Quit Jivin' me, Turkey!

Some knitting quotes for today. The first one's mine, I just said it to Pete, as I explained how I would need to rip back three rows on the front of the linen print (I got too enthusiastic as my decreases were continually correct, and I totally forgot to change colours!):

"That's why I like doing the backs first; that way most of my cock-ups are behind me... literally"

I have spent this morning looking after my sick and miserable-looking husband, as he sits balled-up and shivering on the lounge in his Holden flannelette pyjamas (he has a temperature - I'm not freezing him in some wacked-out, 'old wives tale' cure!), and doing the grocery shopping with Wonderboy. This is a new thing for us so far, as we've only had the new car a few days. I'm sure the novelty of "I'll take Wonderboy shopping, you stay at home" will wear off pretty soon.

Once Wonderboy went down for his afternoon nap, I crashed out on the lounge, grabbed the computer, and started up the latest "Cast On" podcast. A new thing for me, "Cast On" is the brainchild of Brenda Dayne, a native Oregonian who has been living, writing and knitting in Wales for the past five years. She has such a lovely, soothing voice, and I find her podcasts so interesting to listen to, usually as I knit. I'm having a bit of trouble connecting with other knitters in my local area (though Ravelry in helping with this!), and so I rely on knitters blogs from all over the place, and "Cast On" to really help reinforce my sense of being a part of this community of these lovely and often strange individuals called Knitters.

Interestingly, Brenda's subject for this most recent podcast was "I speak Jive". This is a quote from the movie 'Flying High', where an old lady offered to translate the 'jive' a bloke was speaking to the air hostess.

What has all this to do with knitting, you ask?

Brenda says:

“In linguistics, a ‘language death’ is a process that occurs when there are no longer speakers of a given language. This can happen in a variety of ways… this process happens slowly, when the older generation cease to transmit the language to younger generations, with the result being fewer and fewer people who speak the language…”

She refers to a book called ‘Traditional Country Craftsmen’, about the tools and languages of mostly forgotten crafts. The end of the book discusses textile crafts, and she was amazed to find that the familiar tools and methods of spinners and weavers had ended up the same way as those of ‘thatchers’, ‘cloggers’ and ‘chair bodgers’ - crafts long ago faded into obscurity.

She continues:

“Several years ago, I knit a sweater called ‘the red edge’ from the book ‘Poems of Colour’. I haven’t worn it in a couple of winters, because the button band was knit - a bit funky... I stopped wearing the sweater that for all of the things I have knit over the years, this was the one thing of which I am most proud…

... On Sunday, I decided to fix the red edge… I had an extra skein in the main colour left over from this project, and so I didn’t bother reknitting the yarn, I just tossed it and started fresh… I also knit the bands a little wider, so they’d accommodate a zipper. the sweater looks great… I love it again, and I cannot wait for the zip to arrive so I can finish the project…

... I ordered an 18-inch, cream coloured open-ended zip, because I could not find one locally. This item cost 4.50, with shipping probably closer to 5. Convert that, to US and I have just paid 10 bucks for an 18 inch, cream coloured plastic zipper, because they are items of such rarity in this country that you must pay for them dearly... People used to sew in Britain. And not that long ago. How did this happen? When did people give it up, and why?

…The birth of industrial process may not have killed craft, but it surely hastened its demise. People stopped ‘bodging’, and ‘clogging’, and ‘thatching’, and sewing, and the language of the crafts dies with them. I don’t think this will happen to knitting, at least not in my lifetime, still I feel it’s usually best to hedge one’s bets. And that is why I speak jive.”

I love the way she linked that all together. Debbie Stoller speaks the same way in 'Stitch and Bitch', referring to engaging in crafts like knitting and crochet as not being anti-feminism, but pro-feminism. Preserving these crafts, these traditions, and not letting them fall by the wayside as we become more and more dependent on technology as a society is such a strong thing to be a part of, and really feels to be, I don't know, humanity-affirming to me. It kind of reminds me how I'm a tiny, tiny part of something bigger, and I love that feeling.