Weekly Virtue: Recap Hope, Prepare for Love or Charity

As I said earlier, Hope is a strange one for me. I don’t consider Hope, on its own, to be a virtue.

Quote from Terry Pratchett’s The Wee Free Men:

Miss Tick sniffed. “You could say this advice is priceless,” she said. “Are you listening?”
“Yes,” said Tiffany.
“Good. Now…if you trust in yourself…”
“Yes?”
“…and believe in your dreams…”
“Yes?”
“…and follow your star…” Miss Tick went on.
“Yes?”
“…you’ll still get beaten by people who spent their their time working hard and learning things and weren’t so lazy. Good-bye.”‘

So, I generally hoped things would go well and worked towards them. Things went well.

The next virtue is Love or Charity. For this week, I’ll distinguish them by scale and tangibility. (Is that a word?)

Love is close to home, and, when they’re capable of it, they love you back. It’s an intangible. It’s a warm fuzzy feeling. In many ways, it’s an investment that creates its own reward. Hugging a kid or helping them find a sock in the drawer they still haven’t tidied. (Reminding them to put their clothes out the night before so you can find the sock while they brush their teeth, a good 12 hours before the morning rush, is even better.) Less doing, more feeling.

I’m doing okay with that, except at bed time when my daughter sleep-walks to the bathroom and cries. I need more patience then. Listen to her describe what’s wrong and do something — placebo medicine is great — to help her back to sleep. (Sitting with her doesn’t work when she’s convinced she’s in great pain.) Knitting a pet scorpion for my son (who loves scorpions and claims the hand-knit socks aren’t any better than regular socks).

Charity is actually doing something tangible, for someone you’re not close to. Tidying shelves in the library, sending money to Haiti, shoveling the neighbour’s walk when he can’t, without expecting anything back. It’s less personal.

I need to work on charity. The budget includes a reasonable amount of money, but I’m not investing much time. I used to. Two hours a week of leading Girl Guides, plus two weekend camps each year. Last year it was rolling coins for the school, but the new secretary does it now. (The new, accurate coin tray made it much faster.) Son’s class doesn’t need me for field trips anymore, and he needs the experience. The first time he went without me, he was in tears. Dtr’s class often needs me, but that’s still only a few hours every few months.

If I include Storytelling, it becomes reasonable. The money we raise at performances goes to local charities. Sometimes I go to a school. Hours spent rehearsing, meeting, advertising and actually performing adds up. I’m not sure if how effective it is, though, hour vs actual effect.

So, this week I will continue to be patient with the kids, and maintain a healthy and relaxed home for the family. To quote FlyLady, “Nothing says, ‘I love you,’ like a clean toilet to throw up in.” I will also put in enough rehearsal time so that next month’s performance goes well, and try not to resent the time I spend sending out advertisements for the guild. Not procrastinating would help the last one.

What are your thoughts, and do you have any virtue-related goals for the week?

Shorthand Dictation Files

Shorthand is a hobby of mine, but I don’t know anyone who dictates at learners’ speeds as a hobby. So, I started creating my own files. Then I decided to share them:

http://www.cricket.onebit.ca/Shorthand/HomePage

So far it’s only a few chapters of Gregg Simplified, but I’m willing to add more methods. Once I have a decent recording, it takes 5-10 minutes to produce a full set at different speeds, independent of length of passage. (Yay computers!) An original at 60wpm produces a reasonable set ranging from 40 to 90 wpm.

Contact me if you want other passages or speeds, or if you’re interested in helping.

Weekly (well…) Virtue: Recap Faith, Prepare for Hope

Mixed success with faith this week. I learned that I can manage when my faith isn’t justified. Nothing big, and not my story to tell. Suffice to say it all worked out in the end and we learned things, both about how to prepare for and do scary things, and a technical way of making this thing less scary.

Oh, and my faith that the local yarn store would have more of the yarn I started Dtr’s socks was also unfounded. Dtr said she wanted leg-warmers, then decided they should be knee socks. They always had lots of that yarn available, so I thought it was popular. Turns out it didn’t sell well. The store is in a tough niche: luxury yarns, but budget-conscious clients. It had to be “red”, so I went to a totally different feel — smooshy rather than hard — and it’s working out well. The old yarn gave warning at a good point, too.

