Out of time

Grant Park pullover, 242 stitches for the body, knit in the round.  I have been anticipating this part of the tubular cast-on, with some trepidation. Each sleeve was multiple starts, rips, and restarts.  That was only 56 stitches. Tubular cast-on. Yup.

Dutifully cast on 242 stitches. Kept looking at the work, wondering what would happen to derail this attempt.  I cannot tell the difference between premonition and actual disaster, so I keep knitting.  My circular needle was barely big enough after the first row (k1, yo).  I decided not to join in the round until a few more rows in, then stitch up the side carefully. Second row (sl 1 wyib, P1), and I'm wondering when the stitches condense into the tube.  Then I am realizing, with pain, and understanding, and inevitability, that I had cast on 242 when I should have cast on 122.  So after knitting...hmmmm 242 x2 plus 242 x 2 -3 (yes it took until three stitches from the end of the entire second row to put it all together), it was frogged. And I wonder why I seem to knit so slowly.

The restart is started.  The hem (K1P1 infinitely) is done.  The pattern is not mindless.  Those purl stitches that make up the diamonds have to be placed Just So.  Once the pattern is established, it will be faster, more rote.

Then the knitstupidity will strike, and the frogging will resume.

Then again, perhaps not.  

I was about to say, "It's a mystery!".  From Shakespeare in Love, it is the most oft-quoted movie line in the Etherknitter household.  I would have linked to a Google quote, but found this.  Simply substitute "knitting" for "theatre".

Philip Henslowe: Mr. Fennyman, allow me to explain about the theatre business. The natural condition is one of insurmountable obstacles on the road to imminent disaster.
Hugh Fennyman: So what do we do?
Philip Henslowe: Nothing. Strangely enough, it all turns out well.
Hugh Fennyman: How?
Philip Henslowe: I don't know. It's a mystery.

I do know that I am part of an amorphous sweater KAL.  No one knows what patterns the others are knitting.  No one knows who else is participating in the KAL.  But we do know the name of the group.

NaKniSweGoSlo.  Srsly.

Our second hotel in Barcelona was in the Gothic quarter.  We were half a block from the Cathedral.  I have to say "Gothic Cathedral", despite the apparent redundancy of that.  The city is more known for Sagrada Familia, the cathedral begun in 1883, with construction taken over by Gaudi in 1884.  That is still a WIP, constructed over decades and centuries, as in the Middle Ages.

The Gothic quarter is old stone, impossibly narrow streets, uneven surfaces, and street musicians who take advantage of the resonance of the stone to perform their best.  Two caught our ear. 

One man plays an unusual harp.  The soundbox built as one of the supports adds resonance to his music.  He is from Colombia, smiles often, plays a mix of classics and pop favorites.  His favorite corner has a small plaza with a stone bench, always lined with happy listeners.  He recognized us each day, smiled and nodded when he saw us again. 

The part of the harp strut that isn't the box was ornately carved.  It reminded me of a Golding wheel.

The Gothic Cathedral is not the best example of its genre.  It continues to be an active church, giving worshippers an earthly impression of the vastness of an Almighty.  The side chapels lining the central nave draw many offerings.  Candles are routine.  Flowers scatter at the front of the enclosures.

These caught my eye.

The terror of flying adds piquancy to the time that follows.  The sense of milennia of history is missing in America.  Roman wall remnants remain in Barcelona.  They are not pristine.  Two thousand years show in the decay of stone, and cobbled repairs.  As in Rome, the walls are used to build other structures, or as foundations for more walls.  What is stamped in our DNA that drives us to build walls?
  

My Rhinebeck shawls are hopelessly behind.  I'm removing the personal thumbscrews.  I won't sacrifice the pleasure of the knit for a deadline.  It is a liberation of sorts.  Shuck the peer pressure, continue knitting.  I think I lost a week somewhere.  Rhinebeck is less than two weeks away, not the three weeks that my inner counter was counting!

Comments

[Carole]

Deadlines suck. You are a smart cookie.

[Gale]

Looks like a lovely vacation.
Your lead will most certainly be followed when it's my turn to cast on for Grant Park. It's not been started for fear of doing something similar - the dumbassery with a cast on around here never stops.

[Manise]

I hate deadlines too. I have many looming and not all are knitting. With all of the baby knitting in progress I've resigned myself to accepting the fact that my Leaf Lace shawl will probably not be ready for Rhinebeck- assuming I'm going of course-heh.

[PumpkinMama]

I'm in the knit,frog, re-knit knitalong right with you. Barcelona looks incredible.

[Marcia]

I've just TINKED back more than twenty rows on a "simple" ribbed cardigan (RS: Knit, WS, K4, sl 1 with y in front, K4) because I apparently continued knitting while asleep in front of the TV the other night. I tried dropping back to fix the TWO incorrect stitches, but it's not that easy on garter stitch! Aurrgghh! I feel your pain....and have a better understanding of why I knit so slowly.

As for Spain, friends recently came back after a vacation in a 5-star, very expensive hotel, with bedbugs. Had to trash their new bedding plus redo a neighboring condo into which the bugs migrated....to the tune of over $10,000. We are going to check carefully in Tuscany! And that harp does indeed remind one of a Golding!

[Pat]

Last year I joined the "3 sweaters in a year" group and can't even seem to do that - still working on #2!
Looking forward to seeing your hem...tomorrow at Starbucks??

