Notes on Glasgow and London life

St Albans on a misty Wednesday morning

Although in theory of course I should not be saying London life anymore as I'm out in the semi-rural provinces.  Actually, that's unfair but St Albans is quite different to SE London and the other day I dialled a friend's number only for the line to be dead and it took me two attempts to realise I had to dial the London area code.  I always thought when I moved out of London I'd head out of London properly - a small holding somewhere, total change in lifestyle.  And in some ways it is, just not in the way I expected.  In the first place, I've never lived so close to a high street and shops and places for coffee and lunch.  My flat in SE London was a good ten minute walk to the nearest approximation of a spot for brunch and there was nowhere really to stock up on groceries that wasn't a twenty minute walk.  Saying that, I loved it - I had my own garden overlooking an allotment so it was very peaceful and all only a 12 minute train ride to London Bridge, and the Womble (the Overground Underground) opened up the whole of town for travels and adventures.  The arrival of Sainsbury Local near the station at my old stomping ground has caused a furore and the potential closure of up to forty local businesses which I'm sad about.  The convenience of being able to pick up a bag of salad (apparently the most frequently discarded thing from the bottom of most people's fridges) on the way home doesn't really offset the warm feeling of popping into a shop and knowing the person behind the counter sufficiently well to say hello and exchange pleasantries.  Although objectively I know all the arguments about why these 'developments' are good, I can't help but feel a bit sad for all the things that you lose with the arrival of so-called progress.  It is a bit of London where we do say hello on the street and I can't help wondering if this particular type of progress means losing other more socially beneficial things over time.  It would be lovely to be proved wrong, but the part of London I grew up in saw exactly this type of gentrification and it hasn't benefited in my view.   

St Albans is gorgeous with it's wonky little houses, beautiful old buildings, the Abbey is stunning and saturated with history, and our neighbours are lovely.  It's only been four months I think since we moved in, but already when someone says they're going into town, I assume they mean the high street.  It is bloody expensive travelling into London so I'm having to curb my urbanite tendencies and that means I'm turning into something of a Country Mouse when I do go into central London - I got manhandled at Holborn the other week, and not in a good way, but a woman who decided I simply wasn't moving through the barriers rapidly enough just grabbed my shoulders and steered me out of the way.  Cheeky so-and-so, but you see how it becomes a self-fulfilling thing where going into town seems less pleasant, you put it off, then when you do you're alert to any unpleasantness.

So have I been making anything?  Not as much as I'd like - the change of pace everyone anticipated when I said I was going to do a masters has been the reverse of all the "slacker student" jibes I've had.  And I've had a lot.  I'm realising every day how enormous the gaps in my knowledge are and so I end up doing long hours of reading, writing, panicking … I've also come up with an idea for my dissertation that I'm convinced will make an interesting form of extended research so am trying to cram information about that before I make a total fool of myself meeting potential supervisors in the New Year.  

In terms of actual things made, I knit a scarf for Husband for Christmas.  In some ways this is the ultimate form of masochism and I'd be interested if anyone else has thoughts on this because for some reason men do not seem that interested in hand made things; women seem to understand the idea of nurture knit into every stitch and I don't know if it's all chaps or just him, but he thinks this idea is bonkers.  He is also wedded to acrylic in all its forms and looked most put out when I suggested that instead of spending £10 on a horrible scarf knit from plastic, I could make him one from lovely bouncy wool from an actual real sheep.  In fact, he has only once worn the lovely skiing hat I made him and the socks I knit him for our wedding over a year ago saw their first outing only last weekend.  Having refused to wear them before he begrudgingly acknowledged that they're very comfortable. Personally, I can't stop wearing my hand knit socks - they fit perfectly and the Jawoll (which I partly love just for the name - must be that half-German heritage) keeps the feet warm and dry.  I wore them on a chilly day in Glasgow just wearing shoes - normally my naturally chilly self would wear boots with tights and socks - and my feet were joyful all day.  It is not an exaggeration to say that warm feet = a happy soul.  So I might be on a hiding to nothing with the scarf - it's a long stripy merino super wash (which is not what I'd normally knit with but gets him close to the finish he likes) from this pattern (http://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/handsome-scarf) - I changed the stripes so they run longways along the scarf and used several colours and stripes of varying depths but I really like this rib as it creates an interesting effect but is still sufficiently manly (in my view) to not immediately put him off.  Will take a photo once it's unwrapped - it's under the tree at the moment.  If the scarf also ends up in the "unworn" pile then the guilt I often feel for not making him a sweater will be put to one side forever - that is a time commitment no one can afford to waste.  

