Knitting in the present tense

So much of knitting, for me, is about the anticipation of future knits. Stashing, swatching, imagining yarn and pattern combinations and finished objects... so much of the pleasure is theoretical.

The rest of knitting tends to focus on the past: things I've completed, small accomplishments within projects, milestones, percentages toward completion... I'm always wishing I could knit faster, in a sense to dispense with the present and rapidly move from future to past tenses, in the form of an FO.



Perhaps it is because Smokey plopped himself on top of my in-progress Hederas, or perhaps I'm just in a peculiar mindset, but I started asking myself how actually present I am with my knitting.

How much do I think about each stitch, contemplate each row? What kind of consideration do I give to the physical act of knitting, the small movements and thoughts which add up into the project at hand?

I started knitting as a way to focus my mind, to meditate and relax, to calm down when I would get distracted and frenzied in my life. So as I sat in the sun the other day, I quieted everything around me and just focused on my sock.



I am turning a heel. I am knitting a gusset. I am making stitches and working through a lace pattern. A yarn over makes a hole.

And so on. It was beautiful, in a way, because I felt so deeply connected with myself in that moment in space and time. I was really doing what I was doing and paying attention to it. I wasn't thinking about the socks I want to cast on next or what I should have been doing instead of knitting (because yeah, there's a huge pile of that). I was just enjoying knitting, in the present tense.

Finally, I felt present. I can't begin to explain what a relief it was.