Months in the making, my impossibly long scarf is finally complete. As I finished weaving in the ends, I pondered over this work marked by uneven stitches and why I sink hours into the pursuit of making imperfect things.
There are different kinds of knitters. There are those who can knit on through mistakes, overlooking a purl that should have been a knit stitch. There are some who would rather rip out hours of work than wear a scarf with one wrong stitch. I’ve admired in wonder those I know who knit in perfect, even stitches, achieving uniformity on par with any machine. And then there are those, like me, fated to knit the occasional loose stitch.
Somewhere along the way, with years of knitting and many projects under my belt, I realized this tendency wasn’t something I’d outgrow with practice. It just is. And so knitting has become an exercise in patience and acceptance.
With $26 worth of yarn and unknown hours of needling loops into loops invested, this handmade thing absolutely looks the part. It wasn’t always so, but I can now say this and really mean it: I’m good with that.