I'm currently knitting Kate Davies's Port O'Leith jumper for myself (http://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/port-o-leith) in Charcoal.  I started yesterday and it's absolutely addictive so my plan to read all day was scuppered.  I did the tension swatch and decided to make the smallest size, going  down a needle size to 4mm to match gauge, but then decided I wanted to make the next size up to have a lovely slouchy sweater for wearing with skinny jeans and concealing the inevitable post-Christmas indulgence - also useful for wearing with my stretchy topped trousers which I like to whip out on Christmas Eve after the big meal (we do Christmas on the 24th) a la Joey from Friends with his turkey maternity pants.  It's a great look.  Anyway, that means I cast on three times yesterday and got varying amounts of jumper knit before frogging.  Third time's the charm though and it's powering along again now.  The wool itself is stunning - it's got a real lustre to it, and the Charcoal colour way has such a depth and variety of shading to it, so it's lovely to work with.  I've had to ban myself from knitting at all this morning because I knew I'd get sucked in and the whole day would pass.  

A few years ago I bought some dark green wool crepe from Linton Tweeds  which I've just washed and gently pressed to make into another Merchant & Mills Trapeze dress which I find an very chic style and also very wearable - the shoulders are a lovely petite fit offsetting the swing skirt.  I hadn't realised how stretchy the crepe would be, and I want to line this version, so it is likely to be a challenge for my sewing skills but I hope to get to that this Christmas break, reading and essay writing aside.  Another pair of socks might get cast on for all the sitting in the car I'm doing this year too - nothing like seeing a sock appearing before your eyes to take your mind off the travel.  That's socks appeal (oh dear, and I've not a drop of mulled wine yet).

It's a cliche, but I really can't believe how much has happened this year and that it's nearly over.  2013 has been a challenge in lots of ways and I'll be glad to see the back of it, but also incredibly grateful for all the opportunities it has presented.  I've finally realised my ambition to study full-time and it's wonderful, not least because I can see it opening other doors into the future.  So roll on 2014 and all the ups and downs that a new year brings.  New Years resolutions to follow and I can't wait …

Happy Christmas.  

And Miss Margo says ...

Three weeks in already - it must be a function of my advanced years (comparatively at least) that the weeks keep flying past.  The flatmates - who are proper postgraduates and therefore a good ten years younger than me - are very kind and welcoming, but clearly do not feel the time is going quickly; in fact, they seem to have all the time in the world.  They do not seem to feel the fear when I say that it's already nearly the end of week three.  Surely they feel the same "eep, only twenty weeks of actual teaching on one of these masters thingies". 

I do already have an MA, but I did it over two years while I was working so there's a lot of latitude in lots of ways.  Here I am so profoundly aware of the gaps in my knowledge that every day feels like a struggle to catch up.  Is it bad that I decided Fabric of Britain was a suitable part of the work schedule and watched it for research?  It is interesting in many ways, and moving in others - I had a lump in my throat looking at the jumpers knit by prisoners of war in the German camps, and thinking of the embroideries destroyed during the Reformation.  It was timely as I had spent the morning reading Margaret Scott's Medieval Fashion and Dress and am feeling very in the spirit, especially after several hours spent dawdling around the cathedral at St Albans on Saturday afternoon.

