wanting some bright

 I did decide to start a new project after all. I had run across some of the yarns I had bought the past few trips to Quixotic Fibers, and found these two (matching) skeins of Gusto Wools "Echoes"

so I wound them off:

It's one of those semi-gradient yarns, where there will be very wide stripes of each color. The paired skeins are to make it easy to get matching socks.

For my own memory: I pulled off 2 yards worth from the purple outside and did the cast on with that; that will allow me to match them pretty well. 

I also cast on the standard 64-stitch fingering weight socks, and got some rows of the ribbing done. No color change yet:

I'm going to do the ribbing for maybe 2" and then change to stockinette. 

I also pulled off (but did not wind off) a silk blend in pale yellow for a pair of fingerless mitts. 

***

Continuing reading on "Blackout"

Last night, a bit of it made me cry, but in a good way. I can't really do this without some vague spoilers, but - the story centers around three time travelers, whose noms de guerre are Mike, Eileen, and Polly.

Polly is posing as a shopgirl in London, with the backstory she came from somewhere "north."

Of course she is all alone. She manages to find a furnished room with a somewhat-harridan of a landlady, and employment, and it seems like everyone is very strict and very short with her. And because it's the beginning of the Blitz, she winds up having to shelter in the basement of a church with a motley crew of others - the rector, and a man with a dog, and a couple of older ladies (one who knits*), and a couple young (20 something I guess) women, and a mother with three daughters, and a man she thinks at first is an aristocrat but turns out to be a Shakespearean actor.

(*very likely the age I am now is the age of one of those women....)

And she becomes friendly with them. And the actor calms the little girls during the worst of the alerts by reciting Shakespeare, and the mother tells them stories, and the young women talk about clothes and dances, and it's almost like a little family there.

And then one night she doesn't go there to shelter, and comes back, and finds the church destroyed, and assumes her friends are dead. (At that point I had to put the book down for a couple days).

Well, I just hit the point in the novel where Polly walks into an Underground station and finds one of the young women - still alive, fine, who presses a cup of tea and a sandwich on her. And the rector! And the mother and her three daughters! And the man with the dog! And even the actor! Everyone is okay!

and oh, it hit me hard. I think it's because I've lost a lot of people I loved this past decade, and I have had dreams where I encountered some of them again, and they were healthy and whole, and for a few moments it was so wonderful, until I woke up. (And yes, Polly thinks she is dreaming at first)

But also, the idea of the reunion. And Polly having friendly faces again after several days alone, thinking they were dead....so maybe I'm finally getting to the "hopeful" part of the book (and there is a second volume, called "All Clear," where I presume everything is finally put right).

But it struck me again, the power of a book, words on a page, to make me think and feel all the things that short passage did....