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Knitting life

The walls are closing in, the air is thick and heavy and hard to breathe.

My shoulders are bowed under weights real and perceived.

Soon any movement will feel like a burden.

Out of the corner of my eye I notice a ball of yarn and needles on the sofa.

My attention is drawn so I walk over, sit down, and take them in my hands.

The yarn is a comfort, soft to touch. I bury my face in it and smell its sheepiness.

Slowly, intentionally, I make a loop and slide it onto the needle.

One loop, a small opening.

Another easily follows and then, with no effort or time, another and then another.

Soft ridges all lined up in a row, contentedly sitting there together.

I take the other needle and put it through the front of the first loop, wrap yarn around the back, and coax it through to the other side as the first one gracefully makes its way off the needle and into a stitch.

Such a simple thing, a very small cozy space framed in color and texture.

A stitch, one single stitch.

Followed by another and then another gracefully flowing off one needle and onto the other. 

Simple and fluid, this movement of yarn and needle.

The air seems lighter. I try filling my lungs. Deep breath in and out, another and another.

Space within which to move.

I then wrap the yarn twice around the needle and work all the way down the row, turn around, and now each stitch made drops off into an even bigger space.

Shoulders lighten and the walls recede.

Air in, needle through loop, yarn around back of needle, through loop, and then a space, a stitch, again and again. 

Such a comfort this repetitive making of stitches with wool. Creating space, marking time as each one builds onto the next.

Breathe

Knit.

Breathe.

Knit.