It is a funny thing to be splitting my time between two homes.  Of course, it means I don't get to enjoy the life of living out of London which was part of the original ambition, or much of the life living in St Albans either.  I am always in lectures, at the library or at my desk in Glasgow, and always running around like a loon when I'm back in London.  Of course, I'm not in London but I can't quite get that out of my system yet either.  Actually, in Glasgow, I invested in a giant cushion so I could read on the bed-the-width-of-a-park-bench and that has been pretty good.  Those swivel chairs they stick in halls are a killer on the back.  

And two weekends into the commute and Husband is no longer speaking to me which leads me to question whether he really supports this quest or not.  Hmm, it's quite the head scratcher.  I have found this a particularly gendered and vexed issue though.  I know at least three other couples where the chap has sauntered off for a year - commuting back and forth during the week for study or to fulfil a dream to live abroad and of course that is fine and does not show a lack of commitment or "team work" which is a term I particularly despise when it comes to relationships because we are not playing some kind of competitive sport or trying to tie up a particularly knotty legal transaction. 

For some reason, it seems, my womanishness is the issue - I should want to be at home fulfilling my domestic function of caring for a grown man.  The fact I get home and do five loads of laundry on Fridays apparently does not quite cut it, and neither does the storm I cook up or the Christmas cake fruit I set off with stewing in the boozy concoction of marvellousness ready for baking after a few weeks of loving nurture.  The fact I am ambitious and value my career is not apparently as valuable.  I know it is not as financially valuable - I am still in a career that earns less primarily because it is still seen as dominated by women.  So I am perplexed as to why it is different for me to be studying for a year, having supported Husband in achieving several of his own ambitions - when other couples seem to be happy for their menfolk to go off to realise some yen they have.  I'm in danger of over-associating the reading I've been doing about the emergence of social and legislative control over women's bodies with my own situation but it is quite a good way of de-personalising.  It all just seems a bit ... erm, silly.  It is jolly peaceful though and I've got an awful lot of my blanket knit and reading done while I've been at home in the chilly silence.

Anyway, despite that St Albans is a delightful place which doesn't mean I don't miss the fun and uniqueness of SE London, or my lovely neighbours (who are keeping an eye on the pumpkin that continues to grow with apparently nothing curbing its enormousness - did you know pumpkins have no natural predators?), and the postman who I hallooed on my way to the station.  But I am having my 80-something year old neighbour round for tea - she looks not a day over 65 and is a hoot - so am starting to find ways into the local neighbourhood.  Small towns (and yes, I know it's a city) are different and you do have to get to know the ways; but nonetheless, there's almost nothing that a good cup of tea and a chat can't overcome is there now.

Still getting my head around the study and the commute but I'm already swirling with ideas for my dissertation while having to knuckle down to actual writing for essays due now.  The world of work has at least prepared me for time pressures, even if it does materially change the way you need to think about things which has made accessing the language and style of academic life a challenge, but that's no bad thing - it is supposed to be a challenge after all.  And it certainly is. 

Untitled musings

So I hadn't realised it had been so long since my last post.  June.  Crumbs.  

At about the time I posted the last post, which was admittedly a slightly perfunctory effort at keeping a hand in, I was going through something of a life crisis.  I'm going to call it a Quarter Life Crisis as with hindsight that is possibly what it was.  

Don't get me wrong; it wasn't dramatic, traumatic or any other kind of -atic.  It just was.  Work was busy and stressful; Husband had moved into my flat and crikey, marriage is quite difficult isn't it and apparently more so when you have to live with each other; my lovely home became full of two sets of things, so it was harder and harder to keep the clutter under control; and we were trying to buy a home together and think about moving so there was little point trying to move his stuff out of storage or some of mine into it.  I was trying to make things but never with the time or space to really get stuck into anything creative - just lots and lots of ideas and no real way of recording them or putting them into action. Everything felt a bit as if it was trying to get all my attention leaving very little in there that was just about me.  The peaceful milling about that had signified my life before wasn't really possible as Husband has a way of doing things and it involves doing things constantly - the contrast between my view that sometimes doing nothing is of equal value to doing something and his view that every minute not spent running around is wasted caused some tension.  Shifting my working days down to three instead of five bought me some space but in the end I had a list of jobs to do on those days off and I never really got the concentrated time I wanted just to bobble around and be myself.  

