Long Runway.

I have completed a second mystery KAL.  It's very far outside of my usual knitting comfort zone (which does shift in terms of technique but not usually with colour).  It's huge, knit in fingering weight yarn (close to 2000 yards of it), and very colourful.  It took me a long time to pick the colours, and even though it's very beautiful now, I'm not convinced I'll wear it.  I usually choose solids, and muted colours.  If I'm combining colours, it's usually in either a muted palette or a very predictable one.   Otherwise, the colours are too bright, too contrasting, too... much. 

I find lots of things 'too much'.  I read a blog post called "When you have a long runway" and named my shawl Long Runway.  The gist of the post: it takes some people a while to make decisions, act on their thinking, speak their minds.  Not because they don't have an opinion but because the thought process is so complicated and deep that saying the exact thing you mean to say, the moment you mean to say often never happens (to borrow a phrase from "You've Got Mail").   

I have a long runway.  I think a lot before I act, I deliberate all the options, I consider perspectives and consequences.  I'm not impulsive, risk-taking, or impractical.  So to buy 2000 yards of multi-coloured fingering weight yarn for a 'mystery' project that I may not like in the end is so far out of my comfort zone.  That said, I love the process of knitting with a group and keeping up (or trying to keep up) with the clues.  

In the end, the wrap represents the process of being bold, and slightly brave.  I realize it's just knitting and not a life-changing decision.  But I believe we make choices based on habit, decisions based on past experiences and patterns.  Next time I'm unsure and reach for the familiar, I can remind myself that it might be okay to do something differently.  Maybe.