Do You Want to be Known?

Do you want to be known? Do you want to be recognized? Or do you want to just live your life? Do you want to sit and eat, not thinking of how you look while you enjoy your cheap wine and fries and watch the crazy guys pass you a hundred times doing wheelies, there, while everyone watches them go by and secretly wonders if those motorcycle riders will crash and roll and if we'll see their body parts bend and tuck and twist on the asphalt?  And if it did happen, would you blame the guys for forever altering your psyche? For forever altering your being because you saw someone do a wheelie and crash there on the Pacific Coast Highway blacktop while you sipped cheap wine and munched on fries and now you can't wipe it out of your mind?

What would you do? What would you do if you had a of couple choices, or maybe just one, or maybe three? Would you want to be known as a student of the Stitch? How about an artist-type, you know, a visionary, but one that could be fleeting?  What about a crafty girl who can stick to it? Or would you be happy with Mom and Happy Husband, one Child, a dog named Chuck, a cat named The Bunny and a (new) Fish named Myrtle?

Or none of the above?

But I do love to knit. And I do know that what I just wrote doesn't make much sense. This weekend was one of those Odyssey weekends with a wild Girlfriend on the Verge of Potty and no naps. I've also been battling a neckline  for a sweater I'm designing that can only be described as Ripped Out a Few Times Too Many to be Perfect...so there you go.

But in our real life, we found ourselves on the beach in Malibu today after a dirty, greasy lunch among the "biker types" and a cheap-ish bottle of wine (which equals heaven, I tell you--well, at least if you have some fried calamari or some steamed crab to accompany), and decided to hit the sand on the way home with my bamboo yarn and the still undecided "Is it a Scarf or a Headband Thing."

So I was there, posing like all get out and after Girlfriend nearly drowned in an unexpected wave, a woman laying there in the sand hailed me over. The waves were crashing.

Her: "Mhhm.. nhmm?" (Her hands making motions. I couldn't hear her.)

Me: "Huh? What did you say?"...and walking over.

Her: "Mhjmmm.?" (Hands making more motions.)

Me: (Thinking: Oh! She's deaf! She's asking me if I know sign-language! I do! I do!)...So I sign to her: *Hi! How are you? Is everything okay?*

Her: "Heh? I was just asking you: Do you knit?"

Me: (Pulling the needles and the Bamboo out of my pocket and feeling like an idiot about the signing thing) "Yeah!"

Her: "I just knit a table cloth and the woman, she pay me $300.00 for it!"

Me: Wow! That's great; that's more than I could make, knitting a table cloth. I mean, no one would pay me to knit a table cloth first of all, because, well, there's too much thinking involved and I'd make these terrible mistakes and it would probably take forever, because I don't really do lace all that much. You must have the patience of...well, you know, a Saint who has patience! Can't think of one off the top of my head. But I'm impressed. Three hundy? Woah, baby!. You must be quite the talent!"

Her: "...Eh. I knit to relax."

Comments

[lori z]

Nice. I like the subtle, while working on the neckline of a sweater I'm designing for Interweave... Good job Wendy. You go girl!

[Shelagh]

Dude, you are known. Famous-known. Probably not by many bikers, and table cloth knitters (besides Monkee), but you're famously known.

Rock on, Jackie-O.

[zib]

IK! Woo!

[Tammy]

Neptunes Net! Our favorite place for greasy seafood with biker types! Love the clam chowder (and my I don't have to worry about my kids being messy or making too much noise)!

[Saskia]

Hey there! Top part of your post: like reading my own blog in a different color. (with me looking much thinner...)Going trough one of the choises/what if/phases (if that's what it is for you) myself. MY big question: Am I the bigcity-stressy-PR woman of can I be the countrylife-knitting-funny-sweet-mummy? And is there anything in between? If you have answers, let me know! ;-) (wonderfull green color, that scarf btw!)

[alice]

Love this post! Surreal - but that's really the way life is, when you stop to consider it. All the what-if's and could've-beens and all that. I think it's good to let our minds "freestyle" for a bit. It helps put our lives and our place in the world into context. There doesn't have to be an answer, or a beginning, middle and end - that's just for the fairy stories!

[chris]

Wow - 300 hundred for a table cloth - I don't know what to say. I want to be slightly known - you know - people not quite sure who you are, but you do look familiar? I think that's the balance - and also as a biker who is responsible - I really don't get much enjoyment out of watching biker stunts - I feel you're anxiety!

[Maryann]

That's pretty cool about the tablecloth lady. You must be pretty good at signing to say that much! Someday I'll learn. My boy-child is on the verge of potty too. Mommy just needs to buckle down and have him do some scheduled pottying. Maybe when school's out.

