Listen and Push Back

Without detailing the current state of our wounded world ...  

a need grew in me to push back.

I have had my fair share of "hits" this spring.  The pandemic started this tsunami of hits beginning with isolation protocols (even from family) and fears of infection for ourselves and our loved ones, followed by the health decline of my cat, Wally, continuing to his death ... and finally topped off with the very serious news that a close family member is being placed on a Transplant list due to kidney failure ... well, the hits just seemed to keep coming this spring.  The last "hit" is not totally unexpected as our family has dealt the kidney disease for a long time - but it is a particularly difficult when you can't put your arms around them.  What I can do is see if I am a compatible donor - my very personal and determined way of pushing back on a personal tsunami.  For now - enough said on that. 

At the very basic level - my first "push back" is with my knitting.  

Unfortunately when I am very upset and distracted, I don't get that positive bump or settling feeling from sitting and knitting (or any other craft) during tough times like so many others.  I usually lose the desire to knit entirely.  I do better getting up and cleaning. (An aside: my condo is now cleaner than it has been in a long time.). I also like to declutter because that down feeling creates a very realistic filter to my 'pitch it out' decisions - do I care enough to keep an item in my current upset state?  It is amazing how much a down attitude crystalizes my "keep it or pitch it" decision making.  

But this week I decided that I would push myself beyond cleaning into knitting.  After all, I have a room full of yarn and it isn't getting smaller just by sitting there.

It started with a cable vest pattern for my grand daughter and even though I am almost half way through it, I kept putting it down after one row.  A little voice in my head said, "Maybe this pattern isn't the right thing for you to knit right now."

I had been thinking to work on a blanket small enough to use in a child's bed so I picked out a selection of Caron Simply Soft acrylic (my go-to acrylic when I knit for kids) and started out with an appealing crochet pattern (you know how fast crochet can be), but I found myself making the blanket wider and wider with each row. Ha!  I don't really understand the crochet stitch well enough to be any good at it and now is not the time to add complexity to anything.  I ripped it out after 4 inches.  I needed to go back to the thing I know best.  Knitting.

Looking through Ravelry at patterns and saw a bunch of beautiful blanket designs, but instead of feeling excited about them - I felt dread!!  Can you believe it?? Unbelievable. No sense starting a project with such negative emotions just by looking at the pictures.  My emotions are so mixed up right now.

Then I stumbled across Purl Soho's Super Easy Lap Blanket.  Basically, cast on a bunch of stitches, knit every row, slip the first stitch for an even edge, and if you are changing colors just knit until you finish the first skein of color and change colors.  FINALLY I found something I can do.  And no dread!

What is hysterical, there are actual instructions on the PurlSoho website for this pattern.  haha!  The instructions take up 1/2 page.  Mine took up 4 lines.  I decided to double the yarn and use 10.5 knitting needles to add speed and body to the project. I am happy with it.  I love Caron Simply Soft as an affordable acrylic and it is working up beautifully.  Something that would usually bore me to tears is now giving me peace.  And it will make a substantial dent in my yarn stash.  Win-win.

While working on it I thought about Elizabeth Zimmerman and her love of garter stitch patterns.  I have several of her books.  I need to take a second look at those projects.  I remember they were simple in design but classic in style.  In fact, I remember reading one of her books written in her own words and discovered how much fun it was to read her thoughts.  She didn't stress over anything and all things knitting were do-able. Maybe I should open one of those and read a bit.

And then I remembered the Sally Melville books:  The Knit Stitch (Book #1), The Purl Stitch (Book #2), and Color, (Book #3.). I have all 3 books - they survived the declutter purge from moving.  

I pulled them out and decided that maybe I would make an Einstein Jacket - an older pattern found in The Knit Stitch  book - I remembered a yarn in my stash that just might work for that pattern.  I got up and searched to the yarn of my memory.  Yep!  I still had it.  

Top right skeins are sock weight and will make a nice matching scarf.

The yarn band said it was bulky weight yarn best used with a #10 knitting needle!  Eureka!!  Exactly what the pattern said was needed.   And in a stunning twist of serendipity - the rust color used in the book is exactly the color of the yarn I have for this project. 

It was like starting a small fire by rubbing 2 sticks together, getting a tiny spark, adding some kindling, blowing on it to build a small fire and finally creating something that could keep you warm! 

Nothing has changed, of course.  I am still self isolating with little family contact and will continue probably another 4 weeks, Wally is still gone forever and we are cat-less for the first time in 50 years of marriage, and my family member still needs a kidney for a quality life - a life I dearly want to preserve.  But I have found a small bit of peace in a world that seems to be spinning out of control all around me.

And maybe (a small voice in my head keeps repeating) just the act of pushing back - doing something that seems right is what you need to do now.  Maybe listening to that small voice in myself was the goal to begin with.

While not a traditionally spiritual person, I do believe in God, but I don't believe in waiting for God to save me from life.  I believe in a God who gave me two amazing gifts to handle life: a brain that sits atop of the animal kingdom in complexity and free will.  He expects me to use my gifts. I don't wait around for God to fix life for me. 

At the risk of offending someone with this cartoon, I feel it nails exactly my relationship with God and how I am handling this pandemic!

Grabbed from Facebook

Listen to the small voices and push back ...