nettle graffiti

It’s still warmish around here.

Warm enough that Temperature rules the days.

My days at any rate—for in this deliciously haggish portion of my life it seems silly to pretend I’m unphased by such things.¹

And honestly, how not to adapt my rhythms to those of the weather—

—much as I’ve been revising my practice to the materials I happen to find?²

Materials that this week led me unexpectedly back to the writing of very slow words.

A single super slow scribble anyway.

And a scribble feels right for no plans July.³

To be sure, it took a false start or two for the scribble to emerge.

But isn’t that how it goes—

—the thing you finally pursue dependent on all the enticingly sinuous⁴ ideas that litter the studio floor?⁵

And thank goodness for it.

How else to figure out that my opinionated Nettle friends⁶ (twisted on the fly)⁷—

—were longing to try a little plant-centric griffonage?

NETTLE was here!

Definitely worth all the unweaving.

As you can see we’re still not finished.

But then neither is July.

And what with two visiting dogs⁸—

—and the multiple hats I’m learning to wear⁹—

—a little glacial herbaceous chirography—

—is just the thing.

1. Once upon a time I madly zoomed around in the heat as a matter of course—and with a certain pride. Walk twenty miles through the heat of the day? Why not? Can jar after jar of produce on a wood cookstove in the middle of the afternoon? I can do that. Sure!

2. Devoting myself to the materials I happen to find is not just the choice of the moment, but has also been wondrously encouraged by all of you. Thanks.

3. No Plans July. It was an idea that came to me a year ago when I found my days and weeks so full of appointments and gatherings and calendar items that I got downright claustrophobic. With little time to relish the long days, no consecutive blank spaces to sink into delicious, essential, easily overlooked and often massively creative summer boredom—no time, in short, to make things up—I was getting seriously grumpy. So I refused to schedule anything for the whole month. And then decided that even if I did plan something, I was also free to change my mind at will. Even if it seemed rude (the worst of sins for me so really hard to stick to). And it was great. Still busier than I liked, but a game-changer nonetheless. How not to try again? How not, indeed, to start dreaming of a No Plans YEAR? (I guess that would be a Sabbatical).

4. Speaking of sinuous — I just learned that the newest Tapestry Discovery Subscription Box, a quarterly weaving/learning/study collaboration between Gist Yarn and Rebecca Mezoff (yarn and videos and instructions and ideas all in one), focuses on curves. If you’re interested in, say, weaving your own handwriting, someone else’s hand writing— or in the joys of playing around with curvaceous woven lines, it could be just the thing.. I spent a year or two super focused on this practice and had an inordinately good time. I called them Margin Notes—long narrow strips of tapestry, most with curving lines. Here is an example. Here’s another.

5. Apparently this is a moment for thinning things out: Anna Brones, Sandi Rosner and Lyn Swett Miller all wrote this week about clearing out their archives and attics—be they full of artwork, digital images, sweaters made but not worn, or high school/college papers (annotated by many a diligent instructor). All this even as I was in the throes of ripping up tapestry cartoons and shredding folders of drawings. Oh the relief of it. There’s more to do, but even a little thinning of the dusty collection feels terrific. Unweaving is much the same (and if you don’t cut it, you can sometimes re-use the yarn). It may be a nice curve, but if I’m not interested in where it is going, best to start again.

6. My relationship with Nettle fiber has been tumultuous—or at least it has not been as consistently natural and rewarding as my friendship with milkweed. Still, this amazing, nourishing prickly plant has pulled me back again and again. So much to learn, eh?

7. Though I’ve twisted on the fly while making simple baskets, this is the first time I’ve done it with tapestry. and I really like it. Not only can I adjust the thickness of the strand to what the image/line demands, but I can also twist just the length I need. No wasted energy and I don’t get precious about it—as sometimes happens when I accumulate yards and skeins.

8. Speckle and Rupert are here for a few days while their people are on a work trip. They are marvelous dogs and we all know each other well—but three dogs still feels like a lot more than one—especially on walks. Or when a rabbit zooms across the yard.

9. My granddaughter loves hats — and she especially likes other people to wear them.

Yipes! What a lot of footnotes for a post about a single word…