And all of a sudden it became blindingly obvious that 95% of what I was doing, I didn't want to be doing.  Not in a forever sort of way but just not right now.  It dawned on me that it was now or never to do some things that I haven't had the chance to do before, for lots of reasons some of which were within and some without my control.  I've never lived outside London for example.  I've never studied (after A'levels) full-time; I've never really done anything that was all about me actually.  There's always been a sidelong look to make sure other people weren't upset by it, or didn't feel threatened by it and then I've pulled back.  

So suddenly here I am.  I find myself on a career break (for which I am eternally grateful to my very supportive and understanding employer) and living for four days a week in Glasgow, studying for a masters in art history - it is textile related and pretty niche (I did at least consider whether I could do it from London - I can't) and I had my first lecture today.  

The funny thing is that, aside from a few butterflies when I landed here a couple of weeks ago so that Husband could help me orientate (without some fairly hefty navigational support I am a flightless bird with no sense of north) I feel pretty fine.  I am someone perennially beset by doubt, able to forensically identify all the possible pitfalls and then to worry myself into inertia by them.  Contrastingly, or perhaps because of that, I am also capable of incredible spontaneity and honestly I think sometimes the lack of thinking time when making big decisions helps me not to be a completely fixed point.  But this morning, as I navigated my way to my first lecture clutching my trusty A to Z (I still can't work my smart phone) I felt nothing but Monday morning sleepiness and a hearty dose of anticipation for what was to come.  The thought that ran through my mind was "this is just what I am doing now."  There was no need for nerves or wobbles of any sort.  It was very pleasing.  

The first lecture was really interesting and afterwards, I meandered round the city before heading back to Halls to do some reading.  There is a lot of work to do and of course I do wonder if I'm up to it; I certainly hope so but only the next twelve months and lots of work will really be able to tell.  But it's part of the experiment just to see what on earth will happen.  I was reading Tilly & the Buttons blog the other day and she has also recently left her job and it occurred to me that perhaps it's a sign of the times, or perhaps it's a community of bloggers who are all roughly the same age and therefore are reading each others words on the web as well as going through similar experiences, but change has seemed to be in the air for a while and things simply couldn't carry on as they had.  


Of course, the reality is that I haven't left my job and I am grateful to know that it is there to go back to.  There were moments over the weekend when the reality set in and I was upset.  The team I work with are fun, really fun.  My panicky thought was "who will I have fun with now."  I suspect in 18 months time, things will feel very much as they did before - although I'm sure some of the faces at work will be different, some change is inevitable after all - but I can't help feeling now that I have the most amazing opportunity at my fingertips and it is absolutely imperative that I don't let it pass me by.  Just because the balance feels precarious doesn't mean that it is - those seals who balance beach balls on their nose make it look very easy but I imagine it's pretty tricky to do.  One of the concerns that has always held me back, even when I was very small, was the fear of "what happens if I try really hard and am still not able to succeed" - it always seemed much easier therefore not to try too hard, just in case.  This is something I am very conscious of and perhaps that is enough to overcome those funny little voices we all have holding us back from things.  

There are still making projects in the offing - for example, I made a pair of curtains for the bathroom the other day.  I am not going to show a photograph for several reasons.  Firstly, the fabric is a lovely mushroom colour with white spots.  It photographs a municipal institutional colour, like a curtain pulled round a sick bed; it looks horrible.  Secondly, the curtains were fine but very basic and what would have been the point really, a photograph may actually have been more boring than no photographs.  When we moved into the house, the previous owners appear to have taken everything - half of the lightbulbs had gone, all of the pelmets (which were ugly but was it necessary to detach them from the walls with small explosives, same with the wall lights) and the curtain rails.  The house will be lovely in a few years and lots of work time, but at the moment, I am left frequently marvelling at how people live.  How can a couple live happily with giant Rococo style fireplaces but have no work spaces in the kitchen (seriously, none - not even a top to perch a cup of tea on); or install the most enormous bath with the feet of a lion, but have a sink the size of a tea cup contrastingly serviced by firehose water pressure ensuring a thorough drenching every time one has to wash ones hands.  It is a funny thing, how other people live.  

