From the Desk of Heather Gallant, 577 Executive Director
“The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes, but in having new eyes.” ~ Marcel Proust
For children, learning something new is an everyday experience because everything is new. Children are largely free of expectation and preconceptions, filled with curiosity and open to a world of possibilities. For them, in the words of Proust, every day is a “real voyage of discovery,” with new eyes. What else could it be?
For adults, it’s harder to have new eyes. Over the years, we’ve tried to carefully curate our lives to be as predictable as possible. We’ve lived long enough to avoid discomfort and eschew new experiences, especially if we think we won’t enjoy it or immediately be good at it. We can dwell in this predictability, in familiar environments. We think we know how things work. We think we know what will happen next. We pursue comfort in food, entertainment, company, and more.
Until we can’t.
No matter what, as humans we will encounter discomfort. Sometimes it’s in the form of an illness or unwelcome diagnosis. Sometimes it’s the messy work of being with other humans, or the dog barking next door, or traffic, or simply a dollop of “wintery mix” down the back of our coat collar. Discomfort is inevitable because we are interconnected with everything around us. We do not live alone in this world, we cannot control for every variable that comes our way, and we are sensory beings who can, by and large, smell, taste, hear, see, feel, and think – often all at the same time.
What’s interesting is this: we can train ourselves to be less sensitive to discomfort by cultivating curiosity and practicing creativity. By putting ourselves in uncomfortable learning situations with the mind of a beginner, we open ourselves up to more possibilities and find a more satisfying comfort within the discomfort.
For example: Me + crochet.
I can’t tell you how many times I’ve tried and failed at crochet.
People would try to show or tell me how it worked, but it was as if they were speaking a different language. My loops looked weird. One would be too tight for the hook, while the next was so loose it was comical. Things got knotted up. Why did it look like that? I grew frustrated because I expected to be good at this. I’m good at a few things, why not this? Why aren’t my fingers working the way theirs are? Why couldn’t I unlock the crochet code? I gave up.
But one day, my colleague held an impromptu crochet salon at our annual staff appreciation party back in 2023. It didn’t matter what we were making. We were just trying something for fun, enjoying each other’s company. Her patient demonstration, being together with an entire group of friendly beginners, the lack of pressure to get it “right,” and her way of checking in with each of us and adapting her message based on what she knew about each of us finally cracked crochet for me.
I was hooked (pun intended).
This is the type of experience we offer at 577 every day. It’s the opportunity to be a beginner, to feel the discomfort of learning in a supportive, comfortable environment with others, to relieve the pressure of immediate proficiency and focus more on the joy of discovery with new eyes. It’s the process of creating something yourself.
This is how we experience real life together.
A week or so after I got hooked (ha!) on crochet, I decided to practice on a massive project and started a blanket. Now, twelve months later, it is six feet wide by four feet long (and still growing!). It’s mostly made from yarn I’ve purchased in the Curiosity Shop at 577, which was donated by you, our beloved community members.



Looking at the early, tentative stitches, it’s very obviously imperfect. The edges are uneven. Some rows have more stitches than others. Stitches were accidentally dropped here or added there. A different weight yarn causes chaos compared to the rows before. Learning was clearly occurring.
But as the blanket progresses over time, a visible shift occurs. A row of stitches with perfect, even tension appears. A new stitch, the double crochet, appears for a row, and then two. The edges of the blanket become uniform, all the same number of stitches. I’ve created it while sick, bored, happy, irritated, impatient, visiting with friends, waiting in public, even with our cats sitting on it so I can’t fully turn it over.
As it turns out, practice over twelve months makes a difference, in expected and unexpected ways.
I’ve grown pretty comfortable with the stitches I know: single crochet, double crochet, and a triangular one called the “granny stripe.” I know there’s much more to learn. I registered for one of our community instructor Annie Johnson’s beginning crochet classes with my teenage daughter. We’ll spend a delightful evening together, throwing ourselves into the planned discomfort of being curious beginners at something in service of learning to create something new, a real voyage of discovery with new eyes.
Join us?
Take care,
Heather
P.S. Ready to embark on your own voyage of discovery? Whether you’re picking up a crochet hook for the first time, exploring a new art form, or diving into a hands-on experience, there’s something waiting for you at 577. Explore upcoming classes and discover something new.