Winter's Calling

For as long as I can remember I have loathed winter. Even in high school, after learning how to snowboard (and despite loving it), I still could not properly cope with the fact that it was going to be THAT freaking cold for THAT freaking long. When Jake and I planned our trip to Europe last year, many people asked why we were leaving in late September. My answer was always, "because I would like to avoid winter in Maine at all cost." "But you know there will still be winter in Europe, right?" they would retort, to which I would state, "Yes, but at least when I'm freezing in the snow I will be surrounded by something beautiful and new." And it was true.

Last winter, I spent a lot of my time coughing my lungs off with bronchitis, washing dishes, and hanging laundry. However, I also spent a lot of time learning to knit. Probably one of the main reasons I kept my sanity in those wacky, cozy sheds, was the fact that Seona had taught me something useful and creative. Since returning home, I hadn't really felt much urge to continue knitting. In the spring, I made some fingerless gloves for a few friends, knitted a few pairs of baby booties, but I never felt the need to knit like I did in England. Until this fall.

Roughly a week before the wedding it started getting absolutely frigid. I went to the yarn shop and stocked up on yarn, and started in on a couple of projects. This week, however, it has hit me full boar. Not only am I feeling the need to knit, I am feeling the need to knit CONSTANTLY. I daydream about Catherine Hill in Frome, the wool shop in Wells, and I just become so unbelievably depressed. Don't get me wrong, KnitWit is absolutely wonderful, but something about the yarn shops I went to in England - they are a comforting memory, and knitting at home is a way to deal with missing Frome and the Chapmans.

With this knitting compulsion also comes the comforting fact that I want to keep learning. Having had my grandfather's flax wheel in the apartment for 8 months, I am just itching to take spinning lessons. What an amazing coincidence that the lessons are only held on my days off! How odd, that this is the first year in which I am not dreading the Maine winter.