Aging Well

I'm so glad that you finally made it here 
With the things you know now, that only time could tell 
Looking back, seeing far, landing right where we are 
And oh, you're aging, oh, and I am aging, oh, aren't we aging well?
    ~ singer Dar Williams, "You're Aging Well"

Last week I celebrated yet another birthday, the last one that starts with the number 5—sobering thought! Gingko made us these fabulous Baked Raspberry Tarts, which were so good we decided that it would be an excellent idea to celebrate birthdays every week during fresh raspberry season. (Recipe can be found in America's Test Kitchen Family Baking Book, an excellent resource.) 

Some things about getting older are just a pain: I'm talking menopause, all you young-uns out there who haven't experienced this miracle of nature. What survival benefits do hot flashes give us, eh, Darwin? Ah, but this road leads to bitterness, and let me tell you your mother's warning—"if you keep making that face, your face will freeze like that!"—does come true at this age as the wrinkles make themselves at home. So I will move on to nicer subjects.

Mostly I just get happier with my life—I'm less concerned about what others think, my skills are getting honed, and my active brain is filled with ideas. The problem is never boredom! I'm lucky, of course, in that I have my health and my sight and my teeth—John often notes that none of his relatives had their own teeth by the time they were 60, and having teeth goes a long way towards contentment. . . and towards enjoying Baked Raspberry Tarts.

Rachael Herron's long-awaited book of essays, A Life in Stitches, came out last week. What a captivating book! Rachael writes about her parents, her loves, her work, her pets and her friends with clear-sighted honesty (full disclosure: she writes about me, too, in a chapter about mothers and mother figures—I cry each time I read this chapter and when I hear Arlo Guthrie's The City of New Orleans). Inevitably her writing covers aging, although it's not a book about getting older:

"At least in knitting and writing—these essential parts of who I am—I can always go back and fix things. I know how. It makes me bold. And it's a comfort to know that when I knit badly or when I write poorly, I haven't really lost anything but time—and even that time has changed into something: knowledge."

As usual, Rachael was able to convey what I find myself hard pressed to find the words to express. I gulped this book down and recommend it highly.

Stranded Knitting in Interweave Knits

On a knitting note, the Fall 2011 issue of Interweave Knits includes a yarn review of four jumperweight Shetland (or Shetland-like) yarns suitable for stranded knitting: Jamieson's Spindrift, Jamieson & Smith jumperweight, Elemental Affects Natural Shetland fingering, and Harrisville Designs New England Shetland. (There's a slight inaccuracy in the description of Spindrift: It is available in some 220 colors, not simply "more than 100.") The issue includes several stranded projects (although none in the yarns listed above).

Comments

[Joan]

What a lovely raspberry tart, I hope you had a good birthday.

[Caroline]

Oh, that's an interesting point, the colorwork yarns reviewed aren't used in the colorwork projects. Just one more way IK is getting incoherent.

[Phyllis]

If you are in an area of the country where acupuncture is an accepted health modality, it can do WONDERS for toning down menopausal symptoms, including hot flashes. It did that for me, so I thought I would throw that out there.

The tarts look YUMMY, but my raspberries never make it that far. They get devoured nearly immediately...
:)
Phyllis

[Linda]

I am also in the last birthday that starts with a 5. I did manage to get the menopause thing out of the way a loooong time ago. Gave me quite a scare, I thought I was going to have to start the baby thing all over again. I breathed a sigh that it was just thyroid and menopause. Rachael's book is wonderful. I was wondering if it was you when she talked about the spinning. Then I read the chapter that mentioned you. I was so sorry to have the book end. So many things hit so close to home--it seems a lot of knitters share more than a collection of needles and yarn.

[Marilyn van Keppel]

I'm waiting eagerly for Rachael's book! And those raspberry tarts look so fab! Good job, Ginko! Oh, and once you get to the other side of menopause, it's a breeze!

[Anne]

I just love how the main knitting magazines talk about the traditional fair isle (stranded) yarns (Jamiesons and J&S) and never uses them LOL! (I thought perhaps with Eunny at the helm they night use some of these yarns but not so.......hang in there, m*nop**s* gets easier! (I find cutting out sugar helps - so send those raspberry tarts to me LOL!)

[Deb]

This week I turned 61.5 - yes, I celebrate the half year also - or at least acknowledge it. It reminds me of what I want to accomplish in that year and that I have only 6 months left! When I turned 60, I truly celebrated and breathed a sigh of relief - not because I didn't think I wouldn't make it, but because the 50's were still too much work - having to be this, having to be that, having to be here, having to be there. At 60, I feel I have entered a wonderful new era of more tolerance for myself as well as others, a chance to slow down when I choose without wondering if I am losing ground, "getting" that I know stuff and can trust what I know, dressing for myself instead of for success,etc. I have the senior memory moments, but my mind is clearer than it's ever been. It's the freedom to say it IS a beautiful raspberry tart and I'm sure it is delicious, but I don't need it - and mean it. I have my sight, my hands, and my health is manageable. I don't always recognize myself in the mirror, but that doesn't seem to matter so much anymore because I see beyond that and like what I see - truly. Be glad you're 59 - the best is yet to come.