The Road Not Taken
by Robert Frost
Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;
Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,
And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.
I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.
When I was in school I learned this poem and out of all the poems, novels and plays I studied this one has stuck with me. There are so many times in life where you are presented with options and want to do both. You stand at a crossroads and must choose. This also happens with design work; every step along the way is a decision. Each choice is not necessarily good or bad – just different.
When I spent a year in art college we ended the year with a project. We picked a topic and then spend the next several months examining it from different angles. There were charcoal drawings, pastel drawings, long lost sculptures and paper texture work. I’ve recently rediscover a lot of this in my parents attic and it’s made me a little nostalgic! (And yes, my project was on a prawn…it smelled really, really dreadful after several months even with freezes between uses.)
Over the coming months I’m starting a new project. I’m gradually piecing together in my head how I want it to work. It will be an exploration of colour combinations and gradients. I want to do more than a single design, it feels like this is a project that needs to take as many forks on the road as possible. There will be swatches, tutorials, patterns and project options. I think an e-book released over a series of weeks or months a chapter at a time that travels on the exploration journey with me would be the most useful for knitters.
Anyone want to join me on this journey?
Your art work is great, and I’m really looking forward to the results of your playing.
That sounds fascinating! I would love to come along.
This sounds really interesting!
There’s something so wonderful about being able to spend your days just drawing or painting; I miss it too. Though most of the drawings I’ve kept involve nudity! (I really loved life drawing).
Oh, and I heard stories of previous students using fish & stinking out the college studio space… was that you?! ;)
Absolutely! I’m in!
I’ve always loved that poem too! It is so true of life’s journey. I’m really interested to see what you come up with next. Our house had lots of smelly projects also when our son was in art college.
I was definitely one of them…people kept quite a distance from me in the last few weeks :-)
Sounds very interesting. Will you be needing testers or sample knitters? If so, I have done a quite a bit of that. Finnknitter on Ravelry.
I’m working my way through your Craftsy courses and some of the projects in your book, Contemporary Irish Knits. I’ll follow your road “less travelled” and wish you luck and the wind at your back.
This sounds awesome. Would love to join you.
Carol, I’d love to join you. Dorothy
Sounds very interesting to me. I am in!
Love the prawn project :)
This journey sounds exciting, count me in! I really need to find the fun in knitting again, this could even be a New Year’s thingy!!
I am in!
I do sometimes! I’ll give a shout out.
It sounds very interesting! I’d like to join you. You are very generous for sharing
It sounds like the internet … Which inviting way to choose, then one path leads to another, and it is not always easy to return to the beginning.