Tension

For the last three days, I have been knitting a circular scarf. It is designed so that you can wear it as a traditional scarf OR you can double it up around your neck OR you can triple it up and then pull one layer over your head like a hood. The pattern is beautiful.

I was well, WELL past the half way mark when I decided to stop kidding myself: I had screwed up by substituting the wrong yarn, and the diameter of the thing was less than half of what it should have been. Although it technically could have fit around my neck twice, I would not have been happy about it. And making it circle my throat three times would have resulted in asphyciation related death in less than five minutes.

See, with the new wool I just didn't get gauge (the number of suggested stitches per inch.) In some countries, the concept of "gauge" is caled "tension".

Tension. Interesting word.

If I have learned anything from knitting, it is that I need to chill out and relax. If I drop a stitch? Just work backwards and pick it up again. If my gauge is wrong, just accept it, pull it off the needles and start over. Knitting teaches you patience, it teaches a Type A personality like me to just let it go. Knitting has, in all honesty, done wonders for my mental health.

Funny how even the most spectacular tension error in my knitting helps to relieve the tension in my real life.

CHanging the world, one stitch at a time...