until my inner sense is pleased because it’s more than just superficially seeming okay. There has to be that inner sense of satisfaction, pleasure.
If only people would realize the importance of being satisfied with what they build upon – in life as well as in crochet. More than satisfied, we should be exuberant. The happier we are with the start we make, the much more likely it is that we will finish and finish well.