Blogging therefore will take a bit less of a makey turn and probably focus more on things I'm pondering for the course and things I'm pondering for the house.  Saying that, I do plan to make myself a corduroy skirt, along the lines of the red one I made a few months ago but in a dark navy or aubergine corduroy, a Fair Isle tank top (just in case other students weren't sure I was the oldest person in Halls by a long margin) , this poncho (http://www.knitrowan.com/designs-and-patterns/patterns/comfort) because I hear it can get pretty chilly in Glasgow, and I'm also working my way though Debbie Abrahams Mystery Blanket pattern at the moment although I'm still on mail out three and it's currently on mail out nine of ten so best knit like the wind eh Margo.  

Right, a very long and picture free post - I will change that next time; goodness knows Glasgow is a beautiful city so there are plenty of things to take snaps of.  Just need to find the camera which is packed somewhere sensible and safe but unlocatable.  

Toodleoo for now ...

Great minds ...

I'm sure you already know about the Village Haberdashery - it's been a great online shop for a while, but now has a lovely bricks and mortar shop in north London.  The newsletter came out today and I saw these lovely baby blankets.  It reminds me of a blanket I made for my niece at Christmas.  By a spooky coincidence I got the fleece from the Village Haberdashery and then bought wool felt for the back to help it stand up to being used as a play mat on a wooden floor. 

I also hand quilted a bird on the wool felt side to add some detailing, although I only thought of it once I'd sewn the three layers (cotton fleece, batting and wool felt) together and it was a bit of a trial to do it that way.  You do get a quite nice shadow effect though, which you can see on the second photograph, so I'm not entirely unhappy with it.  It turned into a popular present too, but not for my niece who never got her paws on it as it was pinched by my sister instead.

Scaling the giddy heights

Nothing says glamour like an office shot

My career can now officially be measured in centimetres – scaling the giddy heights of an HR career, I was today assigned the woeful task of measuring the company’s sunflowers for a competition.  Would you believe that someone was actually doping theirs?  It’s lawyers, right so they’re obviously pretty crazy.  Judge rules?  Miracle Gro is not sporting so... Disqualified.  We were each given six seeds, and I shared mine with two people in the team who were the epitome of detachment parenting – which is apparently pretty hot stuff right now – where I spent a lot of time fussing around mine which might explain why they were fairly stunted.   A metaphor perhaps for the perils of overbearing parenting?  Perhaps I’m getting to that age.

Last week there were a lot of tears and tantrums in the office – not mine, I just supply the message and the tissues – and I’m fairly sure the resultant high levels of carbon dioxide prevented heady growth.  Over the course of the weekend, and away from my hovering presence, the sunflowers bloomed (not literally) and were widely deemed as the likely winners.  Well, it certainly helps to make us popular when we win stuff.  The person responsible for measuring lost interest, went on holiday, I don’t know and I was nomintold that I was in charge.  In a weird way, I had too much power for that limited time.  No idea what to do with the results, but Philip and Roger, my two sunflowers, are very happy office companions for me.  Does anything else look quite as sad as a candid shot of an office though?  There’s a bit more oomph in here generally day-to-day, honest.

So on this grand note, I have news about the future of my crafting work life.  From the beginning of June I am going to start working three days a week in the glamour of HR, and the rest of the week will be spent endeavouring to build some kind of something from the knitting, sewing, embroidering side of life.  I don’t really know what it looks like yet, but I’m excited to find out; and for the first time in my life enjoying not knowing what the end point looks like or trying to control what it looks like.  My sense is that trying to hold it too tightly can only be a bad thing and so I’m very lucky that I’m able to just see what happens.

As part of that, I will be planning to move my blog and will update with more details of that in due course.  I’m determined to figure out taking proper photographs. 

