SWEATER QUEST by Adrienne Martini

Author:Adrienne Martini
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Free Press
Published: 2010-04-10T04:00:00+00:00

6

JULY AND AUGUST

Knots in the Skein

Video entitled Fair Isle Without Fear, hosted by Alice Starmore: $275 (or free with library card)

Before I get too wrapped up in my existential dilemma about what makes an Alice Starmore an Alice Starmore, life intervenes and I have to fly to Pittsburgh, my hometown.

My grandfather’s death isn’t a huge surprise. When you hit ninety, it’s pretty clear that your personal alarm clock is close to ringing. He remained in decent health for nearly all those ninety years, which was a blessing.

While it isn’t a sudden shock, it is still very sad. He was a decent, wonderful man whose loss leaves a void in the lives that his touched. The depth of my own grief surprises me. It sneaks up on little cat feet and bites me during the church service.

I haven’t been in a church—much less a Catholic one—in years. You never really forget the emotions that religion has a knack for evoking. Guilt has always been one of them, for me, anyway. But few other institutions are as good at channeling hope and grief.

I cry through most of the Mass, which is so unexpected that I don’t even have a tissue. My dad gives me the soft, white handkerchief that he always has with him, something that he hasn’t done since I was a kid. The memory of all the times one of those handkerchiefs wiped my nose or dried my tears makes me cry even more, because I know that sooner than I’d like to imagine, my dad won’t be there to hand me a handkerchief when I need one.

During the drive from the church to the cemetery, which takes about thirty times longer than anticipated because the parkway is never swift, I want more than anything to knit a round or two of Mary Tudor, which is almost knitted to the armholes. But the sweater is now big enough that it is too cumbersome to fly with. I’ve taken to carrying all the little balls of yarn with me so that I won’t have to stop to hunt for them. The sweater’s tote bag grows more awkward each week. I’m certain that it won’t fit in an overhead bin, provided the TSA would let me on a flight with it in the first place. The idea of checking it fills me with dread. What if it got lost? I need to lie down even now when I think about it.

I went with my better judgment and left Mary T. at home. But the knitting has gone from cursed to comforting. That unwieldy tote bag of yarn is my very own woobie or blankie. And I wanted my woobie right now, in the same way that my oldest child needs her blankie when life knocks her around.

My grandfather was a Navy man during World War II. In honor of his service, two seamen at the cemetery drape his coffin in the American flag, which they then fold and present to my aunt. When the younger of the two thanks her for her father’s service, his sincerity is palpable.

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