Things I Learned From Knitting by Stephanie Pearl–McPhee Read Free Book Online Page A

isn’t performing up to your standards. You can be as absolutely picky as you want with your knitting, and no one will suffer. Yarn is almost infinitely reuseable. You can rip back and reknit something as many times as you want to, tinkering with stitches and edges, obsessively choosing decreases that match each other perfectly. Whatever need for perfection and control any of us may have can truly be met by knitting, without doing any damage to anyone’s self-esteem. And that, my friends, can’t be said of anything else in my life.
    If I had things my way — which, we have already established, I do not — the whole world would work the way knitting does. I would be in charge, I would say what happens and when, and I would be able to quit anything that wasn’t working out or had stopped being fun — without having to live with the consequences. Knitting is perfect for those of us who have these urges to control everything but have learned that spouses, coworkers, children, and friends cannot be managed in this way if we still want them to be ourspouses, coworkers, children, and friends. It would seem prudent that people with control issues learn three lessons: to let go, to lighten up, and to find an acceptable outlet for the times when those first two simply aren’t possible.
    I humbly suggest knitting to moderate the desire to run the world, and run it right. The satisfaction that perfect garter stitch can give you or the solid feeling of well-being that comes from being able to make all the decisions (if only on a small scale) can be a very good outlet for the intense and engaged knitter’s heart.
    Knitting is also a whole lot easier than divorce, finding a new job, going to family therapy, or suffering eventual loneliness, which is where I would be headed without it. Knitting’s moderating effect on my personality also explains why, occasionally, when I’m a little wound up … people sometimes suggest I go knit for a while.

the 19 th thing

Two heads are better than one.
    I STARED AT THE TV. I WAS STUNNED . There’s this rancher in Cuba, Raul Hernandez, who’s worked his arse off inbreeding cows until he has finally arrived at what he wants. After carefully selecting cows that have the qualities he desires, then breeding them and selecting the most promising of their offspring, and then breeding the offspring, he’s finally managed to produce — get this —
vacas de patio.
Translated from the Spanish, that’s “patio cows.”
    These cows are being bred for their teeniness, and now this rancher has cows that stand only a miniscule 23 to 28 inches tall. These dog-sized cows eat grass and weeds, and theoretically, you could keep one on your patio or in your backyard and it will produce about 4 quarts of milk a day, depending on the patio cow in question. That’s a lovely supply of milk for a family. Raulwas talking about how they could supply fresh, organic dairy to families who don’t have access to a store and don’t necessarily have the resources or the desire to manage cattle.
    My mind reeled. Patio cows? This was brilliant. I turned to my husband and said so. He smiled at me and asked me if I wanted to go to Cuba and get myself a little wee cow. I stared at him. There are moments in this marriage when I would have to say that he doesn’t know me at all. I’ve got no use for a patio cow. I can get milk at the corner store, for crying out loud. I’m thinking outside of the box. I’m taking the fine work of Raul Hernandez to its next logical step. The man is a genius at the beginning of a beautiful arc of an idea.
    I wonder if I could call him. I don’t know about this little cow idea, but just imagine … patio sheep — not those miniature sheep that are bred without knitters in mind, but real fleece sheep, like, say, patio Shetlands or patio merinos. Wait … patio llamas! Patio alpacas! Patio cashmere