The first time I learned to knit, I was seven years old. It must've been my mom who taught me, but I don't remember the learning part, I just remember the odd shape that emerged out of working diligently with two wooden needles for several days. Probably, she started me off with ten stitches of the soft red wool yarn. The idea, I suppose, was to keep knitting until I had a nice tidy long scarf or something. But, by the time I cast off the final stitch, there must have been forty or fifty stitches on the working needle, so my finished piece looked nothing like a scarf. It had the profile of a blunt-nosed dog: The ten original stitches, which I managed to continue for maybe eight or ten rows being his snout, and, perhaps because I kept splitting the yarn or, via some other mysterious process, I kept adding stitches, so there was a slope where his eyes would be and on up to his flat-topped head. The opposite edge looked like major double chins on this flat, red, wooly "doggie." I kept the scrap for many long years, perhaps hoping to find someone who could sort out what I did wrong and teach me how to knit correctly. Help was not forthcoming from my over-worked mom. I give her credit for trying.
My husband's Aunt Faye taught me again when I was in my early twenties. Cousin June, who was somewhat of an extra grandma to our daughters, taught me again when I was in my forties. Every time it was as if I'd never done it before. Without using and reinforcing the skill, I didn't retain the steps.
Mid-January, one of my new Oakland friends sent out an email to her crafty friends. I don't consider myself crafty, but I do enjoy crochet as a meditative act. The email invited Judy's gal pals to join her in a Pussyhat knitting party one afternoon. I couldn't get to the gathering, but I was intrigued and wanted to learn how to knit yet again, so I could wear a bright pink Pussyhat in solidarity with my sisters world-wide who are concerned over endangered reproductive rights, modeling from our new president of bullying with impunity, and diminishing accessibility to health care. I was looking forward to the day of the post-inauguration Great Women's March. It seemed a reasonable goal to knit a hat by January 21!
I got a pound of magenta acrylic yarn at JoAnn's for under six bucks. I still had my grandmother's ancient ivory colored needles tucked away in a long narrow MacKenzie's Shortbread box. I had a visual memory of my mother with a gigantico knitting needle balanced upright on her knee and doing some magic hand-cantation over it such that the yarn wrapped itself around the needle magically. But, I had no idea how to "cast on," which is the first step in knitting anything.
As illiterate as I may be with computers, I do know how to get onto YouTube. So I did. It's amazing what you can learn from dedicated well-wishing-teachers and their super cool, slowed down so even I can get it videos. AND, you can pause, rewind and learn the steps over and over again! So cool!
Several practice sessions of casting on, knitting and purling later, I was on my way to knitting a simple rectangle suitable for folding into a Pussyhat. I learned a lot, both about knitting and about my persistent dyslexia. I kept saying "counterclockwise" but I kept throwing the yarn over the needle in a clockwise direction. Lots of rippings-out-and-starting-overs later, I finished the project at six o'clock the night before the march.
Kat Coyle is credited with disseminating the pattern on how to make the (now) iconic hat. She runs a shop called The Little Knittery in Atwater district of Los Angeles. Hats off to Kat (so to speak) for working with one of her customers, Krista Suh, to develop the pattern and make it accessible to hundreds of thousands of women. The act of knitting together for a mutually beneficial cause forged many friendships. I'm grateful to my friend Judy for giving me a private tutorial.
Saturday's march wasn't exactly anti-climactic, but rather a convention of kindness; an affirmation that yes, these folks with whom I'm rubbing shoulders as we walk down the street (v-e-r-y---s-l-o-w-l-y) toward Frank Ogawa Square (that is too small to hold all of us for the rally) are folks with whom I can work when the real work of protesting begins. Or when we need to get signatures for petitions, or walk door to door to check on our neighbors after a disaster, and when federal funds are no longer available to California because in Oakland, Berkeley, and San Francisco (and maybe other communities as well) we've self-designated as Sanctuary Cities, and the new powers that be are breathing punitive fire and rumbling and grumbling at the entrances to their caves about building walls, and turning away the down-trodden, tired, the poor, and the hungry. (Emma Lazarus is turning over in her grave.)
Yes, I can work with these folks. Yes, I will work with my community to maintain sanity when faced with the craziness of this new (and scary) administration. And, like our fear-mongering new leader does, but with tongue in cheek, We Shall OverComb. (One of my favorite signs of many at the march Saturday.)
Younger daughter Sunday asked me pointedly whether the energy spent by the multitudes all over the globe might better have been spent in performing actions that really create a change for good. I cannot disagree, but I think that the kindness and cooperation of all who marched (at least where I was in Oakland), was a first step in affirming that we're all in this world together, and we'd best learn how to cooperate to maximize our efforts. The plentiful pink pussyhats remind me that we are all made from the same cloth; men women and children, and that we all came into the world from our mother's life-giving womb. Let's not grab anyone by the short hairs, eh? "My grandmother didn't burn her bra so you could grab my pussy," was another of my favorite signs on the march.
Are there YouTube videos about knitting our communities back together, re-empowering all females, and watching out for each other? I think we just made some lovely, unifying heart videos Saturday.
No comments:
Post a Comment