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Erin's avatar

A. My daughter will graduate from college (a semester early) in December. I'm still trying to figure out how to be ready to send her to college. big hugs

B. If only SO MANY PEOPLE would have had this driven into their brains so many years ago...but then again, so many have been broken by the cult of personality. When doing things to protect the people around you (because we live in a SOCIETY for a reason) becomes a burden, "do what's right for you" becomes justification. It's not a rebuke - trying to accommodate this new bit of thought into the Piagetian file cabinet of my current brain/thinking.

C. I wonder what would happen if we could force the people who rule to learn to knit. It could derail the bad ones (or at the very least literally tie them up in knots), perhaps retrain the brains of the less-bad, provide a purpose for the ET from South Africa, and encourage the good ones to stand up and fight harder, if only so they could get back to their brioche shawl by Bristol Ivy (that I have now re-ripped for the nth time because maybe I'm not actually ok with all of those mistakes and O. em. Gee. that is NOT the correct number of stitches for this row or that one...or all 50 of those... πŸ˜¬πŸ€¦πŸΌβ€β™€οΈ. Thank goodnessI bought that Zoom course with her duringthe pandemic, because it looks like I'll be going back to re-watch some instruction. The things we do for our knitting...).

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Jasmin Knitmore's avatar

β€œthere is dignity in all work,” i love this SO HARD.

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A. Wilder Westgate's avatar

This is a lesson I have to learn over and over. Thank you for sharing!

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Ruth's avatar

Thank you, as always, for the wonderful reminder to do what we need for ourselves and to enjoy simple details. Earlier I was admiring the way the light reflected through my glass of water…telling myself it’s okay, it’s a good thing to just sit and do that.

My college-kid story: when my first-born was getting ready to start college, I was happy for him, and felt I was prepared for β€œempty nest.” After all, he was only going to be 30 minutes away! And, I still had a younger child at home in said β€œnest.” We took him to campus, and the school had a lovely welcoming assembly for us parents, and in the middle of it, with no warning, I started to sob. Well, I realized pretty quick that it wasn’t the distance, it wasn’t the number of fledglings still in the nest…it was the tremendous milestone and all the inevitable emotions such things bring. Sending you love ❀️.

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Dorie's avatar

I really needed to hear this today. Thank you for sharing!

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Kathy's avatar

Thanks so much - always so nice to hear from you and to have the positives amplified.

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Martha Levey's avatar

Thank you for sharing your essay.

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Karen Seemuth's avatar

I’ll be thinking of you as your son leaves for college. It was a hard transition for me but I got through it. I won’t lie, I cried for 3 weeks after he left. He is nearly 40 years old now. He lives one hour away and I get to see him several times a month. So usually everything works out ok. ❀️

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Gail M's avatar

Yes. Thank you so much for this essay. It spoke to my heart.

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