On the other hand, the scary thing got done on the second attempt, despite my almost messing it up. The new yarn is working out well, once I got used to the different feel.

I don’t see Hope as being a virtue. The virtuous part of it, relying on Fate or God to do what you can’t, so you don’t give up on doing what you can, is Faith.

Maybe it’s like choosing a present to give the kids, but being very unsure about it. You hope they’ll like it, but not confident enough that it can be called Faith. Maybe it’s a matter of scale. I have Faith that the big picture will work out, but as I do each step it’s Hope. I Hope to get the housework done today and have Faith that the house won’t fall apart if I don’t. I Hope Son do well on the upcoming grammar test and have Faith that they will do well in life.

This one needs some thinking about.

A Published Story!

Yep, published, for a minor definition of published — but still more official than any of my work to date. Under my real name: Sandy Schoen. Yay!

http://mgddasef.blogspot.com/2010/01/how-i-got-my-agent-11.html

Weekly Virtue: Recap Courage/Fortitude, Prepare for Faith

Weekly? Hah! Total abandonment of the schedule this time.

The need for courage scared me. Why did the Fates consider this one appropriate for the holidays?

Turns out I worried for nothing. There were the usual, typical glitches, but nothing we weren’t prepared for. The kids are getting older, so even those glitches were easier to handle. (Neither of them gets sick from reading in the car, so being unable to play the audiobook wasn’t an issue. Yay!) Maybe it was a way for the Fates to tell me to Be Prepared, which I was.

Faith is an odd one for me to work on. I suspect the intention something about your relationship with God, which is difficult for an agnostic. In some ways I’ve worked on it a lot this fall. Jane’s blog is great for faith-based tidbits that make me think.

Mostly, though, when I use the word “Faith” it’s in the phrase, “I have faith that…” I have faith that my kids will turn out well, despite my parenting mistakes. I have faith that my muses will return. (They did, and are waiting patiently for me to create more room for them.) It’s a way of saying that stressing out about something will likely cause more grief then letting it happen naturally. It’s not an excuse to do nothing. One of the reasons my kids are turning out so well is they know I care enough about them to work on it, even if I might not know the best way to do it. It’s just a handy place to put the worries while I deal with the parts I can actually do something about.

In the next week, I have faith that my schedule will eventually align so I can spend an afternoon downtown celebrating my birthday. I have faith that I will maintain my new housework and learning schedule, and the results will be worth it.

What does faith mean to you?

Knitting Check List

Found this on on Ravelry. (Where else?)

Bold for stuff you’ve done, italics for stuff you plan to do one day, and normal for stuff you’re not planning on doing.

Afghan
I-cord
Garter stitch
Knitting with metal wire
Shawl
Stockinette stitch
Socks: top-down
Socks: toe-up
Knitting with camel yarn
Mittens: Cuff-up
Mittens: Tip-down
Hat
Knitting with silk
Moebius band knitting
Participating in a KAL
Sweater
Drop stitch patterns
Knitting with recycled/secondhand yarn
Slip stitch patterns
Knitting with bananafiber yarn
Domino knitting (=modular knitting)
Twisted stitch patterns
Knitting with bamboo yarn
Two end knitting
Charity knitting — does for a fundraiser for dance school count?
Knitting with soy yarn
Cardigan
Toy/doll clothing
Knitting with circular needles
Baby items
Knitting with your own handspun yarn Over the holidays!
Slippers
Graffitti knitting: knitting items on, or to be left on the street
Continental knitting
Designing knitted garments
Cable stitch patterns
Lace patterns
Publishing a knitting book
Scarf
Teaching a child to knit in progress
Knitting to make money
Button holes
Knitting with alpaca
Fair Isle knitting
Norwegian knitting
Household items: dishcloths, washcloths, tea cosies…
knitting socks- or other small tubular items- on two circulars
Dying with plant colours
Knitting items for a wedding
Olympic knitting
Knitting with someone else’s handspun yarn
Knitting with dpns
Holiday related knitting
Teaching a male how to knit – one quick lesson then he went back to his own thing
Bobbles
Knitting for a living
Knitting with cotton
Knitting smocking
Dying yarn
Steeks
Knitting art
Fulling/felting
Knitting with wool
Textured knitting
Kitchener BO
Purses/bags
Knitting with beads
Swatching
Long Tail CO
Entrelac Knitting and purling backwards
Machine knitting
Knitting with selfpatterning/selfstriping/variegating yarn
Stuffed toys
Knitting with cashmere
Darning
JewelryKnitting with synthetic yarn
Writing a pattern
Gloves
Intarsia
Knitting with linen
Knitting for preemies
Tubular CO
Freeform knitting
Short rows
Cuffs/fingerless mitts/armwarmers
Pillows
Knitting a pattern from an online knitting magazine
Rug
Knitting on a loom
Thrummed knitting
Knitting a gift
Knitting for pets
Shrug/bolero/poncho
Knitting with dog/cat hair
Hair accessories
Knitting in public

