and now here I am in this restaurant and I don’t have anything to knit and the waitress hasn’t even taken our drink order yet, and this restaurant is good, but slow, and that means it’s going to be a long time with no knitting and… I check my bag again to make sure that I didn’t miss my knitting in there. Maybe it’s under the gum. I rifle my belongings again, trying really hard to quiet the stirring panic.
Amanda, my eldest daughter, notices that I’m looking for something, probably because of the blizzard of receipts, stitch markers, notepads, and knitting patterns emerging from my bag and piling on the table in front of me, while I continue hopelessly looking for the yarn and needles I know now are sitting uselessly on the kitchen counter. “What are you looking for?” she asks, while I stare at the bottom of my bag, sweeping my hand across the surface like maybe my knitting has become invisible and that’s why I can’t find it. I see her brow crease with concern, and I realize that she can see I’m missing something important—something like a credit card or my wallet—and I can see that I’m about to be very poorly understood. I’m about to open my mouth to say that I forgot my knitting, and then there will be an eye roll of epic proportions, probably coupled with laughter around the table. I’ve been down this road before. I’m just about the only person in my house who would put the word “important” in front of the word “yarn,” and I know what it looks like when I do. They aren’t going to understand this. My love of yarn is unique in my family. I accept it, but I still try to avoid them looking at me like I’m a few elves short of an effective workshop, so when Amanda asks me what I’m missing, I just shove everything back into my bag, set it back at my feet, and smile. “Nothing, dear. It’s okay. Have you looked at the menu?”
She hasn’t, and as the minutes tick by, I start to figure out what I’ll do. I’m looking at the menu but I’m not choosing what to eat. My thoughts keep getting dragged back to the knitting. We’re three blocks from home. The walk here took about six minutes, and I think if I went to get my knitting I’d be back pretty quickly. I look around at my family and realize that again, this is going to be poorly understood, and I start tossing around the idea of sneaking out to get my knitting. I could excuse myself to go to the washroom, and then bolt off down the street at a dead run, collect the knitting, and tear back. If I really hustled I think I could do it in about seven minutes. Can I be missing for seven minutes?
I’m staring out the window plotting my route and feeling twitchy, when Joe asks me what’s on my mind. I say it’s nothing again, because I’m still trying to avoid looking crazy, and besides, I don’t want to tip him off if I decide to go with the running thing. My youngest daughter, Samantha, who’s always been the sort to notice things, has figured it out, though, and she spills the beans. “Mum forgot her knitting,” she drawls, and I can tell that she’s relishing the moment. “That’s what it is. Mum forgot her knitting, and now she’s twitching and thinking about going to get it. She can’t get through a dinner without her knitting. She’s not going to make it.” Sam pauses here for effect, and I feel the urge to defend myself, but really I’ve been sitting there thinking the same thing. I did forget my knitting. I am freaking out. I am thinking about it and wondering what I’m supposed to do for the twenty minutes in between ordering and when the food arrives. The kid has a point. Sam peers at me over her menu and smirks. “You’re addicted,” she says. “You’re a knitting junkie.”
The family erupts into laughter, and they all begin to share stories about me for which my knitting friends would absolutely come to my defense. The time Mum couldn’t knit because her finger was hurt, and she cleaned the
Amanda, my eldest daughter, notices that I’m looking for something, probably because of the blizzard of receipts, stitch markers, notepads, and knitting patterns emerging from my bag and piling on the table in front of me, while I continue hopelessly looking for the yarn and needles I know now are sitting uselessly on the kitchen counter. “What are you looking for?” she asks, while I stare at the bottom of my bag, sweeping my hand across the surface like maybe my knitting has become invisible and that’s why I can’t find it. I see her brow crease with concern, and I realize that she can see I’m missing something important—something like a credit card or my wallet—and I can see that I’m about to be very poorly understood. I’m about to open my mouth to say that I forgot my knitting, and then there will be an eye roll of epic proportions, probably coupled with laughter around the table. I’ve been down this road before. I’m just about the only person in my house who would put the word “important” in front of the word “yarn,” and I know what it looks like when I do. They aren’t going to understand this. My love of yarn is unique in my family. I accept it, but I still try to avoid them looking at me like I’m a few elves short of an effective workshop, so when Amanda asks me what I’m missing, I just shove everything back into my bag, set it back at my feet, and smile. “Nothing, dear. It’s okay. Have you looked at the menu?”
She hasn’t, and as the minutes tick by, I start to figure out what I’ll do. I’m looking at the menu but I’m not choosing what to eat. My thoughts keep getting dragged back to the knitting. We’re three blocks from home. The walk here took about six minutes, and I think if I went to get my knitting I’d be back pretty quickly. I look around at my family and realize that again, this is going to be poorly understood, and I start tossing around the idea of sneaking out to get my knitting. I could excuse myself to go to the washroom, and then bolt off down the street at a dead run, collect the knitting, and tear back. If I really hustled I think I could do it in about seven minutes. Can I be missing for seven minutes?
I’m staring out the window plotting my route and feeling twitchy, when Joe asks me what’s on my mind. I say it’s nothing again, because I’m still trying to avoid looking crazy, and besides, I don’t want to tip him off if I decide to go with the running thing. My youngest daughter, Samantha, who’s always been the sort to notice things, has figured it out, though, and she spills the beans. “Mum forgot her knitting,” she drawls, and I can tell that she’s relishing the moment. “That’s what it is. Mum forgot her knitting, and now she’s twitching and thinking about going to get it. She can’t get through a dinner without her knitting. She’s not going to make it.” Sam pauses here for effect, and I feel the urge to defend myself, but really I’ve been sitting there thinking the same thing. I did forget my knitting. I am freaking out. I am thinking about it and wondering what I’m supposed to do for the twenty minutes in between ordering and when the food arrives. The kid has a point. Sam peers at me over her menu and smirks. “You’re addicted,” she says. “You’re a knitting junkie.”
The family erupts into laughter, and they all begin to share stories about me for which my knitting friends would absolutely come to my defense. The time Mum couldn’t knit because her finger was hurt, and she cleaned the
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