Sorry for being a bit radio silent for the past week! I really have no good excuse lined up this time…
My fingers have not been idle though – they just haven’t been typing blog posts. I’ve been working away at my Oppositional top and I’ve made it to the middle section:
So far, I’m really happy with it. The twisted stockinette (ok – half twisted. I am no masochist and didn’t twist on the purl rows) lends a lovely texture to the top part, and also ensures a firm fabric despite the thin fingering weight yarn. I think I mentioned before, but I’m surprisingly a fan of the bright pink. The splatters of deeper pink and red keep it from being overly sweet, but even so I am still very glad I’m not doing an all-pink top. The blue and green DK helps balance the pink, and for me creates a much more palatable look. Rather like putting jam on toast instead of eating jam straight from the jar. Mind – I am NOT judging anybody who has done that, though I personally prefer a spoonful of hot fudge sauce as my indulgence for straight-sweet when life requires it. But this top will be a far more everyday top with the toast included.
Jam and how it should or should not be consumed is not the unpopular opinion though.
The Inauguration
I have never before felt it was so important to me personally to watch the Inauguration of a new U.S. President live. I’ve absolutely been excited about Inauguration day before, but have often been content to watch snippets on the news later, or read about it. But last Wednesday, I dialed into my last work call on my phone (instead of my computer) so that I could watch over my husband’s shoulder with my phone mic on mute and one headphone on my ear to chime in as necessary for work. Sadly, I had to turn my attention back to work for a couple minutes as Kamala Harris was sworn in, but I saw Biden’s swearing in. About then my last call of the day wrapped, so I saw the rest of the ceremonies live.
I was absolutely blown away by Amanda Gorman’s poetry and her performance of her poem. If you didn’t see it, I recommend you look up “The Hill We Climb” and watch one of the recordings of her performance available on the various news network YouTube channels. The words of the poem itself are amazing, but I also loved her delivery. She clearly practiced not only her vocal delivery, but also the way she used her hands to enhance the words. Its a performance worth watching, and not just listening to.
Now for what I feel must be an unpopular opinion – the Bernie Meme. I, like many, was tickled by the photo of Bernie sitting in a chair alone with great big knitted mittens. The memes of his image inserted into other photos was funny for about the first 24hrs, and I genuinely enjoyed it at first as something light hearted which provided a break and relief from the tension of the past few months (or years), and which celebrated how practicality and beauty intersect in knitting. Then I got bored as more and more popped up, and by last Saturday as my social media feeds were increasingly a giant sea of Bernie photoshopped into increasingly random photos I became irritated. There were so many amazing and touching parts of the Inauguration, and so many amazing woman were core to the Inauguration itself, as well as instrumental in getting people there, and yet it was all subsumed by one image of a single man. Ugh.
And the craft groups and site were inundated with “Bernie” mitten, sweater and similar patterns. Some of these were people having fun with their own creations, but I definitely felt like there were some designers jumping on the “Bernie mitten” bandwagon, and rushing to get patterns out before the fad was over. This left a bit of a bad taste in my mouth as well.
I cannot tell you how happy I am that this morning it felt like images and commentary of other people is creeping back into my social media. I have also found a lot more joy and pleasure in seeing the various artistic interpretations (drawings, paintings, collage) of the inauguration from various portraits of Amanda Gorman to Michelle Obama drawn super-hero style in her awesome pantsuit.
I don’t think I fully appreciated how much tension I was holding in my body leading up to the Inauguration until after it was over though. I’m hopeful for the future, but now we have to set about doing the work which we fought so hard to have the opportunity to do. Legislatures around the country (looking at you Georgia) are already seeking ways to make voting harder next time around. Racism, sexism and bigotry haven’t gone away – they just don’t have as much sway on the government for the moment.
So maybe that’s one unpopular opinion (the Bernie Meme isn’t that funny) and one undesirable truth (the hard work is just getting started). But, one stitch at a time, we can get there.