closing the circle

As many readers know, I'm a weaver and have been for about ten years, so when I planned my move here, the only thing I knew I had to bring was my loom. It was my high school graduation gift, chosen for its portability (a folding loom! how awesome is that?) and versatility- I can weave something a yard wide, and have the design flexibility for almost anything. My loom came with me to college, it moved with me to Martha's Vineyard after school, it moved to Boston when I started working there. My designs have evolved from disco thread (silver filament) and black chenille in everything, to materials collected from all over the world in patterns that reflect accumulated views and ideas. The loom has been a sporadic source of income too- I never marketed, but word got around and friends and family of friends ordered scarves through the years, enough to support the habit and hobby.

Last year, when I was packing up my apartment, I sent the loom in to storage since I couldn't bring it over until I had a job and a home. It finally came in November, and when I opened it, still chilly from its days in the Eimskip warehouse awaiting customs clearance, I discovered that the sea journey had not been kind to it. Two of the most essential pieces were broken, rendering it so structurally unsound I was unable to weave it.

That was a strange day, opening all those boxes that seemed full of the energy of those strangely hot days in April last year when I packed my supplies, uncertain of when, or even where I'd see them again. Also, this one thing I had most wanted to survive had not come through unscathed. J reminded me gently that it was fixable, and that I did have insurance to pay for the parts. I called the store I'd ordered the loom from, the best fiber supplier in the East, who assured me they'd be able to send the leg and other parts I needed. I sent them a picture with the pieces I needed circled, and hoped for the best. When the pieces finally did arrive in the middle of March, they had sent the leg for the other side of the loom.

True to their awesome customer service, they sent the correct part the next day to J's brother, who gamely humped a huge box with the correct leg through Icelandair, cradled in his hiking socks and t-shirts. Last Sunday J and I finally put it back together, and my loom, after travelling so far, was finally ready to go.

I'd been planning for this for months, so I'd set aside a pile of yarn, a combination of hand-dyed wool from my weaving teacher in Vermont and skeins from the Faroe Islands, another gift. I spent the rest of the afternoon in a pile of color, textile design, and weaving pattern books, thinking of color combinations, imagining how the colors could be combined in different patterns, and looking out at the sun lighting up Akrafjall. I started winding the warp later with the warping board propped against the sun-filtered windowpane, settling back in to the familiar hand motions as the ravens sailed by outside.

Ship sighting: nothing much exciting due in today, but this morning was a nice drive past the harbor. Eldborg is still getting fixed up in the slip, the research boat is in the prime central spot, and there was a scattering of boats in the more inner part of the harbor, below Esja, shrouded in clouds and covered in snow.