All Thumbs

You probably are aware, Gentle Readers, that as a cook, I make an excellent knitter.  I make it a firm policy to snivel loudly and regularly about how I hate to go into the Room Where We Keep the Beer, with any other purpose but retrieving one.  This policy, while providing me with some form of release, has not actually saved me from any cooking duty.  Not even once.

So on Saturday night, when it was time to make soup for dinner, I dutifully reported to the scullery.  Lindsay had two little girlfriends over for a slumber party.  Phillip and Campbell were watching a football game.  And I had a date with a pile of leeks.  And an 8" Chef's knife, which I'm proud to announce, I keep very, very sharp.  While I don't understand food, I do understand tools, and I've always felt that a dull knife, in addition to being miserable to operate, is actually more dangerous than a sharp one.  So I'm pretty zealous with the stone and the steel.  I've wondered if my cutlery compulsions are really some past life experience intruding upon this one; maybe I was once a fierce warrior, and the need to keep my sword sharp is some kind of holdover.  Whatever the reason, my knives hold an edge that could shave a damsel's legs.  Or make short work of a pile of leeks.

Or, as it happens, the end of my left thumb.  I have no idea how I did it.  One minute I was carefully chopping leeks, the next, I had become a super-gross human fountain.  Ever mindful of stuff I need my hands for (like making a living), I was more than a little panicky when the fountain hadn't stopped after a reasonable amount of time.  It occurred to me that this might be one of those go-to-the-doctor times, just in case a stitch or two were needed.  But I had a house full of children, some of whom were not my own, and leaving them alone (and without soup!) seemed irresponsible.  So Phillip stepped up and finished the soup, while keeping an eye on the slumber party (and the game, too, I assume), and I took myself to the ER.

As ER visits go, I really couldn't have had a better time.  It was a rare quiet night at the hospital, and I was in and out in under an hour.  A nice lady doctor did things I couldn't watch to my thumb in order to ascertain and repair the damage.  Then a lovely nurse came and put on bandages.  KNITTED bandages, as it turned out, which I noted with interest.  The action part of the dressing setup involved a KNITTED TUBE, which held all the gauze, etc. in place.  Once that was on, my clever nurse SLICED THE TUBE OPEN (sound familiar, steek-happy knitters?), in order to use its ends to secure the whole rig to my hand.  Sexy!  Knitting is everywhere, Gentle Readers, and it is always Good.

I'm all patched up, and assured the damage is not permanent.  The extreme sharpness of the blade, I'm told, will actually make for faster healing.  The downside is that I'm under orders to stay off it for three days.  So no Hitchhiking.  And no thumb-wrestling.  And no Knitting.

No Knitting.

For Three Days.

My family is twitchy about what it's going to be like for them if I can't knit.  They should be.

Here's the Thistle Stole I would like to be working on:

Paisley has appointed herself its guardian, and is watching over it very carefully:
 

I'm sure I'll be fine without knitting.  I mean, it's only for three days.  There have been plenty of times when I couldn't knit.  I'm sure there must have.  Though none are leaping to mind. 

Phillip is seriously concerned that I'll have to be tied to a chair before it's over.  He may be right.  Please submit suggestions for what I can do with myself for three days that doesn't require the use of my left thumb.

Warm Hands, Warm Hearts

Some of you will remember from taking my Selbuvotter classes that this is the sample I present as the Quintessential Norwegian mitten. 

Those who attend my Sassy Selbuvotter class get a different pattern, but a few of my 50 New Best Friends from the Knitters Review Retreat asked if they could have this one, as well. 

I thought I'd put it up on Ravelry for them, and anybody else who's in the mood for a little warm-hearted knitting.  Click HERE to get it!

When given as gifts, Selbuvotter traditionally incorporate symbols meant to impart special sentiments to the wearer.  This pair include:
 
        Selburoses for luck and protection
        Hearts for love and courage
        Crosses for faith and humility
        Nets for protection and prosperity

Those are my wishes for you, Gentle Readers.  Feel free to pass them on!

 

My Ship Comes In and I am At The Airport

If you had been following my progress as a knitting teacher, you might have noticed that I'm doing my best to expand my territory.  Not that there's anything wrong with regional teaching; on the contrary, it's great to work close to home.  But I realized early in my teaching career that if I'm to make ends meet (and spit splice them), I need to fill my calendar up with engagements, which means working farther and farther away.  For the last two years my goal has been to teach closer and closer to the left side of the (US) map.  Last April I made it all the way to the middle (Minneapolis), which felt like a huge stride, but I still had my eyes on the prize of Eastern Seaboard.

But last summer I was presented with the opportunity of a lifetime: a plum of a job teaching, at nothing less than Clara Parkes' Knitters Review Retreat.  In Canandaigua, NY.  At the time, and every day hence, I pinched myself and tried not to panic.  I even (sort of) managed to hold it together when Clara invited me to give a talk at the event.