In the meantime, I’m beavering away on my knitwear design course, and have been using manhole covers – not very original I know – as a source of inspiration for my first module homework.  If you’ve never looked at them much before, there is a plethora of different types of doorway into the world under the pavements and each company seems to have made an art form of them.  From paving stones, utility company covers and manhole covers, someone somewhere wanted to make these mundane bits of the world beautiful and I found that very inspiring.  No, I don't think I'm unique or original in thinking that; if anything I should be ashamed that it has taken me this long to think it.  It's probably scuttled across my mind before, but taking the photographs has made me ponder on it properly.  Here are a selection. 

Fleet Street maholes

To quote Tom Hanks in Turner & Hooch "this is not my shoe" - someone scampered past quick as a flash while I was taking the picture (they looked perplexed about why I was taking the picture too)

Crossing bobbles - utilitarian and oddly lovely (sore on the feet though)

Commemorative and functional and older than me, hooray - not that I'm anxious about my birthday just gone and advancing years

Water - simple grid but striking

The South Bank - I loved the way the straight line pavement markers ran up to meet the grid of the cover

Clifford's Inn - a window to the basement

Old Inns of Court door

Is it the same Hope Foundry Co - formed in the 19th century and still adorning our streets



Cobblestone fans outside St Pauls Cathedral

Having charted them – which really made my head ache, having to try and think in reverse (I think this is where the dyslexia can sometimes be apparent) – they are looking quite nice actually and photographs of those will follow shortly.  I’ve become obsessed though with cobble stones and brickwork and all sorts of crazy things.  Having gone from a very slow start to the course – post-wedding lack of motivation as Husband moved into my flat one spoon at a time – now I’ve started I think I’m addicted.  The living room is buried under balls of yarn and random needles as I try new things, and there are samples blocking e.very.where.  Fun. 

Have you seen Truly Myrtle’s Skeppe Hat pattern?  I was lucky enough to be a test knitter and was smitten with the finished result.  It’s a lovely hat, very warm and toasty which in these lovely London summer days is pretty handy; and several people have commented on what a stylish topper it is.  Libby's blog is also a gratuitously good read and very inspiring - it's one of those that I look forward to dropping into my inbox each time. 

The view from my bicycle

This weekend I suspect I shall be dragged back out on the mean streets of SE London.  I say dragged; it's great fun being out on the bicycle although people openly laugh at me with my SS tank commander cycle hat (albeit in Cranberry) and on the Pashley while Husband rides a perfectly sensible and modern bicycle.  Mine weighs 3.5 stone or thereabouts, I can barely get the thing up and down the pavements without help and my pathetically low athleticism means that I spend quite a bit of time huffing and puffing up the hills while Husband bounds up, back down to meet me, up again, back down.  You get the idea.  Much like when we run together - he probably covers twice the distance as I bouncy walk along behind him.  I'm not built for running - I've got a runners lean upper body, and the classic legs of the English pear.  I feel sad for me too.  It presents several challenges with dress making, and more of that in June too ...

I'm trying to work out a bit of image styling for a brand new, pimped out, vamped up blog and loved the colours of this Koigu merino.  An introduction to photograph course starts soon at the City Lit and I am signed up - couldn't come soon enough as I've got to stop being frightened of the technological future, especially as the future I'm fearing is already the past and I'm on the verge of being obsolete.

Bought from The Village Haberdashery, rubbish photograph by me

Finally, I saw Kaffe Fassett at SOAS on Monday evening and this image (excuse the stair rail in the foreground - I was trying to snap quickly while Brandon Mably flew through the slides) really struck a chord.  I love the colours and vibrancy and it got my already quite motivated self even more motivated to get working harder on the knit/stitch/sewn design side. 

Kaffe Fassett - photograph of slides at SOAS presentation 20 May 2013

Anyway, more information on the new beginnings side of things in due course.  I’m excited to see what part-time work brings, and there will be much to share soon – probably a list or two (I do love a list).  Stay tuned for that ...

Have lovely bank holiday weekends in the meantime – lots of good stitching if the rotten weather holds