Neighbourly Chat

(A major digression from) Little Cadet

from The Second Irresistibly Sublime  Baby 4 Ply Book

Garter Stitch in Sublime 4 Ply

For Ted, aged one week...

View fullsize

A local story for a tiny new neighbour...

Once upon a time a very long time ago, a kitten came to live in a basement next door.  The kitten grew to full size and became an outdoor cat, preferring to roam the gardens at the back of her basement than sit in by anyone's fire.  One day her family needed to move house, but she liked where she was and wouldn't budge. Many times the family captured her and took her, yowling, with them to their new home, but somehow the cat always managed to find her way back. The family were at their wits end, so eventually Lily and I - two neighbours from either side - offered to take care of her in her chosen place.  In fact this took in our homes too in any case.  The family were relieved and accepted gratefully.   

Lily lived in the house that is now Ted's - back then, before Ted and while she was still there, Lily and I became friendly on account of the cat..  Lily had a husband, George, who was very much older than herself, and whom I didn't know so well.  Certainly I saw him regularly -  my children were of an age where I was doing a lot of driving and fetching.  Our paths crossed heading in and out of our houses and George was never short of something to say.  However he spoke at a pitch that I couldn't quite catch - he muttered...   For instance, he muttered as I loaded the car for a trip to the sea, and I might reply with something genial such as ..“LOVELY DAY! GET OUT WHILE WE CAN!”

I might be marshaling kids by him on bikes, and “Mutter-mutter-mutter-muttter!”, he'd remark. “GRAND", I'd venture. "AND THANKS SO MUCH! I HOPE YOU’RE KEEPING WELL YOURSELF!”

Out of the blue he might say “MUMBLE!!!” with feeling as I passed to the shops, and  I might reply “OH I'M SURE! TOO RIGHT!  WELL, GOOD-BYE!”, perhaps sympathetically rolling my eyes.

The cat was limping one day and I could see that something seemed to be really bothering her. I called at Lily's to let her know that the cat and I were about  to make a trip to the vet and it was George who answered... generally he never came to the door. 

“Oh, hello George”, I said.  “Is Lily at home? I just wanted to mention …”

...and he turned and began muttering back into his house, only for once I was close enough to make him out....

...“Lily!", he said.  "It’s that woman who can't speak English... Lily! Come here and tell her to get away from our house!”

... as close as it was prudent to get to the cat...

Shakespeare and Brown...

Cameo by PaulinaP in Blueskies Mélange 100% Alpaca

in throes of blocking

I never photographed this (extended) Cameo before giving it to Jane, and at least one winter has passed since then... and I'm suddenly in Shakespearean mode...   So I asked Jane if the brown-and-pink shawl was still on the go,  and she emailed direct from her sofa... 

I bought this lovely mélange yarn at a http://www.thisisknit.ie sale, because the quality and the pink both appealed to me enormously.  I liked the combination of brown-and-pink too, but while I can admire and appreciate brown theoretically, it's a colour I absolutely don't wear - I had a brown school uniform for what seemed like forever.

When I was aged eleven I was moved abruptly to a new school in the middle of a school year - meaning I left a small and decidedly no-uniform system for a huge school with a disgusting brown uniform - the most disgusting brown uniform.  I also left  a junior cycle for a senior cycle, was eleven where most were at least twelve, had to learn to navigate timetables and room and very daunting textbook changes with which everyone else was already familiar.  I was a different religion too - not just a much bigger deal then than now, but also at that time meaning that I knew nobody at all.  Against the odds, though, I liked it as much as it's possible to like anything throughout teenage years... Children didn't have a lot of say but I had older siblings, which prepares anyone for pretty much anything, and had already learned that low expectations and a thick skin gets you through an awful lot.  Yes, I was mostly very cheerily miserable there (which in retrospect could have been the problem) (because something I've learned since is that there are people who are jealous of even that). 

Not long after my arrival, the form teacher announced an upcoming weekend school trip to Stratford-upon-Avon - my first trip abroad - and  the cause of weeks of negotiating over who to sit beside on the coach and who would be room mates at the accommodation. The play was to be Richard II, we'd see Shakespeare's birthplace, Ann Hathaway's garden, Coventry too.  We'd pass Birmingham on roads called M22 and suchlike, which up to that point had only been mythical concepts referred to by BBC radio 1 disc jockeys on traffic reports (while you waited to hear the Top 30)(life and death issue in those days). In England we could also stock up on Opal Fruits and Mars Bars, which were unavailable here.

On the mail boat, berths could be reserved and so it was agreed that I was to share with three of my new friends. We were to depart from school on a school day in full uniform, but from the following day we could wear our own clothes. For my birthday I got a cheesecloth blouse with a tie-waist, Sloopy jeans with X belt loops and embroidered blue canvass clogs, and this was when they'd get their first serious outing.  

First night was great: posing near the slot machines as though we might be thinking of playing them (they were for over-eighteens), only were too cool eating chocolate and sleeping in our berths. The following morning we were woken early for breakfast before disembarking. I went to get my bag and get dressed but found that  in the night someone had taken all my things - all my new finery was gone. This was devastating for many reasons, not least that I felt I'd be in very serious trouble back home - in our house you didn't lose stuff lightly.   And I couldn't believe that I alone would have the humiliation of staying in my vile brown uniform for the whole weekend in front of all my dolled up classmates, not to mention the cosmopolitan English.  Off the boat, there was an interminably long coach journey where everything seemed odd and my friends very taken up with their own business; and eventually at the bed-and-breakfast, it transpired that apparently I hadn't understood that the friends had decided ages before to take someone other than me to make up their foursome for their room. And so I had to make up another plan for myself.  

We travelled back home on a different boat, and my belongings were eventually found on that, stuffed into a plastic bag, later in the week, meaning someone on the trip had...which was kind of more than i was able to think about at the time... 

I learned a lot - not least that there are always a few nice people around too, but while I've gone through many phases of trying to wear brown again, I'm never fully convinced.

Herringbone

Miss Potter Mittens in Hedgehog Fibres Cashmere

For Ciara

This photo displays in all their imperfection mitts I made for a friend from childhood some time ago for a milestone birthday - and either I hadn't understood picot yet, or they weren't blocked; I do recall that my heart and soul went into them, even though they caused me quite a lot of heartache.  The pattern itself wasn't the issue - in fact, it was very satisfying and came to mind again because the stitch sequence on my current project is quite similar (more anon).  

No, the problem had to do with Dear Prudence here, who is prone to bouts of jealous curiosity about knitting...

photo courtesy of Lucy

...involving furtive staking, attacking and destroying when I'm out or asleep...   I was working from start and finish of one precious and irreplaceable skein while knitting on the double in every sense for a birthday deadline.  And I was almost done when Prue launched one of her onslaughts...  And by the way, butter does melt in her mouth because she's got form there too...

photo courtesy of Lucy