“Kick front – drop – change – kick front – in – back – change – rock step. It’s really not that hard. Once you get the hang of it, this will be your breather step.”Shawn and I looked at our instructor and down at our tangled feet and then incredulously at each other. Right....Except that he was right. We were learning the Charleston, which seemed dreadfully complicated at the time, but now I don’t even think about it. It’s something Shawn leads in a fast song when we need to breathe for a second or two. I could do it in my sleep I bet, and I haven’t donned my Bleyers since before Luke was born.Why do I mention the Charleston? It’s a little like learning to knit.You think I’m insane? Wrap yarn around right pinky, in front of second and third finger and drape over index finger. Hold needles in front of yarn. Guide stitch with left index finger. Insert needle from front to back, wrap yarn around new needle counterclockwise, pull loop through stitch, nudge stitch off old needle. Repeat. A lot. Much like the Charleston, it’s a complicated pattern that your brain understands in a general, theoretical sort of way. Then we have to translate this theory into corresponding physical movements. Houston, we have a problem.HP just announced the innovation of the memristor, a heretofore theoretical fourth element to the electronic circuit that is capable of storing memory. This latest discovery on the path to cheaper/faster/smaller/better when applied to computers will hopefully bring us machines that don’t need to boot up, that long start-up process of circuits accessing a magnetic hard drive to figure out who they are and what they’re doing there so they can get back to work. Essentially, we’d be giving computers muscle memory.Slowly, with repetition, your fingers (or your feet) get the idea of what they’re supposed to be doing. Eventually your fingers can do the work without constantly accessing that magnetic drive in your head. Real knitters barely look at their work. They chat with their stitch n’ bitch buddies and let their fingers dance over their seemingly self-propelled needles as scarves and sweaters issue forth of their own accord. Madame Defarge, remember, oversaw hundreds of beheadings while clicking away at her knitting and never dropped a stitch.As I sat on the couch chanting a rhyme to help me remember the components of a single knit, my brow furrowed, the needles two inches from my eyes, and a pile of yarn barf tangled on my lap, Shawn said, “So, is this something you can see yourself getting the knack of so you barely have to look at it? You know, so it’s fun and relaxing?” I looked at him the way I looked at our lindy hop instructor the day he introduced us to the Charleston, as if he had potato bugs in his hair and I’ve elected not to tell him.It’s like practicing pirouettes. Your instructor molds and corrects you a hundred times, twisting you into unnatural positions as if you are part of some cosmic game of Twister and someone forgot to lay down the mat. “Turn out your toes. Bend your knees. Hold your fourth position. Pull up. Drop your tailbone. Keep your knees over your toes. Push your shoulders back. Not that far back. Chin up. Spring off the ground, but also push into it. Don’t forget to spot.” Then she has the audacity to look at the frown on your face and say, “Stop thinking and dance.” It’s a good thing I’m not armed with sharp and dangerous knitting needles in that environment.And then, just when you start to get the hang of it, your instructor says, “Now, do it backwards.” Bastard.Knitting, as I am learning, comes with two basic stitches: the knit, and the purl, which is a knit only performed backwards. What’s so hard about doing it backwards? you say. Well, I’ll tell you, you go and try to debone a chicken in reverse and let me know how it goes. I’ll be right over here untangling this ball of yarn. I’m feeling a bit like the doozers during the Great Radish Famine. A knitter needs his noggin read. And yet if there were no challenge, there would be no point in learning. If one could merely say , “Tank, I need a knitting program for a mohair sweater,” and instantly be a pro, who would bother to knit sweaters? Just go to The Gap and get it over with. I want to conquer knitting in the way that I someday want to conquer Half Dome. It’s a challenge. I’ve been sewing for years. Now I’m constructing the fabric. Next I’ll be rearing the sheep, or maybe growing the soy to spin my own silk. I hate sheep.Thus far I have produced three misshapen little test swatches and now I’ve got about 6 inches of a scarf hanging off my needles. It’s almost enough for a Barbie blanket, but it’s longer than it is wide, and this is an achievement. By the time I reach 6 feet, I hope my fingers will be dancing with a little more ease and agility. ...Then I can throw in some new steps.
