Thursday, April 14, 2005

Profound minutiae?

My friend Kevin has accused me, rightfully enough, of dwelling on "minutiae" in my blog. He is, of course, correct -- this is pretty much what a blog is for, particularly a knitting blog with a fairly specific readership in mind.

However, his comment did send my thoughts to the wonderful books of Sally Melville, the Zen Buddhist priestess of knitting, and her ideas about the right and left hemispheres of the brain, and specifically how the right brain is free, while knitting, to expand and create on its own. Sally mentions that activities that are repetitive and require little focused analytical thought can do this. (My DH, of course, uses this as an excuse to spend hours playing computer games. But why not, if it accomplishes the same thing?) Are the recording and processing of minutiae part of this experience, I wonder? Perhaps I will email Sally and ask her.

Thinking about right brain and left brain a lot right now while reading up on Sylvia Plath and Ted Hughes for my next show. Sylvia's journals are fascinating. I think, had she lived today, she would have been a voracious blogger. It seems clear to me that she was enamoured of her own genius and knew the journals would be published one day. She knew everyone would hang desperately onto every detail of her everyday existence. Those journals are her immortality, and perhaps that's why we all blog, to put some kind of public record of our internal life out into the world.

At any rate, on to the minutiae! I have successfully blocked the light blue seed stitch pieces of Blue Cardy (and yes, Spinnity, you are right, this greatly reduced the differences between the old and new sections), and I have sewn the side seams on the dark blue side. They look very nice and tidy. Shoulders next, then setting in sleeves, which I am dreading -- any pointers? Then the same on the other side and there's a complicated bit where I have to attach the two with crab stitch -- can't remember how to do crab stitch! Luckily the internet exists for such dilemmas.

Just about done now with Bias Betty, so it will have a photo op soon and I will move on to Peter's Backpack.

1 comment:

spinnity said...

I think crab stitch is about crocheting "backwards", from L to R, usually over another row of crochet. It makes an edge that looks like it was finished blanket stitch or something that wraps the edge.

Set in sleeves.. I may have to do a photo essay. In fact.. I've already got a little diagram about how NOT to set in your sleeves.. I'll see if I can get it posted.