HOMEFREE: A Cottage In The City (excerpt)
A son and daughter-in-law are moving abode. A long distance relationship for the moment this will be her ‘permanent’ place, his pied a terre.
In tradition I am making them a dishcloth. Something functional and pretty.
Peruse the stash and a ball of white Danish cotton ‘speaks’. It has had some life experience already and I wonder if the ivory shading comes from sun in a shop window, and where would that shop have been, or from storage in some other stash, also where, or maybe this is the ‘dust’ of many travels. So it requires preparation.
The inner end is located and a ball started. Then something compels to remove the label and begin unwinding the outer ball to see the extent of the shading. Quite a lot of unraveling. Then start another ball from the outside. Hmmm. Seems the yarn is suggesting a double thickness. So both balls get unwound and a single ball started with two strands. The shaded yarn gets put in a mesh bag and tossed in washer with the hot white laundry load. Then it is hung on the deck to dry, later to be rolled, for some reason, from each end into two connected balls, pristine white again.
(Funnily enough I will get peanut butter on the dishcloth as I knit after breakfast one day and have to spot clean this.)
Needles are chosen. The tortoiseshell appeal because they have such depth and the amber are lovely to work with but the creamy bone ones (if from a tusk, then surely taken from a roadkill elephant) feel most suitable and cool to knit with on hot summer days.
Cast on with a simple thumb stitch. How many? Thirty-three feels and looks right. Master number. There are three of them, counting the cat. They plan on being a family as soon as possible going from the twosome of a couple to a threesome. Thirty-three feels right. Three plus three for six pertaining to relationships, balance.
What stitch? Start to knit and find out. Three rows of garter stitch. Or maybe it is four. Then four stitches at each end of garter (five was too many, three not enough) and a stockingette stitch in between. Part way along, the Tunisian stitch beckons and gets expressed part way across and back, further across and back, further across and back, all the way across and back for the next eight rows. Does it want to go further. Hmmmm. No, it is enough. And it does not need to step down as it has stepped up.
I knit at home to put Homefree into the dishcloth. I knit in the garden to include sun and wind and birdsong and a dragonfly flight and clouds and the scent of southernwood and the leaves of fragrant geranium. I knit with the ladies at the Sidney street market to bring in adventure and sea longings and frying oysters and laughter. I knit, finally, at the Polish Deli, on the patio, morning ritual, for community.
The dishcloth is nearing the end. There was one need to add new yarn part way up and I did so from an end and shags will have to be hidden. But the next join is effortless, a loop in the end of one yarn, the two enjoined balls needing simply to step across this loop. Comes to mind that we pay our dues in relationships and then it is more seamless.
On the last row. I have eyeballed the dishcloth several times to decide when it is done and this feels right. Garter stitch again to balance the start.
I glance up and a woman is walking down the street toward me with the wide open face that tells me she has spotted me and is not about to look away. The sort of woman you don’t really want to maintain eye contact with because she seems unpredictable. Dressed in black with a short skirt and high clunky heels, a boxy jacket. Just a bit off from making an interesting fashion statement. She does stop.
“Whatcha knitting?” she asks in an accent that reminds me of Canada’s eastern shore.
“A dishcloth,” I tell her.
“Looks like a baby hat,” she says, not because she is disputing what I have said but because I don’t think she heard me so I repeat, “A dishcloth.”
“Well, that’s really great,” she exclaims, “Keep up the good work.” And she strides away as I am thanking her.
I finish the row, cast off, thinking of the woman and her blessing on the endeavour. I find I am smiling.
Five minutes later, as I walk home, my cell phone rings and it is son for whom the dishcloth is intended. He is in town. He is with his wife at their new place. They will see me later.
I continue on home to finish the dishcloth, wrap it around a bar of homemade soap, get it ready for its next journey.