An Idea: Place to Share Small Accomplishments

Ever have a day when a checkmark, even a really big one, just isn’t enough reward for accomplishing something? What you really want to do is share it with others who understand.

There are days I could easily overwhelm my Twitter contacts with hourly (or quarterly) updates, but try to restrain myself to things that might give value to their day.

I really don’t expect people to read about all I accomplish. That would be counter-productive. The idea is to report your accomplishment and keep going, not read what others are doing. Maybe every few hours we cheer each other on.

How many would like a place to share that sort of thing.

Ideas so far:

A forum on onebit.ca . Easy to set up, but I won’t get fancy with skin and other options.

A WordPress.com blog, with multiple authors. Choose a skin with an RSS feed for comments. Or not — the goal is we update our status more often than we read others’.

(Side note: Where does the apostrophe go for plural things that belong to plural other people?)

A separate Twitter account, and a Twitter-list of people in the group.

If it’s a forum or blog, maybe one main entry per day and everyone uses that day’s comments section for status messages.

Possibly a daily quote or goal or motivation or laugh. Take turns, informal.

Point system? Very informal, humorous. A monthly award for the most points?

Weekly Virtue: Recap Restraint, Prep Courage or Fortitude

The week started with me yelling at my daughter to go faster, finish her meal, get her boots on, stop fussing about the wrinkle in her sock, and generally stop slowing things down.

Definitely something I need to cut back on, but restraint is nothing without something to replace the old behaviour.

Greene’s book The Explosive Child came back to mind. It was a good book. The premise is that when a child starts reacting, either by fighting or withdrawing, everyone has lost. The goal is to sidestep that reaction, or, failing that, shorten it. Then you can discuss it, bring up both people’s concerns, and come up with a plan. That’s only what I remember. We’ll go to the library this weekend.

I’ve put what I remember into practice, and it’s helping. A calm voice for “I’m worried that if you stop every time your sock slips we’ll be late,” or “It’s faster if I get that, may I?” usually gets a better response than telling her there’s no time. The total time of one more sock fix then running is less than a sock fix while moving and dragging her feet while crying.

Still need to work on restraint when replying to blogs. Too many cases of “one more sentence” or “Yes, the timer buzzed, but the way this is written overstates the case.” Must learn to either send or delete when the timer goes. Also helps if I actually set the timer.

I’ve also been bad about skipping the computer until the housework is done. Both times I had an excuse, but it still leads to more messing around on the internet than progress on the housework.

My life doesn’t appear to need Courage or Fortitude at the moment, beyond the seasonal routine. We’re a lucky family. All of the relatives are flexible about dates, and the excitement is spread over several small events.

Let’s hope nothing unusually stressful happens to change the routine.

I go mostly internet-free over the holiday. Not totally, but my parents have a painfully slow connection, and the kids usually want my attention. It’s nice to reconnect with non-internet life.

My normal schedule will resume sometime during the first week of January.

Hope your holidays are wonderful!

Weekly Virtue: Recap Justice, Begin Restraint

Justice was a hard one, probably because the definition is so vague. Maybe I should choose a definition to concentrate on next time it comes around.

Social justice, on a small scale, seemed the right part to work on. Easy enough at this time of the year, when all the charities are begging. We even held a (distributed) family meeting on where to send the Christmas donation.