I worked hard on my speech.  I designed special mittens.  I made beautiful little kits for the students.  I knit a sweater to wear there.  I left no opportunity for fabulousness unexplored, so great was my desire to make a good impression on Clara and the top-flight knitters I knew I would meet in Canandaigua, NY. 

The kits were ready right on time.  I found tights to match my new sweater.  My Terror-O-Meter went to 11 every time I thought about the speech.  I made it to the airport with time to spare, and finally began to relax a little.  I started to feel good about all my hard work and preparation.  Digital slide projector, laptop and all the cords to make them go? Check.  Baggage handler at terminal implored to care for my box of mitten kits as it it were his firstborn (with commensurate tip)? Check.  Noise-canceling headphones so I can arrive less frazzled and ready to teach and do my speech? Check.  Class material rehearsed and ready? Check.  I was a bulletproof knitting teacher.  I had anticipated and contemplated every possible problem.  I was ready.

I even managed to relax and enjoy the first 6-hour leg of the journey East.  Like some reverse pioneer, I was looking forward to my adventure, and the people I would be having it with.  And that bright spirit stayed with me, right up to the moment I missed my connecting flight.

I had been sitting at the gate (which I knew was the right one), with my boarding pass in hand.  And there were all these heavily-accented PA announcements, which overlapped each other and were unintelligible.  And I waited.  And I waited.  And then I noticed that it was quiet.  Yeah.  Too Quiet.  I went to the desk at the gate and asked the status of my flight.  "Oh, that left five minutes ago."

I have never ever ever in my life missed a flight before.  And now, somehow I had managed to do it, at the threshold of my most important career assignment, to date.  I may have cried a little.

My friend (and quasi-neighbor - she lives in Portland, too), Sivia Harding, who was also teaching at the retreat, was there too, and she also missed the flight.  At least I wasn't the only one who never heard the boarding call.  We did our best to reassure each other.  The next flight was in four hours, but there was no room on it.  We'd have to wait and try standby.  We called Clara and begged for forgiveness.  Clara was lovely and advised us to have a glass of wine while we waited, and let her know if we got on.

It was a long four hours, but Sivia and I were glad to have each other for company.  We stayed positive for each other.  Sivia called a clairvoyant friend to ask what our chances of getting on the plane were (the answer was 70%).  I texted my sister, who has scary parking-space mojo, to please work her magic on our flight.  She said she'd do her best.  And that was all we could think to do.  We settled in, helplessly.

When the flight finally boarded, all the stupid stinking "ticketed" passengers showed up.  So Sivia and I couldn't get on.  Which meant that we had to wait for the next flight.  Which was seven hours away.  We found a hotel (somehow - it's all a miserable blur now), and slept in our clothes for five hours of it.  All I remember is Sivia saying "Thank God the people we're going to are Knitters."  I was only mildly consoled.  Assuming we could get onto this third airplane (whose very existence I was beginning to doubt), we had already missed all of the Thursday activities, Clara's opening presentation, and the welcome dinner.  And worst of all, we would be showing up two hours late for our own classes.  Clara was going to have to reschedule the whole day because of us.  Not the way I had hoped to make an impression.

We made it to the gate, rumpled, red-eyed and exhausted.  Desperate, too.  And when we scanned our boarding passes to get on THIS plane, the sensor screeched, and the flight attendant said we weren't scheduled to be on the flight.  Would we please step to the side?  Sure.  Of Course.  Step to the side while all the other people get on but we don't.  Step to the side while my whole knitting career flies away, for the third time in 12 hours.  Step to the side and emotionally bludgeon myself some more for somehow not getting on that first plane.

And then a nice man made the computer stop screeching, and let us on the plane.

Sivia and I were in a fugue state, right up until the point where we landed.  Our feet touched the ground in the Rochester terminal and we hugged and squealed and jumped up and down like sweepstakes winners.  We had done it.  Somehow, we had completed the one-hour flight that would FINALLY take us to the knitters.  

Things were looking up, because we were reunited with our bags (my precious mitten kits!) with surgical precision.  Audrey, a retreat attendee-turned airport refugee rescuer, came to collect us in her very own car. 

We arrived exactly 15 minutes before the start of our rescheduled teaching times.  That was enough time for me to ditch my slept-in clothes in favor of the newly knit sweater.  And matching tights.  I added breath mints, and more deodorant than was strictly necessary, just for good measure.

Everything after that was perfect.  And by perfect, I mean that I could not have imagined a more delightful teaching and learning experience.  The spirit of that group of knitters is positively transformative, and I parted from them feeling both creatively and spiritually well-fed. 

Here we all are:
 

So what have we learned, Dorothy?  It really is true that the best-laid plans of mice and men often go astray.  And those of knitting teachers, too.  But it turns out that even the realization of my worst fear was survivable.  And being forced to let go of the misery and embarrassment of it all in order to teach the second I arrived was actually the best part.  I did a good job, once I got there, and not just because I had something to prove.  I did a good job because I had worked so hard to be prepared.  Even though the wheels had fallen off, I still had everything I needed to pull it together. 

And of course, I was in the safe and forgiving arms of the Knitters.