Knitting led to cross stitch, which led to beading, which led to my current and most aggravating endeavor, quilting. I am a 26-year-old male quilter. (I don�t care if I am gay, it�s still embarrassing.)
After making a few practice quilts, I took on the hardest pattern I had seen: The Star of Bethlehem. It sounds gentle and non-imposing, doesn�t it? Names can be deceiving. Forget getting a college degree in actuarial sciences, this was far more difficult than anything I�ve ever been delusional enough to try.
And I failed.
I got through almost the whole damn thing, and the corners wouldn�t come together. I was 5 inches short on each corner, which basically led to me calmly stuffing the quilt in the closet for nearly a year and declaring that I never liked that damn quilt anyway. Quilt Shmilt.
Last night, prompted by a comment on my diary by Nividian, I forgave it for being so difficult and for making me feel like a failure. I made peace with it right before I ripped it apart. I actually just needed a few minor adjustments to the border. Check out the pictures (forgetting the fact that I haven�t put the back on and finished the edges or ironed out the wrinkles that a year in the closet is liable to cause):
And check out the troublesome corner. The precision, the beauty, it�s nothing short of a miracle:
I�m not very good at failing, even at quilts. How silly is it that I didn�t make the finalists for that funniest diary entry contest, and I don�t feel like I can write anymore. For the last five days, I tried and couldn�t get half way through a sentence without second-guessing everything I�d just written. Actually, I was in that phase before, now I�m in the vindictive phase and after every sentence I think, �I wonder if the judges will like THAT� bastards.�
It�s not very often that I try and still fail, but when I do, it�s crushing. Just ask SP after I get a failure notice from an actuarial exam, and he has to watch me, unshaven, motionless, and teary eyed, wrapped up in a quilt on the couch for a week straight.
You know those inspirational sayings,
�You win some, You lose some.�
�No pain, No gain.�
�You�ve got to get back up on the horse.�
Fuck those sayings. What Stuart Smalley drone came up with those? I want a new saying,
�You win some, It�s ok to cry a lot if you don�t.�
�No pain, thank god.�
�Shoot the fucking horse already.�
Well, despite the lack of belief in inspirational gobbledy-gook, I think I made a great leap forward in my emotional development yesterday. I may have shot the horse, but I still got back on him and together we rode to Bethlehem.
