I had hoped to get a start on the squaring off and piecing of the cookie baby blanket project that is eating the month of November.

Instead, I spent a lot of yesterday working on photo tutorials for the pattern I am writing for the project, and today, I ran errands from sunup to sundown with a brief respite to eat lunch and crochet a bit.

One of those errands included driving to see my cousin David.

He was, as always, glad to see me (he loves visitors), and as part of our visit, I shared some animal videos with him; he, in turn, shared his observations about the videos, and it became clear to me that for David, life is a documentary.

David’s observation about this porcupine eating a pumpkin:

was that the porcupine must have strong teeth, and that reminded me of his stay at UNC Hospital not quite a year ago.

David was undergoing a variety of tests that led to him being diagnosed with the lung cancer he continues to live with, and the movie “A Fish Called Wanda” was playing on the television in his room. When my mom and I arrived he shared his observations about the film and was just as matter of fact is his assessment and understanding of the movie as he had been of the animal videos I shared with him today.

So today, as I wove in ends on these two cookies:

and almost (but not quite) finished the surface decoration of these cookies:

As I worked on my crochet, I contemplated my cousin and his unusual and refreshing view of the world, and I know that he has changed me in some way that has made me a better person, and I can only hope I have done the same for him.