two hands

Hands. To me they are magic incarnate. The way they move, subtle, precise, artful, storied. The endless possibility they communicate in elegant birdlike gestures. The incredible perceptiveness of fingertips, brushing warm skin, soft cloth, cold metal.

With two hands we create our worlds.

In my hands I hold the long slender needles. They remind me of bones, or tree branches, worn smooth by years of touch and time.

In my hands I hold the wool. I think about the long story it lived to get to me. The sheep, doggedly chewing hard grass on some rain hung mountain side. The hands that sheared the bouncy fleece. The hands of the spinner, teasing the combed wool into strong fine lengths. The dyer, the trader, the packers, the passing of boxes onto and off ships.

My hands know the patterns. My fingers move in a memory dance, a code. I watch the colour morph through shades, poems of hue.

It is a real magic, alchemical, to watch the skeins unwind and loop themselves into cloth, into garments you wrap around your cold body. I love to watch you.

There are tools I hold dear. Every maker cherishes their tools. The familiarity of their weight in the hand. The pleasure of a well designed instrument. It's ease with itself. The needles of course, their clacking song a rhythm worn into my bones. The markers, little coloured hoops that slide across needle tips like commas. I have a soft spot for scissors. More than one pair tucked into my kit, each its own delight. The tiny golden snips for small stray threads. The perfect balanced heaviness of the solid cutters, the satisfaction of their precise alignment and clean blades. The pleasing metallic click of the closing.

Our hands are made for making. All the glowing screens and virtual worlds in existence are hollow up against our palms. Remote. They will make us empty. They are saddening us. We need touch. We need to bring things into life. To know we can clothe ourselves. To know the straight up real pleasure of using our bodies, our senses, our articulate miraculous hands.

Sitting with my knitting I am monk-like. My mind is gentle. My thoughts loop and unravel with the wool. I am a person, in the madly spinning world, who knits. This is something I can know.

Please, pick up your tools. Sit. Make.

Knit your way to enlightenment.