[Teyani]

Ah yes, knit 5 rows, rippp five rows, knit ten rows, rippp 6 - I know that dance.
And I love the fact that you have removed your inner time pressure. Makes it so much better.
Great photos.
Love that harp - and yes! I totally thought of the Golding wheels as well.

[Kathy]

Peer pressure and kntiting are not mutally exclusive :-)

Love the trip pictures. Have to go there. And have to see you!

[elizabeth]

I hope in my next life, I'm born in Europe. I wonder what it'd be like to be born with that connection to a place and people thousands of years old - although that's really not true, is it? North America was inhabited before the settlers, just not all built up, so it doesn't seem to count? Now I have all kinds of strange thoughts going through my head! Thanks, Laurie! ;o)

[Lisa]

I had the exact same revelation regarding knitting deadlines and undue pressures. My Rhinebeck clock was off kilter too! Why did we both think it was the following weekend?!?

[Cheryl S.]

Whew! When I glanced at your post in Google Reader, my eyes caught "Grant Park" and "242 stitches for the body". I missed the "pullover". I was afraid there'd been a terrible accident, and not of the knitting kind.

Ah Barcelona! I am so envious. I would love to go there some day.

Crocheted carnations! Fun!

[Anne]

Oh how I do lurves me some Tom Stoppard. I use that quote all the time, as well as several from Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead. No one ever has a clue what I'm talking about. Par for my course, I suppose.

I couldn't even manage a 1x1 rib sleeve this weekend, so I guess we are all in the same boat to some extent with the NaSweDearGodWillItEverEnd.

[Lynn]

Emergency afghan square knitting is a really good excuse for not finishing my Rhinebeck sweater, I'm telling myself. Also, Manise IS coming to Rhinebeck, no maybes about it. Tell her I said so, and that I'm looking forward to having her yell at me about that. ;~)

[Caroline M]

Cue Monty Python - what have the Romans ever done for us? We still have some of the straight roads that they built, they leap out at you from a road map because they cut straight through the landscape.

There's enough real pressure in daily life without adding to it by making knitting deadlines too - well done for scrapping the new Rhinebeck knit. Just think how well ahead you are now for next year.

[Fulvia]

The "arpa llanera" or "harp of the plains" is one of the instruments closely identified with Venezuela. Check this out: http://harpingforharmony.org/arpa-llanera/

I often play this music when painting fabric or free-motion stitching and I am invariably transported, transformed, in bliss.

[Fulvia]

Better yet, go to this link:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=377MskP7J3M

It is a sloooooooow version of our National song, but it still fabulous. Hope you enjoy it! Makes me so proud of my countrymen ...

[Kim]

Deadlines are always the beginning of the end for me....I don't do well with them. ;)

I LOVE that harp! Do you know that learning how to play the harp is one of the things I hope to do before my days are over. Harps are so beautiful....just like spinning wheels.

[margene]

From our first steps into this country we wanted new. Our loss is that sense of the past, one that has been replaced with "more".
I've never met a knitting project I didn't need to start twice.

[Melissa G]

Thanks for the wall picture. I have stalled out reading McCullough's Masters of Rome, but now I am motivated to jump back in (only 2 left). My in-laws took a "Backwards in Time" (my title) tour of Europe. They started in England then went to Italy and Greece. Coincidentally they were in Rome when John Paul died.

[Sylvia]

I owe you an email -- about the plying twist. It's written -- will try to find it today.

You said TWO musicians. Where is #2???

Lovely harp.

242 stitches. I do something like that every few years, then remember and am more careful for a while, then mess up again. Now when it happens I laugh and frog and give it another try.

I love building walls. Freestone, brick and mortar, Hilfiker retaining walls... It's definitely in the DNA, but I think because of selection. If you could build a decent wall, you could keep your livestock in, the wild things out, have a roof overhead, etc.

[gayle]

Not the tubular cast-on I showed you...
My brother spent 2 weeks in Turkey, visiting his son who was doing a semester abroad there. He took pictures of things that were OLD - he laughed when he thought about us Americans thinking a couple of hundred years was old. Some things he saw were a couple of *thousand* years old...

[Kim]

And now it's one week away and I can't wait to see you and others. :)

My first (and possibly last) me time this entire year since SPA.

[Lorette]

Um hmm. Most of my most dumbassed mistakes are on the cast on row, generally discovered about 2 inches after the cast on row. I currently seem to be stuck in the Sleeves That Never End KAL, complicated by an apparent inability to knit stockinette.
We are just babes in the US compared to Europe. Seeing structures in Ireland built by humans thousands of years ago is rather humbling.

[claudia]

I often wonder where the "new knits for Rhinebeck" insanity came from. If we are very lucky, it might be too warm for knits. If we are not, then the knits will be covered by coats.

Ah well...

[KathleenC]

I definitely feel your pain. I finally finished my husband's sweater, having spent more than three years on it.
It's FIRST time out was just after casting on. Because I measured a 2" gauge swatch, and then forgot to divide the stitch count by two. So I cast on 6 40 stitches instead of 320.
Yes... it was a really slow first two inches.
And yes... it took me two inches (of ribbing) to realize.

Also I now have Robert Frost going through my head... "Something there is that doesn't love a wall..."

[Chris]

Our DNA finds safety and comfort in defined territory. Hence, walls. Beyond the wall, we do not have to defend, but within, it is ours in which to relax unless invaded. Wolves do the same thing, only their "walls" are pee.