Yin and Yang.

As has been mentioned before, I have a decided lean toward Eastern Philosophy. It's not something where I woke up one morning and thought "I think I'm gonna follow Eastern philosophies from now on". More it was decades of reading and thinking and seeking and finally running across some Eastern religions and philosophies, and going "HEY. That's what I've always thought."

So I don't really consider myself Taoist, but, dang, if you read up on it, it's like I wrote the less-wise bits of them. Especially the parts about Piglet and Pooh.

Balance is one of the biggies for me. I've always thought that the universe, the world, and an individual's life, are balanced, or will be if you let them. That means accepting the negative as well as the positive, and realizing that one leads to the other. The Taoists have a symbol for that. I'm sure you've all seen it, so I got an image with some concepts written in it.

Yin and Yang. Dark and light. Evil and good. Jackassery and common sense. Chocolate and peanut butter. You get the idea.

So, this week, well, the week, she has sucked, as the French would say. (I'm reading a book on French cuisine. You've been warned.) Yesterday's brouhaha was... heck, it wasn't even the tip of an iceberg. It was like a snowflake on the tip of a giant iceberg of shit that I've been dealing with, only about 25% of which has been bitched about around here, for legal reasons. (You know it's a good time when the term 'for legal reasons' is thrown around.) At other times of my life, when things really sucked, I started doing good stuff on purpose, just random anything positive, to try and get something moving around and sort of trigger good stuff, 'cause obviously wallowing in pits of negativity isn't gonna fix anything. Usually. I was still in the wallowing point today, though.

By this morning, I'd about had it with the outside world in general, and in particular was wondering how to crash the internet (I know it's not possible; let me dream). As I was hunched over the computer, shoveling shit and muttering to myself, the husbeast came in and handed me the mail.

First was a note from Roxie. She's buying some wool from me, which is cool. See, I dyed up a bunch of wool, expecting some traffic through my Etsy shop after the last Knitty article, and Knitty got the web addy wrong for my shop and I never got that traffic (to my knowledge they never fixed it, either, even though I asked). The wool sat around in the shop for three months, then rotated into non-moving stock, and in fact I was gradually spinning it up for sale or personal use; that's where the Summer Berries yarn AND the Dreamsicle socks came from. Then, out of the blue, I get this message from Roxie, asking if I could custom dye her something that was ALREADY SITTING THERE! So I cut her a deal and everybody's happy.

And here's this happy reminder of a sale, and some pretty cool kismet, with a funny note. Hm.

The second thing in the mail was a box. I'd been told it was coming, but in my snarling nasty fit, I'd forgotten. Remember the Starf? The friend I knit it for makes jewellery. And when she got the Starf, she loved it, and realized I knit with beads, and the next thing I know...

Beads all over my kitchen table. These are exactly the kind I need to experiment with bead knitting, and now I don't have to go buy any. I have a box full to choose from! (Most of them are so awesomely pretty I'm gonna save 'em up for knitting after I figure out what I'm doing, though.)

I went out shopping to pick up some ribbon I need to finish a floral project. I hit a couple sales at 50% off, including one at the book store, where I found a book that was EXACTLY what I've been looking for, right there on the shelf I've ransacked twenty times before.

The computer mouse I'd been using had died (more annoyance), so I went in to buy another, and...

IT'S PINK! INNIT CUUUUTE?

The cycle's still cycling. I just need to remember it. Around, and around, and around, balancing in a self-correcting cycle, if we just sit back and let it all work itself out. Sure, there's negative shit in there, but there's positive too, and if it were all positive, it'd get really boring, wouldn't it? Though, in the future, I'd prefer the negative spread out a little more. Just sayin'.

Hopefully the rest of the issues will work themselves out so smoothly. But they'll balance, one way or another. I've just gotta remember that.

---

Finished the first bobbin of Frog in a Blender.

For those who can't remember, the joke goes like this:
What is red and green and goes around in circles at a thousand miles an hour? A frog in a blender.



Just finished the editing and spell check. THE NEW MOUSE IS AWESOME AND PINK.