A is for...

Assurance.  Bet you thought I was going to say Asperger’s.

I wonder if people are used to thinking more in terms of reassurance?  I know that with my kiddos, we try to be repetitive with the good messages and provide a lot of reassurance when they’re on the right track – or when they aren’t on the right track and we’re trying to convince them they can be!

The holiday season is upon us, and Boyo is dancing as a Party Boy in Ballet Northwest's The Nutcracker again this year.  As it gets closer to opening night, the rehearsals get longer and more frequent, and the schedule gets more complicated for the family.  I’m happy about that, because he loves it.  Even more importantly, it makes a huge impact on his attitude and behavior, because it’s a wonderfully positive, supportive atmosphere, and he rests in the assurance of his dance teachers that he will be successful.  Boyo works hard at dance and it burns off energy and anxiety, leaving him much more relaxed and allowing him to be more patient and kind to his sister.

Do we ever stop needing assurance?  No; in fact, if you think about it you have some sort of assurance in place every day.  Your insurance company assures you they’ve got you covered if anything untoward should happen while you’re out on the road.  The weatherman assures you that whatever is in the forecast is what you can expect to see in the sky.  You can rest assured that, with your usual ingredients, your go-to recipe is going to turn out exactly the way you like it. 

We rely on this.  It’s what faith is made of.  My friend Rhondi assured me that I could write a blog – I love her faith in me J

In my knitting, I’ve learned that with most sock yarns I can use US 0 (2 mm) needles and be assured of getting 9 stitches per inch – so much so that I can check the gauge by eye and know if it’s close enough.  If I’m following a pattern I may have to adjust the stitch count; otherwise I just go on with the basic toe up guidelines as written on Fleegle’s blog, and I've done it so many times I know it by heart.  I get a sock that fits, every time.  

That’s a long way from the days when I was convinced I’d never be able to knit socks, and a friend assured me that yes, I could, all I had to do was follow the pattern one step at a time.  Two dozen pairs later, I think socks have become a metaphor for me, and an assurance that everything will be all right.  In knitting, and in life – one step at a time.