Wordplay

I like words. In the manner I was taught, if I don't know a word, I stop what I'm doing and look it up. Back in the day of petticoats and parasols, this meant keeping a very heavy dictionary and possibly a thesaurus next to wherever I happened to be perched. Now, it's easier. The dashboard on my Macbook (which is pretty spiffy looking minus the cracks) has a dictionary right there. It helps with all sorts of things including spelling. Online dictionaries are a click away. And, they are bookmarked.

The first time I encountered the word paradigm (a couple of decades ago) was in relation to a hospital management change in philosophy, or model of care and management. It would seem that we would be using ancillary staff to manage patient care under the supervision of the licensed nurse (read me) in order to free up said nurse for MORE responsibilities. They said we (nurses) had to change our paradigms and learn to think differently about patient care. I went home and looked this word up and immediately filed it in a special spot in my brain. I would later pull this word out of thin air and use it to describe any bullshit scenario in which I thought someone had to change their way of thinking. More likely, I used it whenever management was deemed to be up to it's old tricks. It's a great word for just such occasions.

This is what my trusty Merriam-Webster online dictionary says about the word paradigm:

par·a·digm
Pronunciation:
\ˈper-ə-ˌdīm, ˈpa-rə- also -ˌdim\
Function:
noun
Etymology:
Late Latin paradigma, from Greek paradeigma, from paradeiknynai to show side by side, from para- + deiknynai to show — more at diction
Date:
15th century
1: example, pattern; especially : an outstandingly clear or typical example or archetype
2: an example of a conjugation or declension showing a word in all its inflectional forms
3: a philosophical and theoretical framework of a scientific school or discipline within which theories, laws, and generalizations and the experiments performed in support of them are formulated; broadly : a philosophical or theoretical framework of any kind

I think, example 3 is what our management wanted-for us to change the way we were used to doing things and do it their way. This meant having unlicensed personnel perform the tasks that prior to this, were done solely by nurses. Ah. Don't get me going here (I know you didn't, I did it to myself.) And, this didn't start out as a post about nursing-it's one about knitting.

I'm changing my knitting paradigm. I'm re-learning to knit socks on 2 circular needles and I like it. In some ways, it's so much easier to manage and delivers a slightly better product. No more ladders (loose stitches where one moves from needle to needle that form ladders where the joins are.) The other benefit is that I don't worry about stitches falling off the end of my needles when I set the socks aside.

au revoir to my collection of not so inexpensive double pointed needles

this is only a bit of what I own

It isn't easy to learn new tricks but it's what keeps my knitting fresh. I like challenges. Last year, I signed up for the yahoo group Mystery Stoles 3. It was my first foray into knitting lace, using knitting charts and playing with yarn not much thicker than thread. In Mystery Stoles, a weekly clue in the form of a chart was released. You had a week to knit it up and then the next was released. I made it half way and abandoned it. I didn't like the opposite end of the shawl at all. It was a wing and made the shawl asymmetrical-this didn't appeal to me. I like it all orderly. It was a stunning piece, don't get me wrong. It just wasn't me and I fell out of like with the whole thing. I haven't tossed it. It's just in time out until I decide that I'll either finish it, frog it or I need those size 4 Addi Turbo Lace needles. I'm betting on needing the Addis. In the event you think I'm alone with this knitting fanaticism, when Mystery Stole 3 started, we knitters temporarily overwhelmed Yahoo's server.

Here is my next SW victim's sock in profile. Have I told you lately that I LOVE this yarn?

Knitting the socks in profile is the hardest thing for me to wrap my head around. I'm used to having all the instep stitches on 1 or more usually, 2 needles and the soles on 1 and again more likely, 2 needles. Prior to this, I used 5 needles to knit socks and mittens. It's foreign to me to have half the instep and soles stitches on one needle and the remainder on the other-knitting in profile. I've found myself using multiple markers to keep myself oriented to the important parts of the sock. I like it a lot for trying it on for size. I've snapped many bamboo or clover needles trying them on for size like in the picture below.

It hasn't been hard to change my paradigm in respect to knitting in the round. Bolstered by this, I next plan to learn to knit magic loop socks. I'm excited about that. I'm embracing change these days and it's ok.