Weavings © 2010 Bo Mackison
A popular ritual for welcoming in the New Year- at least in many of the blogging circles that I follow – is to choose a word for the year. This is a word that serves as a focus for the next twelve months, and seems more doable than a slew of New Year’s Resolutions that are forgotten by Leap Day.
Christine Painter in her blog Abbey of the Arts discusses the choice of a word in depth and asks these two questions.
- What is your word for the year that contains within it a seed of invitation to cross a new threshold?
- What word shimmers before you, inviting you to dwell with it until it ripens fully inside of you?
Even though we are a week into 2012, I wanted to post both her questions and my response, first to share, and second, so I have a place where it is safely documented.
Hanging Weavings © 2010 Bo Mackison
My word for 2012 is WEAVING.
When I was choosing a word, I had several ideas. I journaled about the different words, and I found weaving deep with meaning. Since I wrote in concepts and phrases, here’s the journal entry itself instead of trying to sweep that pile of thoughts and words into cohesive paragraphs:
- Weaving – take the good, the boring, the sad and the happy, the challenges and the gifts — take all and weave them together. And then I end up with a life like an intricate tapestry.
- Is weaving connected to creativity, to photography? Do I weave a photograph. Like that idea. I take a photo, but the photograph isn’t any photo, it is one where I have added myself to it, I weave myself into all of my photographs, I am a part.
- Weaving is action. Not sitting while doing nothing. Continued, purposeful action. Sweep the shuttle, pull the beater, tighten the weave, change the treadles, sweep the shuttle, pull the beater, tighten the weave. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat. A routine, a rhythm. Living my life with some routine, a rhythm would help pace my days. And calming, the repetition is calming. Add calming activities to my life.
- But weaving isn’t boring–the pattern is always changing. And life, like weaving, is always changing.
- Weave fabric. Make something beautiful, functional. And woven fabric is stable, it does not easily get distorted like a knitted or crocheted piece. Make something beautiful and useful from my life. Colorful, artistic, creative. A tapestry?
- Weaving creates that tapestry. Putting things together, stringing days together, but just one thread at a time, one step at a time. The goal is a finished piece, but mistakes are okay. In all that weaving, but almost impossible to find a misplaced thread. Make a mistake, repair it if you can, make amends if need be, and then keep on going.
- Weave with ideas. Put ideas together. Weaving is slow. Slow down, give thoughts time enough to turn into workable plans. Might be slow, but you can see the progress if you keep weaving, even doing it slowly.
- Weaving — a comfort, in the cold or harsh winds, easy to wrap a woven shawl around me for comfort and warmth.
- Weaving on my path — this kind of journey weaving is never walked on a straight, smooth sidewalk. It requires a weaving in and out, amidst obstacles, with/around people.
WEAVING — a word that will accompany me through this year.
