And a hit song from a popular Broadway musical inspired
Laura for her

Starshine
scarf…“Good morning starshine, the earth says hello.” Hair. The musical was
controversial. The music was amazing. My parents got the sound track when it was
new back in 1968, and I wore it out. One of my favorite cuts was always “Good
Morning Starshine.” Do you know it? If you do, just try to not sing it while you
knit these cabled stars that dance in front of a distant galaxy.” 
The scarf is knit from one end straight through to the
other.  Knit it up in only one skein of Anzula


Sebastian, the sea cell and merino wool
bend will give your scarf in exceptional drape.  

I have so much to tell you, I have gotten a little overwhelmed and don’t know where to start. There has been a wonderful trip to Stockholm, another move to another neighbourhood in London, a number of finished projects and incessant rain. Too much stuff. And it’s not like it stops there, every day there is more stuff. The old stuff doesn’t go away: it stays noteworthy stuff I want to tell you and so it builds up. I am hoarding news.

I have long wondered whether there is some deeper sociological and/or psychological reason that unites knitters to hoarding. I even wonder if it might be genetic – part of how our brain works as makers and a survival mechanism. We may politely call our collections of yarn a ‘stash’, but I think if we’re honest, it’s bigger than what a squirrel might need to overwinter. That is certainly the case for me, though I know yours is stash is significantly tamer. Generally, yarn isn’t the only thing a knitter stashes: we keep buttons, patterns, needles, gadgetry, maybe some fabric and what else? Does our habit of stashing extend and relate to those tins of chickpeas in the kitchen cabinet? If I am honest, there are more garbanzos in there than we can eat before I next shop. Maybe you, like me, tend to have not just one, but two (and maybe more) tubes of toothpaste in the bathroom cabinet ready for when you have squeezed out the last pea-sized drop and then cut the tube open to scoop out the rest? Do you carry 2 plasters (aka bandaids) in your wallet incase of an unexpected blister – yours or someone else’s?

Our tendency as knitters to keep and be prepared may be as simple as that, unlike straight up consumers, because we can make something ourselves, we are more inclined and trained to see potential in everything. I read a really good article a few years ago in Metropolis M, a/the Dutch art magazine, which proposed that it was in fact the unread books on your bookshelf that truly form who you are as a person, rather than the books you have read. The imagined contents of each book far out weighing the been-there-done-that of a finished tome in the life changing stakes. That is why it is hard to get rid of a book you still haven’t read after years of dusting it (or not) on the shelf – it is better in your head than when you actually read it. That discrepancy between your tailor-made mental idea of what that book contains, as opposed to what it actually says, is what makes you strive for a better life – you have imagined the better and more satisfying answers that should be written in that unopened book and that is what you live by. Not to mention how impressive a well stocked bookshelf is to house guests, who are supposed to think more of you for the quality of your reading. The same can’t be said for yarn, because the language and reference points aren’t understood quite so widely as the written word. Indeed, there is also the sad fact that a well rounded bookshelf is so much neater, compact and easy to contain than a stash of yarn. Yet, I would say that all the same holds true for my yarn collection. I can not part with any of it, because it is all about the potential for the yarn to be turned in to the perfect answer.

We have moved again, this time to East Finchley, where I am plotting using wooden needles to quietly knit through films at the beautiful Phoenix Cinema, one of London’s great independent art-house cinemas. As we packed up yet again, my stash, which is being carried along from place to place in large plastic tubs filled me with shame and embarrassment, made worse knowing that this is only the section I felt I needed instant access to. There is an equal if not greater amount in deep storage. This is not a good emotional reaction to have, as we have been moving every 1 to 3 months since October. This tour of London via house sits and sublets means I am made to feel crap much more often than when my yarn has a steady place in a longterm abode. Really, all this stash should be giving me joy: imagining the beautiful things these skeins and balls will one day become. All the potential each ball contains grows and morphs the longer I have them, though is often fixed the moment I bought said yarn. And yes, frugality does come in to play – I would hate to have to buy something when I know I have some somewhere.

And then, on Tuesday, while going to see the Bauhaus: Art as Life exhibition at the Barbican Centre, I wondered in to the Song Dong: Waste Not exhibition in The Curve Gallery. It’s a beautiful and engaging collaboration between the artist and his family, specifically his late mother. It is her life’s collecting that he has installed in the gallery and boy, did she keep a lot. The full magnitude hits you upon first entering.

As I wandered through, along the narrow paths, details started to appear. The World has changed a lot in the 50+ years that Song Dong’s mother, Zhoa Xiangyuan collected these items. Many of those changes can be teased out of her collection: interesting connections that highlight the changes occurring in China specifically, as well as in the rest of the world. Here we go from hand woven baskets made from natural materials, to mass produced plastic baskets and colanders.

This cupboard filled with neatly folded material, all ready to become something, reminds me of my own cupboard, that of my mother’s and my oma, but I suppose, perhaps more and more, not everyone has one. It’s a little frustrating to not be able to unfold the pieces of fabric to feel them and see the full patterns.

A good collection of hats, though on speed inspection, the only handmade ones were crocheted.

Notice the bright red crocheted scarf at the top right, next to the tie dye. The yellow hand knitted lace shawl at the bottom was the only hand knitting I clocked.

These faded blue clothes remind me of the denim quilts I saw in the Quilts of Gee’s Bend exhibition at the De Young in 2006. Those denim quilts made from old workwear were by far my favourites – I loved being able to see where the knees had worn out and how those signs of wear were used to form the aesthetic design of the quilt.

There I was thinking that hats with ears were a recent cutsey phenomena!

This section of the exhibition made me think of Mike Kelly’s More Love Hours Than Can Ever Be Repaid, 1987, but then, since his unexpected death earlier this year, I am reminded of his work in all sorts of places.

That same evening, in one of those strange coincidences, there was a programme on BBC1 about hoarding: My Hoarder Mum and Me. It is a very touching show focusing on the presenter helping her mum get rid of stuff, interspersed with interviews with other families with an extreme hoarder in their midst. My own collection was dwarfed in comparison and I have to say it cheered me up. I don’t feel so bad – I’m not keeping mouldy food or waterlogged books, but it’s a good reminder of what I could turn in to, especially given that there is a slight precedent for it in my background…

With this letter on it’s way to you, I’ve started letting go of some of my hoarded news. Expect more over the next few days. Now to start a new knitting project!

xoxAnna