My volunteer job has been taken over by the school secretary, so I need to find something else. Coin counting (Literally. Pizza slices are 1.25 and subs are 3.50.) was my speed. Not sure where to look next. As a teenager it was Girl Guides, but Daughter has enough on already and it doesn’t interest me anymore. Storytelling counts a bit, but not enough for me. Maybe I’ll join the group that goes to seniors’ residences. I hope to get into more schools around World Storytelling Day this spring.

Turns out I already did Justice back in October using Ben Franklin’s definition: “Wrong none by doing injuries, or omitting the benefits that are your duty.” I did reasonably well on injuries, and adequate on duty, but as I said above, that’s only because of the family Christmas donation.

The next virtue is Restraint.

Another vague one. I suspect all the Heavenly Virtues will have this problem.

Let’s see: Restrain self from getting angry or procrastinating. Restrain self from eating all those yummy cookies. I showed restraint after the concert by not bringing home all the leftover yummies. Need to think more on this one.

Rockwell vs Reality

Usual disclaimer: All research in this post done in about 30 minutes via the internet and summarized into three lines. If I omitted or mis-represented your group it was not intentional, and I’d appreciate your help in correcting the mistake.

Rockwell:

The entire family crowds around a table, laden with seasonal eats and trimmings. (In some traditions there is an abundance of home-baked sugar, in others it’s bitter herbs and ashes. Rockwell would have gone with the Americana version.)

The kids present their gaily decorated jars, filled to overflowing with carefully-saved and prayed-over coins, mostly small denominations, with the occasional crisp bill from an aunt who said, “Spend it wisely.”

They look over a list of charities and come to a consensus. The kids decorate at least three cards each (for the walls of the charity), then decorate the more formal anonymous letter from the parents. The envelope is stuffed and sealed, and they sing carols while walking three miles to deliver it in person.

Reality:

On the rare occasions Mom remembers to pay allowance (she keeps track so it all adds up by the end of the year), she also drops the agreed-on number of coins into each child’s plain manila charity envelope, decorated with the child’s name in block-letters. Sometimes she substitutes IOU notes for coins.

When the school does Jump Rope for Heart or the Terry Fox Walk, the kids empty their envelopes. Yes, the second event, only six weeks after the first, gets short-changed.

When making the chart of who has to buy for whom, she mumbles something about charity. She repeats the mumbles every so often, usually when the kids should be concentrating on something else, such as getting out the door.

Eventually, while procrastinating from housework, she looks up the average spending, to assuage her conscience. CBC report .

Canadians are cheap. (Either that or they don’t keep tax receipts.) Only 25% of families claim any donation on their income taxes, and of that the median claim is only $250 — meaning half of Canadian families donate even less. Minimum wage is $10, for $20,000 / year. 1% of that would be $200. Our family makes more than minimum wage.

Okay, maybe those stats doesn’t count the coins tossed into fountains and the grocery stores that let you add a few bucks to the total for the foodbank, but it’s still pretty bad.

The Old Testament suggests 10% of income as the magic number, and that comes from even older traditions. It’s one of the five pillars of Islam (although there’s some discrepancy of tithing 10% of income vs offering 2.5% of ones assets). Dasvandh (das = tenth, vandh = giving) is mandated in the Sikh scriptures and applies to both time in prayer and income. All said the money is to support the work of the religion (including buildings and salaries) and the poor. No faith insisted you send the money through them, although they all had sub-groups who claimed otherwise. Likewise, they all said they had expenses and would appreciate being one of the charities you support.

So, somewhere between 1% and 10% of income. Parents agree on family total and where parents’ donation will go. Leave a chunk for the “family donation” as chosen by the kids.

Back to the charming family scene:

As the kids are getting ready for school, Mom asks where their charity money should go. Repeat when they should be going to sleep and other busy times. After a few weeks of this she takes the notepad with her and writes down the answers.

While the kids are at school, she counts the contents of their envelopes and dumps the coins into the family coin bin. She also adds up donations from earlier this year and calculates how much the parents will donate. She adds the two numbers, then goes online to find the address and ends up using the online donation form and her credit card.

I dunno, doesn’t seem as personal as dropping coins into a kettle, kids don’t get the same warm glow, but it’s a step in the right direction.