Pause and ramblings

Ever have one of those moments when you are in between things and you have a feeling that something big is about to happen - something that will change your perspective or your life?

So I just did a six day stint at the yarn shop. Then worked at my fish job yesterday where there was High Drama (won't go into details, some locals read my blog).

Today Dan and I will drive down to Victoria, tomorrow fly to Kelowna in the morning and attend the funeral in the afternoon, fly back on Thursday and drive home Thursday night. In the space in between - the time in Kelowna... I'm sure I'll be exhausted by all the people. I get peopled out pretty easily. You can be sure that I'll be visiting both the yarn shops in Kelowna - research you know, in case I ever want to open my own shop one day.

Dan and I have been waiting a long time. Waiting to get married, waiting for me to finish my degree, waiting for our honeymoon, waiting for one of us to find a job, waiting to move, waiting for the contract that never came, waiting for another job... As someone who often lives in the future, Dan is great at pulling me back into the present. In my mind, I have already moved to Montana, but he reminded me yesterday that he is competing against some very high caliber brewers and might not get the job. Oh yeah. There is still a chance we might be here through the winter, if none of the other things pan out.

The fish job is really busy right now. The weather is good and the trawlers are going nonstop. They offload at night, go to their fishing spot, fill their holds in a day's fishing and come back to offload at night. Every night. Dan has worked his ninth graveyard in a row, he's sleeping now. I asked the plant guy last night how long we can expect this to continue like this, and he said until the storm moves in.

Waiting for the storm to move in.

Waiting for good weather so I can cut the grass.

Waiting for Dan to wake up so I can vacuum.

I keep getting told that, as a knitting teacher, I must be very patient. I wonder which came first: the patience to knit or that knitting has taught me patience? I'm not actually very patient. Not in every circumstance, anyway. I know now that I can start a project and see its completion (university degrees and hand-knit socks alike). I also know now that, as the cliche goes, good things come to those who wait. I don't regret moving to this little town. We were desperate to get out of East Sooke.

I've had a lot of interesting experiences here and made some good friends. I have way more of a social life here than I did while I was living in East Sooke/Victoria. Before I would have to go into town and make arrangements with people to come visit, or drop in on the regular coffee break with former coworkers. Friends would seldom come to visit us. It was a 45 minute drive, depending on traffic.

Here we live in town, and all summer long we had people drop in on us, especially if the front door was open, which it was in good weather. Most of the people in Victoria who never or seldom came to visit us in East Sooke said, when we told them we were moving to Ucluelet, they would definitely come visit us here. Yeah right. It's been almost six months and in the time we've been here, other than family we've seen only one set of friends (and many thanks for making the effort!) though I do have a regular Skype date with another set of friends (who helped us move here so, technically, they have been here!). It means a lot to me to keep those relationships going.

I often muse about how strange our relationships are with people we have moved away from. I have moved away from places quite a lot and there are some friendships that continue to grow, even from a distance. Others often fall off because some people are just not good at keeping in touch. Keeping in touch requires effort on both sides and in my experience, I have been the one making the effort. At some point I get bitter and resentful and decide not to chase that person around anymore. Why should I make them be friends with me? I'm obviously not worth their effort...

I can't blame someone if they don't want to read my blog. Lots of people aren't blog readers. I was one of them until I decided that blogging was a good idea. Then I started reading other blogs. But blogging has given me a whole new appreciation now to people who do blog on a regular basis - because it means they are showing up at the page. As a writer, I have a lot of respect for showing up at the page.

Sorry this got a bit rant-y.