Life Lessons From Knitting
Knitting for life. It’s what some Ukrainians are doing.
I’m not one of those old people who look at modern technology as if it has teeth or the newest deadly variant of the coronavirus.
I embrace technology with the fervor of a senior citizen desperately trying to prove that, though she may walk with a cane, she still has a few functioning neurons left.
I can set up my new devices without paying exorbitant fees to a geek. Update my own software and self-download (if that’s even a word) my computer programs. I even create a website on occasion without screaming, Help! Thanks to user-friendly technology.
Still, as much as we all love our devices and apps, we have to acknowledge that the advances coming out of Tech Heaven come with a price.
According to the Uncluttering Our Minds article by the wonderful Avi Kotzer, we may search much faster for information on the web, but we don’t retain as much of it as if we had looked it up by hand.
But hold on. This isn’t a screed about longing for the good old days. I’ve lived through eighty-two years of them, and, trust me, most of them weren’t much better than what we wake up to every day in our current century.
So, yeah. Bring on the iPhone 50 or whatever is coming down the pike next, but could you just lower the cost?
And while you’re at it, call up a YouTube video on your pocket computer about the famed knitters of old from the Shetland Islands.
Probably our Olympic-level gamers can wield their joysticks with the same agility as the women knitting jumpers (pullovers if you live in the States) in the film.
Yet, even after watching this film, unless you’ve tried your hand at k2, S1tbl, p2, k3t, YO, repeat for 600 stitches on fine lace weight yarn (don’t try this at home), you can’t imagine the brilliance of the Shetlander’s skills.
You may think knitting is old-fashioned, but let me tell you, there’s nothing user-friendly about it.
Shetland is one of the islands off the coast of the British, Scottish, and Irish isles, stuck out in the wild Atlantic halfway to Norway. These lands are known for, among other things, f their exceptional crafts.
We write a great deal on Medium, exhorting ourselves to strive for greater and greater productivity.
Back in the day, these women thought nothing of wearing belts with hooks to hold their knitting while they stirred their pots or walked into town.
All without worrying whether they had the right morning hack.
Knitting while cooking? That’s not even a challenge Top Chef would take on.
In my collection of knitting books, a favorite is Michael Pearson’s Traditional Knitting.
This compendium of techniques from the islands off the coast of Scotland and Ireland features photos of implements that, at first glance, resemble torture devices from the Spanish inquisition.
Upon closer inspection, these implements are varieties of knitting needles women used before the turn of the century. The nineteenth/twentieth centuries.
Pictures of sweaters designed by wives in fishing communities intrigued me for their use of gussets, which I thought were only possible in sewn garments. These techniques demonstrate intricate stranded stitches such as Fair Isle, Jersey, and Gansey, unique to each locale.
The residents, often but not always women, knit garments such as sweaters, shawls, and gloves using several strands of yarns in different colors to form their patterns.
Whether or not you like the style, these techniques are very difficult to master.
Skilled knitters say if you learn to knit and purl, the two basic knitting stitches, you can knit anything.
Yeah, but that’s like saying if you know some verbs and nouns, you can write a novel.
Here’s an example of a speed competition in 1970 Australia.
The yarn for Shetland sweaters is made from local sheep whose fleece is thick with lanolin.
Historically, this yarn kept the wearer warm and relatively dry during the long, cold winter months.
In the old days, each woman on these islands created her own patterns, which, while creative, occasionally had a sad practical purpose. The men in these communities fished in the open sea in large open row boats.
Drownings were a hard fact of their way of life. Men who perished in the fierce storms in their open fishing boats might wash up on the shores long after the seas calmed.
Their bodies could be identified by the pattern of the sweater they wore, knit by their wives or mothers.
Despite the practicality of these sweaters and knitting patterns, at the other end of the spectrum from thick winter sweaters, a prized possession of a Shetland bride was a wedding ring shawl.
Women learned in childhood the intricate lace stitches that produced a gossamer veil so fine it could be pulled through a wedding ring.
This became a craft that provided an income for local women who would gather daily in one another’s homes to knit together to produce their veils, often in as little as six weeks.
The Shetland Island knitters produced colorwork patterns, some over a hundred years old, so intricate that a museum dedicated to sweaters, hats, and other garments now displays the work of these amazing women.
You can buy a sweater cheaper than you can make it, they say, but the mall won’t give you the life lessons of patience, perseverance, and skill you gain by learning to knit.
Shetland knitters never used the keys to productivity such as the 10,000 hours and Pomodoro method those needed by those of us who lead cushy lives in order to reach our goals.
Knitting for these women was a means of livelihood, the way to clothe themselves and their families.
I first became aware of knitting while walking when I researched my novel on the Irish famine. It was common for women to knit stockings and sell them by the side of the road to feed their families.
Somehow, I can’t imagine them struggling to find hacks to get them through their morning routine.
I’m not wishing we could go back to relying on speed-knitting to fill out our wardrobes. Some of you, though, may know of my campaign to alert readers to a method of supporting Ukrainian women by sending money to their digital download accounts.
I’ve seen posts on Instagram by sewers doing the same thing with sewing and quilting patterns from Ukraine.
We’re all doing what we can.
As I first began researching this article months ago, I told myself nobody cared about hand knitters. So I let it go, along with many other article ideas. Such was the state of my Medium momentum last summer.
But it was the desire to support Ukrainian knitters that helped sparked my return to this platform.
Now I’m in the middle of my self-inflicted challenge to write thirty articles in thirty days.
Which is why I brought this piece back to life.
Maybe more people are interested in knitting than I thought.
Maybe more people like to learn new things than I thought.
Or maybe if readers learned some of the history of knitting, they’d find sympathy with the knitting designers in Ukraine.
In any case, I hope you enjoyed reading about some phenomenal knitters and remember them the next time you throw a sweater over your shoulders for warmth or receive a handmade scarf as a gift.
And maybe consider reading an article below and send a few bucks to a knitter in Ukraine.
The Shetlanders may not need your donation today, but the Ukrainian knitters surely do.
Thank you for reading.