Works in Progress
My mom and stepdad, Terry, are in the early part of their retirement and are taking every opportunity to travel “while they can”. Every three to four months I receive an email with an itinerary and off they go on a plane, ship, or in their car puling their trailer along behind.
At some point last year while somewhere in North America Mom and Terry were in a shop that sold Alpaca yarn. Knowing that I love to knit and crochet, Mom was looking at the yarn and thinking about buying me a skein. Seeing this, Terry asked, “How many projects does Megan have going right now?”
An apt question. I’m not sure I can even answer the question myself. It would take at least an hour to sort through my craft corner (aka the mountain of craft supplies covering one whole side of my living room) and count the active projects I have going right now. The list includes:
A set of six small Christmas cross stitch patterns which I’m making for myself to be Christmas decor whenever I finish them
A set of placemats that I’m knitting for someone, but I’ve grown unsure of the color choice
The quilt that I made with my mom which I’ve been hand quilting. It is mostly done, but there are a few feet of the edge that still need quilting.
The scarf and fingerless mitten pattern that my mother bought me after my mental breakdown
A couple as of yet un-started projects that shall remain nameless for my goddaughter who is as of yet unborn, but already adored
Multiple sets of Christmas ornaments that will someday be Christmas gifts
Gifts for my former teammates at work
The list goes on from there. I don’t think you will find this in the DSM, but pretty sure this qualifies as a sickness.
I love creating things whether it is crochet, knitting, or cross stitch. Any kind of sewing project I can get behind, really. My favorite is when I find a pattern or think of something that I can make as a gift for someone else. I don’t like giving homemade gifts because they are easy, quick, or cheap. They are none of those things. I like it because it feels the most like I’m giving someone I care about a piece of me. Quite literally, because I sincerely doubt I’ve ever finished a project that didn’t have at least one strand of my hair accidentally woven into it. The time and effort it takes to finish a project is a true labor of love.
Yet somehow it is incredibly hard to motivate myself to finish a project. While there is joy in completing something and giving it away, there is a huge amount of excitement in starting something new. When I’m bummed out about something or generally feeling low, a surefire way to boost my mood is to start a new project. Which is how it came to be that last night I found myself standing in a Michaels store looking at yarn, wondering how many skeins I could reasonably carry out of the store without the reusable shopping bag that I had forgotten on my kitchen table.
This isn’t the greatest coping mechanism given that it can rapidly become prohibitively expensive. I don’t have unlimited space to store all of my materials. I don’t have unlimited time to actually get these projects done. Nonetheless I rely upon these projects to get me through. Few things make me happier than a nice day of introverting: binge watching a show in the background while I stitch away nestled in my bed or on the couch.
I am very accomplished at starting things and do so with enthusiasm, but my follow through sucks. True in crafts and true in life. A short and incomplete list of my current non-crafty projects includes:
Weight loss. A perpetual goal, something I genuinely want to do to feel better, but I have sucky follow through.
Building my self confidence. I am still unclear on how one does this, but for the low low price of $400 a month my therapist and I are working on this one. (She works on it, I avoid it.)
Finding a boyfriend. Taking a break from this one for a while, if for no other reason then I am sick to death of my own life failing to pass the Bechdel Test.
Working on feeling like I deserve the praise I receive at work. I keep trying to tell these people that I’m not that great, but they keep giving me more stuff to do as if I’m reliable or something.
In general being nicer to myself. See above re: how it’s not going too great.
Sometimes I feel like I start all these projects and set all these goals to distract me from the fact that I am my own biggest project. No matter what I do I feel like nothing is ever good enough, like I will never be done working on myself. Perhaps that is normal. Maybe we’re not supposed to stop working on ourselves. Perfection is obviously out of the question, but is constant pursuit of self-improvement a bad thing? We’re all just killing time ‘til the grave, might as well work on something worthwhile, right?
It makes me think of the serenity prayer:
God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage the change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.
That wisdom piece will kick you in the teeth every time. How are you supposed to know what to accept and what to change? Excuse me, serenity prayer, but you’ve left me hanging. I need more information. What projects do I keep working on and what do I let go of?
The last thing I need is another project. But this weekend I did order two new patterns for afghans. And I’m about to order some yarn for a temperature blanket. And now I’m thinking that I should add “figure out what the difference is between an afghan and a blanket” to my project list on top of everything else.
So I’ve got a lot to do. If ever I go quiet for a seemingly long time, send help. Probably I will be found buried under piles of yarn, embroidery floss, and the heavy load of my own expectations.
