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CRUSHED LOVE HEARTS (#SingingAsTheDarknessLifts 141)

CRUSHED LOVE HEARTS

 


 

This morning a cool breeze feels like a refreshing contrast after a super-hot weekend. It brings with it only the smell of smoke.

 

Alt text says this week’s photo is a person taking a selfie. It is indeed and it is me taking a selfie in front of part of Kath’s stand at Wolverhampton Racecourse. I was looking to see if I could find a good angle for our pre-show photo while she was having a wander round, and I rather like this picture so I kept it!

 

This show gave us the hottest temperatures for a show set up that we have ever seen, and I could definitely feel the importance of staying hydrated! Lunch at shows is always peanut butter in rolls – easy to prepare wherever we are staying and a nice simple protein hit. Often there are chocolate bar snacks in the lunch bag too. I always used to have one of these in the late afternoon when things were getting quieter on the sales front, but this was not a sensible option this time given the temperatures so I decided that love heart sweets would make a satisfying alternative. I like the little sugar burst on my tongue and I enjoy the little messages (although I am not so keen on the emoji faces, but I guess they have adapted to the times for a younger audience than me). I also like the random eating of them without even reading them! In a bid to share the love during the show, I attempted to do what I used to do when I’m young… crack a tube in half to share with a friend... reader the tubes these days do not snap so instead I handed over an interestingly mangled tube with some very crushed sweets in the middle.

Kath and I saw a ‘wild Tiffany’ at the show...Tiffany is one of Kath’s shawl designs, and it was lovely to see someone wearing it in beautiful shades of bluey-green. Seeing Kath’s designs in the wild is a particularly lovely part of yarn shows, as is hearing the compliments about Kath’s patterns. All this mixed in with a range of conversations with interesting people keeps each show fresh and different. I never know who I’m going to meet or what the conversations will be about, but I can guarantee there will be much to keep me amused and entertained even when I am looking after the stand on my own. I love these snippets of time and they are a great contrast to my one-to-one work or my very quiet poetry writing. I do sometimes think about taking something of my own to do in the quieter times, but actually it is rather nice just to lean into those moments and to be still and quiet surrounded by colour and pattern and collective creativity. And I chuckle now at the newly pivoting Sue three years ago who didn’t feel like they had a clue about this world of yarn shows that Kath inhabited, and who certainly didn’t think it was possible to look after the stand for afternoons at a time. And now here I am ready, willing and able!

 

Here’s a poem I wrote some years ago about that feeling of not fitting in...

 

 

Clapping

 

You can hear your own clapping

louder than anyone else’s.

You are not matching the rhythm

of anyone in this room.

Soon they will be looking at you

willing you to stop.

You try to change the way

your hands hit one another

but you cannot unhollow the sound.


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