Erin's land journal

I'm writing about sewing again, but this is really a post about clothing in general.

Most of the time clothing is at least a little uncomfortable for me. It can be a problem in several ways: it can restrict movement, which then limits my abilities and can also be hard on my muscles and joints since I have to do movement workarounds to accomplish what I need to. It can give me distracting or painful sensations, anything from full-on hives or shooting pain in my legs to just low-level static that I don't notice which takes up some cognitive load to manage. And then, it can fail to keep me protected from the elements so I'm cold (or whatever) (and then can still have those other issues).

Clothing has always been uncomfortable for me so I don't think about it much. I grew up in a place where clothing was necessary for comfort but not for survival and most of my clothing was from thrift stores; it kind of fit, it was made from whatever.

When I was just out of high school, I remember my mom trying to get my brother go to for walks. He lived with dad, and he wouldn't. Eventually they realized that his shoes were too small, so it hurt him quite a bit to walk with her. I remember thinking at the time that limiting comfortable clothing was such an effective way of controlling someone, of limiting their ability to take joy in the world outside their home.

When I first started summer studenting up north I had more freedom to get myself clothing than I'd had before, ever: I was making some money, and it was important that I spend some of that money on clothing that enabled my work; you don't go to the bush in jeans. I bought into a mostly-proper layering system, on sale so weird colours and kind of cobbled together from merino or standard waffle knit skin layer pants with used army pants over them; a wicking running sock with wool oversocks; thin quick-dry tank tops with either sheer cotton men's dress shirts or my one prized brand-name moisture-moving thick wicking long-sleeved shirt; a brand-name slightly puffy zip jacket. I wasn't entirely new to this sort of thing, since I'd been working in landscaping for years, but in landscaping I could work harder when I was cold and soak a headscarf with a hose if I was too hot. It was in landscaping where I started wearing a headscarf, which is possibly the best extreme-weather-mitigating piece of clothing I've found. In timber cruising it was full speed ahead through effectively an obstacle course, lifting legs to step over hip-height or belly-height logs, bending down and slithering under, all that jazz. Then, once I got to the plot, it was standing still and taking very careful measurements for an amount of time, writing it down, and starting the whole thing over again. My clothing also had to deal with unconventional movements: lifting my legs up to belly-button height to climb over logs, or bending to squirm under them.

I more-or-less got the right clothes. This is where I started to learn that clothing didn't have to be uncomfortable, but I didn't fully realize it at the time. I was living in a cold environment so I couldn't use the clothing workarounds I'd used before, light unconfining dresses and tank tops. A lot of people wore this sort of bush clothes to the bush. Cold in the north just didn't affect my body as much. I did notice just a little that when I went back to the coast for the winter I felt freer outside but I just thought I was in better shape, or didn't think too much of it.

Fast forward seven years and a lot of those clothes have worn out. I'd sewn a batch of similar stuff my second year in the bush to supplement what I got on sale the first year; it's much cheaper to sew with fancy fabrics than it is to buy already-sewn objects. I've spent the last couple years buying the cheapest versions of the more obviously-necessary layers (merino long underwear wears out fast, especially the cheap stuff) and my outer layers have been slowly degrading and I've been wearing whatever is to hand overtop: stretch jeans, socks meant to be an all-in-one system, long underwear tops with a scarf since my fancy light jackets have been seriously compromised at this point. My favourite non-farm boots wore out and the new pair, bought more cheaply, is still insulated but doesn't breathe as well so my feet get damp and then cold, especially without a two-layer sock system.

My world gets smaller.

And I don't just mean I'm not as good in the bush. As I conserve that fancy expensive wear for bush work I wear lined jeans or cotton shirts with a sweater in the house or to work, and my world there is smaller too. My house is really unevenly heated, so I avoid sitting in the cooler parts of it. The waistband on jeans or bought long underwear doesn't fit as well, so it does that weird thing where when I sit for too long my legs get jumpy and painful. I spend less time outside since it's usually colder. I spend less time bending and stretching since my clothes have far less range of position than my body does, so I avoid activities that ask for bending and stretching; I sew a little less, I garden a little less, I never spontaneously break into dance in my livingroom. I don't go outside and get down on the ground with the animals as much because the warm stuff I have left is more like conventional sweaters, and it picks up dirt and straw. I'm less likely to go for walks with folks at work because my boots are more slippery on the bottoms than my old ones. My warm gloves wore out so I just don't touch things in the winter as much; not as many projects get done.

And not just my movement is limited. My expectation of comfort reduces as well. Little by little I tune out the scratchy itchy whine of my skin when there's cool pressure put on it, or the hot prickle of bits of straw that aren't excluded by the loose weave of cheap long underwear or by an outer layer that I go without as often as possible because it bites into my upper hips. Little by little I associate being too cold with being out of bed and going about my day is tinted with shoulders lifted and tensed against that discomfort.

