KNITTING JUNKIE

I am the laziest not lazy person ever. Even lying in bed is active for me, as I am constantly nursing, shifting kids around, answering questions, waking up to resolve issues with snoring, horizontal interlopers in the bed, and myriad other concerns that arise only at night. For example, my children don’t love to drink water. They will, but usually they prefer it flavored with lemonade powder, or they drink milk, because water has no taste and is therefore totally undesirable apparently. Until the sun goes down. Because then, the only thing stronger than their desire to drink tons of water, is their lack of desire to get up and fill up the bottle if it’s empty. But anyway, back to me. So, while I never really rest – ever – what makes me lazy is that all I usually WANT to do is watch television. I mean I want to do other things too, but I want to do them in front of the television.

So imagine my surprise last night when, awoken again, I had no desire to watch television. I wanted to read. So, I turned the light on low and read. Until my son woke up and said "Mommy, don’t read that book." In the interest of not arguing with a two year old in the wee smalls, I shut off the light, thinking he would just go back to sleep. And then he commanded "Mommy, don’t turn out that light." So, on with the light, down with the book. And, with mommy and the whole world safely secured under his adorable little thumb, my boy is able to go back to sleep. And I go back to reading. And then I decide that reading is keeping me awake, so I try to watch TV again. And I discover that a promising crappy show I have recorded is too stupid even for me to watch. So I watch the rest of it and delete it and swear never to watch it again.

And now I’m awake and I actually don’t want to watch TV and I don’t feel like reading, and I start to think about knitting. And I realize something. I am addicted to knitting. I’m like a knitting junkie. I can’t get enough. Of course, as a beginner, I don’t know enough to just take up random projects or make it work with the weird mishmosh of yarn I have accumulated (and which took me hours to sort out on Sunday). So, I’m lying in bed realizing that I don’t know enough to read a pattern that involves anything more complicated than things they just don’t write patterns for because they are so simple, that I have to return the eight knitting books I took out from the library on my four year old’s card so that she can take out more books for herself, that I don’t have enough of any single yarn I like to make anything good (even if I could somehow puzzle through the pattern), and that in the week since I have actually picked up knitting needles, my knitting-induced carpal tunnel has improved dramatically for the first time since, well, the last time I didn’t knit for a week. And I don’t care. Because I’ve got my knitting jones on. And when I’m not knitting, I’m thinking about knitting and the next time I’m going to knit and how I’m going to find time, and what I’m going to make, and what books I want, and I’m searching the internet for free patterns and thinking about knitting a baby hat and scarves, legwarmers, throw pillows, fingerless gloves with mitten flaps to pull over when it’s cold. I’m wondering how and where I’m going to scrounge yarn. I am a junkie willing to do anything it takes to get my fix. I am coming to understand that addiction starts out as a little nod to your creative other self and then you start to justify the inclusion of a passion in your life, and then, then it’s just you, fingering your yarn stash and wondering how wrong it would be to plug the kids into a move to get two hours of knitting time. I realize I’m a lost cause when I don’t want to teach my kids to knit, not yet, because right now it’s all mine. I’m bogarting the knitting.

And why not? Knitting is a noble art. Every time I learn a new stitch I marvel at the invention of such an art. Or a science. The two woven together into fabric. Knitting is the creation of women who used their brains and their creativity to clothe their families and create art at the same time. I yearn to stand in the shoes of the women who developed knowledge of fibers as though it were their birthright. And who continue to develop patterns and color and materials inventive ways to use their creations to warm, to protect, to beautify, to teach, to learn. So I will consider my addiction a small price to pay in order to claim my place in line. To honor the art, and maybe break off a little piece of it as my own, knowing that such pruning is what creates new life. How's that for justifying my addiction as good for all womankind?