Knitting Lessons

Knitting Lessons is a short story I wrote for a contest a couple years ago. I thought I would share it with you. Hope you enjoy it!

Knitting Lessons

            Dashing across the front yard, I ran up our neighbor’s porch stairs and knocked on her door. Mrs. Nelson had come home from the hospital just this morning, so Mom had dished up some lasagna and asked me to take it over.

Shifting impatiently from one foot to the other, I wondered what could be taking her so long. Finally, I heard a bolt slide back and the door opened. Mrs. Nelson peered out.

“Jasmine! What a wonderful surprise!”

            I was startled to see how much weight Mrs. Nelson had shed. Her clothes hung from her frail body. Her lovely round face, once the color of coffee beans, had shriveled to the likeness of a peach well past its prime.

            I held out the container. “Mother thought you might like some lasagna.”

            Mrs. Nelson pushed the door open, holding tightly to her walker. “Come in, child.”

            I shook my head. “I… I have the sniffles. I really shouldn’t –.”

            She frowned. “I need to use both hands on the walker. If you could just pop in and set the food on the table, I’d really appreciate it.”

            I stepped inside, trying to smile convincingly as I edged past her, then set the container on the chipped Formica table top.

            “Thank you, dear,” Mrs. Nelson said, her walker clicking as she padded along behind me. “How are you and your mother doing?”

            “Fine.” I nodded. “And you?”

            “As well as can be expected, I suppose,” she said, lowering herself into a recliner. “The doctors aren’t very optimistic but, ultimately, it’s in God’s hands.”

            The next day, I brought beef stew. When I knocked, Mrs. Nelson called out for me to come in. She was sitting in the same place I’d left her the day before.

            “Stew,” I said, holding up the container.

            “Thank you, Jasmine. You and your Mom are so thoughtful!”

She was knitting a daffodil-yellow blanket, her hands flying along as she deftly wrapped a strand of yarn around a needle, then pulled it through in a loop which she worked into a stitch. Her fingers were gnarled with arthritis, each finger bent at the knuckles like a row of men hunched over their work. I watched in awe, mesmerized as her needles whipped across one row, then another.

            “Do you knit?” Mrs. Nelson asked, as she stabbed, looped, pulled, and tweaked the yarn.

            “No. But I’d like to.”

            “Pull up a chair then and I’ll teach you.”

She handed me a pair of aluminum needles and a skein of dark grey worsted.

            “Grey?” I frowned. “How about something a bit more colorful?”

            “Grey will do just fine for now. Believe me, you’ll do plenty of stitching and tearing apart before you’re ready to work a project. Now, make a slipknot.”

            I gave her a blank look.

            “Oh child, you’ve got a lot to learn.”

            Taking the yarn, she tied a slipknot, then poked one needle into the loop, showing me how to jab, loop, then pull the yarn through and over.

            “Now you try.”

            I held the needles stiffly, thrusting them together, like two rams butting heads.

            “Relax your arms. Lower the needles. They’re supposed to work together, not against each other.”

            The thick yarn felt strange as it wound through my fingers. The needles flopped like wet, slippery fish in my unskilled hands. I plunged the right needle through the next stitch, then attempted to loop the yarn over it. The thread resisted, a rebel in my bumbling hands.

            Mrs. Nelson resumed her own knitting, tactfully ignoring my clumsy efforts. I glanced over, watching as her needles clicked away, obedient little pixies in the service of their master. She made it look so easy.

            The next day, I didn’t fight with the needles as much. Soon, I had a big, grey square that didn’t look too bad.

“Let me show you something,” Mrs. Nelson said, leading me to the guestroom.

The bed was piled high with blankets in shades of purple, red, orange, blue, green, and yellow. A rainbow of love, all knit by hand.

I was shocked. “What’s all this?”

“Blankets for an orphanage overseas. I don’t have much to give those poor babies. But I can knit.”

 “How many blankets have you made so far?”

“One hundred and twenty-six.”

I gasped. “That many?”

“But not nearly enough,” she murmured, tears pooling in her eyes.

Spring warmed into summer. I started helping with the blankets. Blue, pink, purple, lavender, and bright yellow yarns worked their way through my fingers, onto my needles, slowly emerging as blankets that would provide warmth and comfort to many children.

But as the summer wore away and autumn brought cooler weather, Mrs. Nelson seemed to shrivel like the leaves falling from the trees. She was barely five feet now, a stooped little figure, struggling for every breath. I knew she was still fighting, but I wasn’t convinced she was winning.

It was mid-September when Mrs. Nelson died. For several weeks after the funeral I couldn’t bring myself to pick up a pair of knitting needles. I told myself I needed time to heal. How could I knit without my teacher, my mentor, my friend? It just wasn’t the same.

            It was almost Halloween when I arrived home to find a moving van in Mrs. Nelson’s driveway. Her daughter was cleaning out the house. Several large bags had been placed on our doorstep. Dragging them inside, I opened the first one. It was full of yarn. Like a bag of Skittles burst open, colorful skeins in pinks, reds, yellows, and blues spilled out onto the floor. A note lay among the skeins.

            I picked it up and read, “For my sweet Jasmine. Remember me with each stitch you knit. Love, Mrs. Nelson.”

            In that moment, I knew I had to continue the blanket project in her honor. For in teaching me to knit, she had taught me something far more valuable; she had taught me how to love.

Written by Renee Srch, April 2018