You've Knitted This One Back Together

I love my local yarn shop. Every Sunday I go there for a little high fiber therapy.

There are usually ten or so that come nearly every Sunday and as one person noted last Sunday, "I don't come here for the knitting."

During the last year, I had many individual friends that helped me through the worst year of my life. A couple even knew the code phrase that I would occasionally force myself to admit "I need to be among the living today."

I'm not one to run around and threaten to blow my brains out and be the drama queen. I'm not one to look another person in the eye and say "Please hold my hands for the next five minutes so that I won't do something to hurt myself." I had my code phrase and there were a couple people who knew exactly what I meant.

There were times when going out on a Sunday was a chore. It would have been easier to crawl back in bed. It would have been easier to have a pity party. But I knew what I needed in my heart of hearts. I needed to be in a crowd of people that talked about their kids and their spouses (although that was always a painful thing) and their jobs and the reasons why they got out of bed everyday. I needed to stand next to their bright glow and try to feel a little warmth.

There were times when I didn't even knit. Having whatever causes my joints to be stiff and painful usually only allows me to knit a couple times a week and if I was having a bad hand day, I would go to just sit. There were times when I was glad that I didn't have to contribute to the conversation because I would have just started to cry like a baby.

I just needed to recharge my batteries with the wonderful women who perhaps don't even know how wonderful they are.

Many of them showed up to the sentencing and I think a couple might have even had their knitting out. (For all her faults, Madame DeFarge has always been my secret fascination.)

The knitting part of my brain has been in such a fog for such a long time that whenever I do knit, it is brainless scarves and simple sweaters. Certainly nothing that requires an ounce of gray matter.

But Sunday? Sunday I went in and saw the "retro" Dale of Norway trunk show. (For the non-knitters here, a trunk show is a bunch of knitted up items from an artist or a company and they are usually trying to entice you to buy their patterns or yarn or whatever.) They even have a book out of "retro" patterns that is beautiful.

But there are a few hitches here.

I've been knitting out of my tiny little stash for nearly a year now. The yarn that I have purchased for a sweater has been the less than stellar stuff but I'm ok with that. I wasn't looking for a sweater, I was looking for something that I could make for myself, something to comfort myself. It is the fiber equivalent of a chocolate sundae. I made the sweater and everything worked out just fine.

The retro book is full of patterns that I actually have equivalents at home in the "original" books. I just need to rewrite them a little to make them more "convenient".

The yarn? As much as I love Dale of Norway sweaters, I hate their yarn! A big part of yarn for me is how it feels in my hands when I'm using it and their yarn is "squeaky".

Don't ask. I can't explain.

So on Sunday, I splurged and bought a couple skeins of the cheapest yarn there. It is not all wool but I can make it work.

And I looked at the retro book.

And I looked at the sweaters.

And something in my brain went, "hmmmmmm. I can do that!"

So now I have cast on for a sweater that I'm writing half the pattern for and using a couple other patterns from a book from 1946 for ideas.

Maybe, just maybe, the fog is starting to lift.