Free-Range Knitter Read Online Free PDF Page A

It is there for the moment, someday, when I pick some of it off the shelf (or closet, or freezer, whatever) and I cast on, and the whole thing starts. The yarn and I will embark on a thing, even if it’s a little thing, and the knitting will start to tell me a story.
    As a general rule, once someone knows how I am with all the knitting, they ask me how many projects I have in progress at once. Occasionally this person is an interested or slightly confused non-knitter, one who can’t imagine why you would possibly be knitting more than one thing, but more often it is another knitter, come to scope me out.
    Maybe it’s a virtuous knitter with only one or two things on the needles, or maybe it’s a knitter desperately looking for someone who has more on the go than he does, but either way, they have noticed a parade of things on my needles and begun to suspect that I lack a certain monogamous instinct in the project department. In the past I have skirted this question with various dodgy answers, since I have always suspected that it is a trap. If I answer, no matter what I answer—that I have a few or that I have many—the asker always seems to get a huge “Ah-ha! You are exactly as insane as I have always suspected” expression, or worse, they actually say so out loud before looking rather superior.
    This question gets asked in a lot of ways, sometimes boldly, sometimes quietly, sometimes in a private moment between twoknitters, but always in a manner that tells you that they are going to decide something about you, something defining the moment you give them the answer. It is not hard to spot the trap, which makes it embarrassing that I still sometimes fall for it. Knitters ask each other “How many?” the way that non-knitters ask each other questions like “What sort of car do you drive?” or “Do you dance?” or the way that women ask men “Boxers or briefs?” with a suspicious raise of the eyebrow. Like asking a date whether he or she likes to dance, knitters ask this question because they believe the answer will reveal something about the kind of knitter (and therefore person) that I am. Mostly, we think that knitters who have just one or two projects on the go are steadfast, dedicated, loyal, and get a lot done, and we suspect that knitters who have many (many) things on the needles are weak willed, inconstant, easily swayed, or even flighty. As a knitter with several projects on the go (and by several I mean “more than you are expecting,” no matter how many you are expecting), I would like to take a moment to defend my type. We knitters with mountains of knits in progress are more effective and loyal than you think we are.
    See, no matter what anyone suspects about my fealty and its relationship to the number of projects scattered around my house, I do not have this many things on the needles because I am weak willed and pathetically susceptible to wool fumes. (Well, I am weak and pathetically susceptible to wool fumes, but that isn’t how I got into this situation. That was the problemin the yarn store and why I bought it, not why I have since cast it all on.)
    The problem is that I and many other knitters like me are the exact opposite of what you think we are. We are so effective, so practical, and so dedicated that we enjoy having something to knit with us at all times, no matter what our circumstances. Once you look at it that way, as a sincere sort of loyalty, there is no denying that if you are going to knit everywhere, all the time, not every project is going to be appropriate for every situation. This means that I, or other knitters who have embraced this as a lifestyle, require a rather large assortment of different projects available to us in order to meet this goal. It’s all about balance and planning.
    Nobody can knit lace in the dark at the movies. (Sorry. I shouldn’t say “nobody.” I’m sure there are a few crazywild talented knitters out there who are churning out Orenburg