Am I a process knitter or a project knitter? Somewhere in the middle, but probably closer to process. There are scads of chic sweaters, cool leg-warmers, fetching coats, etc. that I would love to wear, but which I could not get myself to knit – all the way thru to the end (“Mère! Look at all that stockinette!” says Sarah, aghast – she knows me so well – and, oddly, keeps popping into my blog veiled in parentheses).

Oh, I could start them easily – am sorely, sorely tempted at times! But I would bog down in Stockinette Wasteland (I hear The Who echoing in my brain whenever I hit that phrase – the howling line from “Teenage Wasteland” – the title of the song actually being “Bubba O’Reilly”, of course, and my son and husband would be scrambling to be the first to correct me on this one if I had not said so). Knitter know thyself! When I hit a large patch of Stockinette, my brain starts to jump around like a puppy eager for something to chew or wrestle or chase. My idea of “TV knitting” is a nice regular cable or an established lace pattern which repeats in less than 2 dozen rows. I take my simplest knitting in the car (when I am not driving) for errands around town because I can usually put it down and take it up again easily – which is essential because whoever I have conned into coming with me to drive (so I can knit) gets impatient if he or she has to stand in the grocery store parking lot in the driving rain while I “just get to a stopping place.” Good stockinette knitting time, but I cannot contrive enough errands to get me through anything of length in less than 6 or 7 years.

So, flash back to the Easter sweater for Max. A cheerful band of Fair Isle color and then 7 inches of stockinette. Fine Ivory yarn, running at 8 stitches and 10 rows to the inch. 217 stitches across (fronts and back worked at one stretch). Get out my trusty pencil and paper: 15,190 stockinette stitches!! And that is only up to the armpits! There is the rest of the body and the two sleeves to go….

I do not usually clock my knitting. What is the point, after all? But I have developed a sick fascination with the numbers on this one (remember, the puppy-like brain needed something to chew on) and estimated that I was knitting maybe 40 stitches at minute. Imagining myself going full-tilt without breaks (pencil, paper, long division): something like 6-7 hours of stockinette. Just to get to the armpits.

Stockinette Wasteland, Stockinette Wasteland….We’re all wasted!