The view from my kitchen counter offers a glimpse of green fields and mountains with less and less snow each day. (You’d be able to see it out that brightly shining back door if the sun wasn’t shining so brightly!) The temperature rises as the weeks go along, and this weekend we’re waiting to see if the weatherman had correctly predicted the 70 degree (F) weather we would so very appreciate.
My back is climbing out of its little funk. All the bed rest has mandated much knitting, so as to keep my wits about me. I churned out the Chudnovsky Pi Shawl at the beginning of my prison sentence, and then took a moment to whine on one of my favorite message boards on Ravelry when I ran out of the yarn.
One of the results of that little whine session, besides the outpouring of encouragement and commiseration from my fellow online knitting chums, was that a British knitter wrote to me and offered me yarn money to help ease the burden of being stuck on my back and inwardly raging over my predicament. I trolled about online yarn shops, my gifted yarn funds burning in my pocket, and came across this brownish-gray color and, despite not really ever having noticed a single thing in that color EVER, I took a liking to its solid drabness.
I searched through my patterns on-hand and came across Juneberry Triangle, which had been gifted to me two Christmases ago by my dear knitting friend, Kit. Gifted yarn, gifted pattern…I liked how it all went together so nicely.
Most of the knitting has been accomplished on my back, on the couch, while I watch old episodes of Frasier. (Goodness, I loved that show while I was growing up!) Any time I pick this up, I start remembering Frasier funnies, which is entirely awesome to me.
I started knitting with the fifth, and final, skein of yarn today. I have about six more repeats of the edging to go and then this will be ready for a soak and a block. My back has improved to allow for less couch-lounging and more standing, so my knitting has relocated to the kitchen counter. The counter is higher than any of the tables in the house, so it makes for a good surface to rest my knitting–I don’t have to stoop down to pick it up, and I don’t have to support the weight of the project while knitting because it rests on the counter.
So I stand, knitting away while gazing out on the blue sky and the fresh green of the fields, knowing that spring is on her way. The washed-out brown color of this yarn reminds me of tree bark at the beginning of spring–weathered and muted from months of cold and drizzly weather, while new life throbs within, waiting to burst forth in flowers and fruit. My back is building up strength, and I’m looking forward to a fresh spring, full of possibilities and made better with the love and service from family and friends, just as this shawl is the more dear to me due to both the pattern and the yarn being gifted from knitters who care.
It’s funny how a little brownish-gray shawl can hold so much symbolism to its creator. But not really, when you think of what lies within each of us, and how the gentle coaxing of a Creator’s hand can cause beauty to bloom, even in our most humbled and weathered states.
That Crafty Cara 