None of these are huge impositions. I'm not shivering in a corner over here; if I was I'd get a blanket. I can bend down and touch my toes better than most people even in jeans over long underwear. I don't know whether this is a sensory sensitivity thing, if most people just don't experience this kind of limitation from their clothing. I don't know if this is a poor thing, if most people allocate a larger percentage of their budget and are more able to regularly get clothing that suits their needs.

I do know that it erodes my quality of life.

So this winter I spent a bunch of money on fancy fabric; military surplus and off-print technical fabric to cut down on price. I spent enough to buy maybe even four fancy outer garments. I'm slowly working my way through sorting patterns to fit my body, and then I expect to turn out several years' worth of garments. This post is being written in my second tester shirt; the first one I wore, unfinished and not quite the right fit, three times in the first week I made it. This one I put on to test the neckline (need to adjust it) and I haven't been able to bring myself to take it off. It's comfortable.

I'm looking forward to being warm again, and being able to move again?

But also as I do this I'm feeling so grateful to what allows me to take on this project: some days off over the winter, and lots of time to myself in the evenings. A storage container supplied by a friend that allows me to have enough room to store things outdoors, which allows a clear sewing table indoors for a couple months and which will allow for stored extra fabric. A sewing machine I had the luxury of toting with me through over a dozen moves, and another machine given me by a friend. A lineage of women who sewed: my grandmother's sewing machine that I learned on, my mom's patience and willingness to explain principles and then allow me freedom to play on the machine as a child instead of making it a chore I was doing wrong. A short course in high school that contained a sewing element. An explosion of sewing videos on youtube, which help me understand the flippy funhouse-mirror spatial aspects of constructing shapes out of other shapes. And the time, patience, and cognitive function to think through my plans, to test things, to problem-solve those tests, to try again and again until I understand what's wrong, fix that thing, and manage to do it right. These are all rare in life, luxuries that support the luxury of my fancy garments.

Clothing is one of those things humans do; it allows us to adapt to so many environments. The right clothing allows us to adapt better to environments, sometimes in surprising ways. Tonight I'm thinking about how different my experiences of that adaptation have been, and wondering just how much quality of life could be improved if everyone could access comfortable, suitable clothes.

drive through the night:
the feeling of morning;
vision before colour

I got up at 4 in the morning so I could give the stove a bit of a burn on fresh wood before turning it down. The road was dark but not snowy, frosty but not wet. Newly-painted centerlines stood out under my single aging headlight and my high beams had a long reach. Sometimes I had company on the highway, usually in clumps going to the mill, to the pipeline camps, to a town. Often I was alone and that was better.

The Highway of Tears is becoming familiar. The cell signal is much better courtesy of a political push; this is how we deal with missing indigenous women (though to be fair the men die at a pretty high rate too): we put money into a program, in this case into some company's pockets. They put a bus in down here too, though it's not tremendously useful. Meanwhile the folks north of me, in Middle River and Takla, apparently call the ambulence when they are in dire need of a ride to town.

There was a lot of dark this morning. When I woke up, when I pulled out of the driveway with my grow lights shining through the window behind me, the sky was the clear bowl full of stars that dominates our winter landscape. The moon was a sliver superimposed on a sphere, low near the trees, and it took a very long time for the sky to grow pale grey behind me as I headed west.

There's no snow on the fields. The word I associate with this open, windblown, waiting-for-winter feeling is sere, colourless-dun and patient. When the light came up I was in the Bulkley Valley as it opens up, as the mountains rise to shape a valley, as the trees retreat to the hills and leave even the patchwork of the previous valley. With the mountains it feels wilder; with the fields it feels cozier and more settled. I like it here.

When I stopped for gas I could tell it was light because the truck, still for the first time in three hours, started crowing. The ducks were upset, chattering away, and that's always hard on my heart.

Three days of especially hard labour, of angling the vibrating pressure washer to kick up a minimum of bird-shit-spray, stray, and feathers into my eyes and sinuses as the light fled; of rounding up the ducks and pulling out the keepers over and over as they kept running back to rejoin the main group; of hauling and pushing and pulling heavy carriers as gently as possible; of carrying bucket after bucket of grain to every group of animals so they'd have days of food for the day I was gone and for an extra day in case something happened; finally four hours of relentless driving in the dark until the light crept up behind me and a bright spot of sunrise showed in the south (why the colour just in the south? I have no idea).

Unloading was easy, having enough carriers is a blessing that way since the animals don't need to be transferred.

The morning was for errands, but first I passed a sign that said "Alpine World" on the highway. When I stopped, the man who ran the plant shop said he'd forgotten to bring in the sign the other day and gave me a two-for-one deal on winter-bare potted apple trees: a Gloria and a State Fair will join my collection. We chatted about apples for a bit, then I moved on. The feed store was less helpful: $22 for a bag of layer pellets ($48 for organic) and I figure I should just wait till I get home. Then the wholesale place, where I get my yearly bakery-quality flour to mix with my home-ground stuff and where I picked up hedgehog mushrooms grown by a small local company. Since I'm innoculating logs with them I might as well taste them, right? The "taste like crab" thing arouses both my suspicion and my interest.

