Why Don't You Get Out More

It is 8 weeks now, since news came that schools were closing and since I have been out of my house  and most days, life has been pretty normal, or would be, if the oven was working or I could get a repair person to come.  My biggest problem through all of this was the quest for yeast. I have had a marvelous time knitting and carding and generally doing my stuff, feeling utterly content with things as they are. 

But the best thing of all has been there is no burden of expectation.  No one is out there wondering why I am just sitting at home.  You cannot imagine what a relief this is.  

Of course, I know I am not just sitting, but to most people, the knitting doesn't count as doing something. The reading doesn't count as doing something.  Reading and knitting are prefaced with 'just' as if it isn't real somehow.  Reading might be occasionally seen as a valuable and important thing to do, but knitting?  

Never.  Not in the modern world. I don't even think in older times either.  Longer ago, knitting is what you filled the spaces between and after other large tasks with.  It needed doing, but it was a thing done in fits and bits and pieces. It wasn't a specific task that took x many hours of a single day so it wasn't really seen as a job to be done.  It was just knitting.

Some people might not agree with me that most people don't divide the world by  'just' things and do things.  But let's look at running.  

When I was a kid, if an adult told you they were out running, people would have looked at you oddly.  Only children were out doors running.  Grown ups did not run.  They may have gone for a walk, but certainly not gone out to run.  Just running?  Hmmm, how odd.  

Somewhere over time, things changed and running became fashion and then that something more, till it is what it is today.  Today, if you say you run, the world looks at you as if you really are doing something. 

Knitting remains a just in the eyes of the larger world. It remains something slightly odd, slightly strange, slightly subversive to the few who feel subversive is good.  But finally, no one is asking why I am sitting at home. 

If I happen to be knitting, energized, excited and occasionally wildly fulfilled, at least no one is saying why don't you get out more.