In the last two days, I have sewn the edges of two torn strips of a large, green bedsheet, and I have wanted to hug the woman at the Minnehaha Ave. Sew What shop for sewing the edges of two others. I have doubted every decision that I can reasonably attribute to my current position in life.

I wanted to hate my imperfect sewing machine instead of hating my utter inability to both fix the broken parts and determine which parts are even broken. (I wanted to stop writing metaphorically, stop merely hinting at what I really mean. The best I can do? I’ll just say it again.) I wanted to hate my imperfect sewing machine instead of hating my utter inability to both fix the broken parts and determine which parts are even broken.

I attended one dance rehearsal where the choreographer reworked and reworked and reworked until we found ourselves—when the time was up—at the same point of not knowing--of not having something solid, or stable, or sure. I went to the second dance rehearsal and danced and laughed and secretly chided myself for not being able to successfully lead a turn with my head, for losing my balance, for forgetting.

I almost got a sewing machine needle severely lodged in my fingernail.

I said (with mock seriousness), during a discussion about plants vs. flowers as gifts, that just because I’m wearing ugly pants and messy pigtails doesn’t mean I’m incapable of picking out a nice plant. And then I wanted to hug the women I’ve been dancing with but didn’t; I’ve learned so much from each of them.

I laughed at myself and cried to myself. I drank a beer. I asked for help. I said, “No, I don’t want help.”

I told my mom that I couldn’t hear her, that her phone was breaking up, when she started hinting about the “right person” for me. I really couldn’t hear her every word, but I could hear key phrases. She laughed and said, “You’re doing that because you don’t want to hear this. You don’t want to hear this.”

In the last two days, I’ve heard people use the idiom “trial by fire” at least three times in two different settings. In the last two days, I heard the idiom “trial by fire” for the first time.