I'm also somewhere I can replace the headlight that went out the day before, so I picked up one of those and some oil. I think she might be burning a little oil? Too hot to check right now though.

By that time it was 11, and my check-in at the hotel was 1:30. I borrowed their parking lot, right in downtown, and walked to lunch and to more errands and sightseeing: replacing insurance, getting soft pretzels and doughnuts for lunch on the road tomorrow, inhaling and looking for inspiration in the european deli/sausage shop, picking up beer from the local brewery, looking at potter's shops and bookshops.

Halfway through my plate of pierogies and sour cream I noticed a cat come to the front door of the restaurant and sit expectantly in front of the glass. After a nod from the owner I let him in and he stalked meaningfully into the back room; twenty minutes later as I was nearing the bottom of my London Fog he stalked back out and sat by the door again, at which point I let him out. "It's not my cat" the owner said, "but he can come in"

The most delightful part of the town was the little farm/craft hub. It had two walls of fridge and freezer cases, with each little section labelled with a different farm: this one had lamb, this one had pork, this one had frozen meat pies. I was badly tempted by another set of mushrooms, and by a mushroom grow kit, but my strategy of doing a full circle of the place before picking up a shopping basket paid off: I was over budget, but not as much as I could have been.

Beside the fridges and freezers were tables of storage produce, mostly garlic and squash at this time of year. There was a bunch of baking, dried mushroom powder and coffee and jerky, and then the other wing of the building was occupied by arts and crafts. All sorts of paintings were on one wall, glass baubles hung from the ceiling, and a blacksmith's display of hooks and pokers took up the back. Textile arts and cosmetics were displayed in two rows down the center, each arranged by artist as the food had been arranged by farmer. Here was a farmer that raised their own alpacas and spun impossibly soft scarves; there was someone who sewed waterproof canvas diaper covers and bags; on the other wall was jewellery and sweaters and round hats and pointy hats.

Altogether it was perfect: in effect a condensed farmer's market full of lovely displays closely side-by-side. The lovely variety and texture of goods was highlighted by how closely the displays could be spaced: unlike a farmer's market there was no crowd and no one was standing behind their goods watching. Lacking the budget to buy paintings I bought three greeting cards from one artist and four from another which will get clustered in frames in my two bathrooms. I chose three kinds of garlic because of course I did, music and spanish roja and marino, half of each to eat and half to plant. The music was notably bigger than the others. I also brought three chocolate bars out with me, half-sized ones (!) suitable for my way of eating sweets: sour cherry with light and with dark chocolate, and a peanut dark chocolate. The mushroom kit remained behind, as did the soft fingerless driving gloves and the frozen spanakopita and the blacksmith's towel hooks.

With that I checked into the hotel. When I reserved the room I asked for something on the top floor (I don't like people above me) with a bathtub and that's what I got. With a courteous "are you alright with stairs" I was given actual keys and headed down the long corridor, up the stairs, and then back the length of the building to find a big, old, worn, sparkling clean, comfy room facing a quiet back street. One thirty, time to collapse, to touch base with folks, to just enjoy the feeling of...

...there's nothing. My hobbies aren't here (though I brought patterns and books to read) and folks are still at work. These days of working my body hard (I was hobbling last night until I put on my muscle salve) and planning and keeping the pressure on myself let up into this evening of perfect release where I sit in a hotel room and contemplate the options of bath or nap, pizza or sushi, light from a bulb or an open window.

I love this feeling and I also can't get here without the buildup. A lack of demands is in itself a demand, and I can't experience it except when the cliff of necessary work falls out from under me and I'm left in midair, still trying to run and finding that instead I'm flying. In a good world I fly far enough to land on the next, carefully-chosen cliff and dig into another good run followed by another flight, and so on. Pacing those leaps and those runs is everything, is the difference between energy and burnout, is the difference between flying and crashing.

There's room in this space for all of me, for delight in the farm hub and deep sadness as the way the goslings' father called after them as I carried them away, for the texture of locally-raised beef jerky strips and lazy contemplation of dinner and the sideways leap of just sitting and writing instead of any of that. There's room for feeling capable and confident as I look up headlight replacement videos and for relief at being able to go home from a place where civil rights stickers in the windows are all in reference to vaccines and masks and wistfulness and envy and possible future thoughts about living somewhere full of small farmers and a little hub I could contribute to. There's room for my body to be tired and for the bed to come up and support it and for me to stay sitting up, typing, with the silvery feeling of exhaustion in my head and for that to be an ok choice.

Pizza or sushi? Bath or nap? I could install the headlights first, even?

Either way, I made it. I did all of it, on my own, and I am here fully filling up my space.

Vision first, but then: colour.