a simple yarn

You’ve heard of the red car syndrome, haven’t you? I buy a red car and, behold, the scales fall off of my eyes and I now see the millions of red cars on the road, which I never knew were there before! For me, it was Ralph Waldo Emerson who began it, not that I’m saying Emerson drove a red car…

…but what I am saying is that his quote, ‘All life is an experiment,’ has opened my eyes to seeing the weekly, daily or hourly experiments in life that bring about interesting, and many times unexpected, results. And so, after Life Experiment No. 1: Vegetables, I stumbled into another one yesterday.

Labels
Perhaps I’m wrong, but I don’t think I’m a label-monger. By that I mean I dont particularly purchase something because of the label it bears. Mind you, I like quality and don’t aim to purchase junk, but the label itself is incidental to me. (Okay…I think I have to amend that statement were I to be totally forthcoming….espresso has to be Lavazza. The Italians just know how to do cappuccino!) Right, so besides the espresso issue, most other areas of my life are not dominated by labels.

And so it was I approached the spinning wheel acquisition. Didn’t have much money to lay out for one, especially after shipping the loom. Have a weaving demonstration gig coming up that will bring in a little cash. Bought what I could afford. Then Husband-Will put it together for me:

I have to be honest that as he did, my heart did a little flump and thoughts randomly flitted through my brain to the tune of ‘you’ve been ripped off…some schmuck put this together in his garage with the Craftsman tool set he got for Christmas and you’re a schmuck for buying it when you could’ve saved your shekels and bought a real wheel….you get what you pay for, so there!’

Why not a Louet? Or an Ashford? Or any other name brand rather than this home-made monstrosity! Will other, real spinners look at my wheel and snigger? Labels.

A bit of adjustment here and fine tuning there and I sat down to have a trial run. Baited breath.

Do you know that thing spun a bit of roving like a dream? (At least in my I’m-so-untrained-I’m-probably-just-blowin’-smoke-opinion) And, as I got to looking at it in my work-room-formerly-known-as-the-living-room, I really like the not-quite-full-size-ness of it. Low profile, like the loom, so it doesn’t overwhelm the room. Granted, it’s a little off-beat and certainly isn’t mainstream, but I think that’s what I like about it! Pfft, I’m such a dope for all of my ‘what-will-others-think’ paranoia.

Most importantly, though, do you know the label I’ve learned to like best about it? Paid in full.