3/08/2006

OCD

Here's how my perfectionistic, obsessive neurosis affects my knitting. It's not by making me frog everything until there are no mistakes in the finished product. Oh no, there are plenty of mistakes in my (still unfinished) Olympic socks, and I'm perfectly happy to let them slide right by on my needles. No, my neurosis is a little more subtle.

It all started when I got the lovely Anna yarn for some nice lace socks. I decided I'd knit them for my cousin (who I'm pretty sure can't be reading this blog, but if she is, there goes that surprise).

My cousin has two sisters. Can you see where this is going? Shortly after I got started on the Anna socks, for cousin #1, Stephanie announced the Knitting Olympics and, well, we all know where that led. My Olympic project was another pair of lace socks, these for cousin #2. Which, of course, I did not finish, but hope to be done with in the next several days. So now I'm thinking about poor old cousin #3. I hadn't planned to knit socks for her. She's younger, maybe less interested in clothing and more in Harry Potter, you know. Maybe less likely to be impressed with hand-knit socks than her older sisters. But I'd hate for her to feel left out, so…. Then I realized, these three girls have a mother. And she has feet, and I wouldn't want her to feel that I was slighting her by knitting socks for her three girls but not for her…

So where am I now? I have a single Anna sock (properly referred to as a Peaks and Valleys sock, but I'm focused on the yarn) about a quarter finished. I have a sock and a half of the Koigu Olympic socks (I think the pattern is called Straight Laced, but I'm not sure). And I have an inner compulsion to knit two more pairs of socks, patterns and yarn as yet unknown, to avoid hypothetically hurting the feelings of people who are probably not sitting around pining for hand-knit socks, or worrying about whether I like them as much as I do their sisters or daughters. I am not unaware of the fact that it's an opportunity to buy – and more importantly, consider, choose, and fondle, new yarn.

I'm also very excited because I've ordered this book and expect it to arrive in a few days. I can't wait to make whole little ecosystems of knitted arctic wildlife and the like, including little shoebox dioramas for them to live in. I'm truly, truly a dork. But a really excited dork.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

The ballerina pictures were adorable!!! I don't think she could be cuter. And I'm a huge dork too, maybe it's in the genes??? Why do us girls get stuck with being dorks? Oh well, at least we can finish our sentences in a decent amount of time.