[KT]

I love Neptunes Net. I remember going there when I was a kid. THanks for the dose of Sunshine.

[Kim]

OK, that you know sign language? You are The Woman Who Can Do It All. And The Woman That Many Of Us Aspire To Be. Or Wish We Were More Like If We Couldn't Be You Exactly.
Second, your daughter has your nose, I think. (Your previous post about her looking nothing like you continues to resonate.)

[Angelia]

She knits just to relax but managed to sell a tablecloth for $300??? wow. I can't imagine knitting a tablecloth!

You are famous. As for me, well, sometimes I think I want to be - but without the paparazzi following your every move, you know? Famous in blogland is good. :-)

[Miz Booshay]

In the top picture...

Girlfriend looks just like you :o)
I see it in your chin and lips and little nose!

Guess it took a peek at your lovely profile :o)

[cherry]

Now maybe its just me - but I would rather that woman had said - "Gee you knit - that's cute!!!!"
That $300 is eating me up - I couldn't sell water in the desert.
As for the surreal - love it, love it - I am happy to be the invisible woman in the middle of nowhere as long as I can buy bread and cheese.

[Meredith]

Hey Wendy! Nothing to do with knitting, but I have been wanting to ask you where you got the green ring that you wear on your right hand. I love it! Oh, and I don't even think I would want a knitted table cloth... yuk!

[Saun]

I think I understand where you are going in the beginning of your post. Knitting starts as a hobby, then you venture into selling a few things and before you know it, it takes on a life of its own. Now you have to figure out exactly where you want to go with the whole thing. Is it a hobby or a career? And once you go down that road are you allowed to turn back and say you don't want to do it anymore because it's not fun anymore. I could be off in my interpretation but I come from a family of artsy types and we've had talks like this before. We go where the mood strikes and can change course in an instant. Ultimately I think what you should be known for is the labels that you give yourself and feel are most important and not the ones others put on you.

I went to MDS&W this weekend and my mother asked about you. I was trying to find another knitblogger and she asked "Is it the woman with the husband who takes the crazy pictures? Is she coming?". She doesn't have the time to keep up with blogs but of all the ones I've shown her, yours is the only one she remembers.

[c.e.]

I love your questions and I love the idea of sort of understanding yet not possibly being able to understand, a sort of a disconnected connectedness, this blog world.

The scarf you're wearing, is it the one from your trip on the train? I liked it the first time I saw it, too...may I beg for more details or how do you feel about people studying your work and trying to imitate it?

[Leslie]

Wendy, I'm just amazed that the sun is shining on whatever beach you are sitting on! Here in Santa Barbara, we've barely seen the sun for the past two weeks. Early June gloom...

[Wendy]

The scarf I'm wearing is the same one from the train trip.

Oh and friends, turns out the woman on the beach wasn't signing! She was just making knitting movements with her hands (her English wasn't so good) and I mistook her for signing! I guess it wasn't clear in my post.

[Cheri]

Girlfriend has your profile, that top picture looks like a grown up girlfriend with yellow hair.

I wouldn't mind being known, but I don't really want to be recognized. I've always thought it would be fun to be a radio personality. I do not want to be known as the lady who got rear ended by some lunatic and then got the ticket for it and had to go to court (my personana for this week it seems, it's Monday morning and I've already been asked about my court date on Wednesday twice so far).

But really in my little burg I'm known for my knitting. I'm known for always having it with me, for knitting while waiting for kids, or doctors, always having something on the needles. $300 for a table cloth!?!

[c.e.]

I found in your Winners FO gallery the scarf details. Forgive me for not digging a bit more before asking :)

[Sherry]

Hey, congratulations on knitting for Interweave!

[jillian]

Interweave???? Way to go!

I adore that scarf. I may have to completely copy you. :)

[Wendy]

It isn't for the magazine. It's just a pattern in one of their books...

[Irene]

Exactly. When people say that you get 15 minutes of fame, most of us just naturally think that's because you couldn't get any more. Isn't it weird when you realize that it's probably there anytime you want it, but you're busy doing the stuff you want to do and you'd have zero patience for people nosing into your four-line HWWV portrait and speculating stuff that's not their business. It's so strange when you realize that "greatness" is a choice...and one that you made differently than you ever thought you would.

I think I know where you are...I think I remember the feeling, but I'm not sure. When you're home making a bigger and bigger Easter dress, not sure against whom you're competing and thinking, "But I KNOW I was supposed to do great things! I KNOW it! Is it possible these are they? Really????"

And they are. And they will be. And life is sooo long. Or maybe that's not how you're feeling at all. I just know that when my Girlfriend turned 18 on March 31, I couldn't believe that it was over (and it is, and it's not, in such a weird way). When her brother turns 18 in a year and a half, when they've both flown the nest...I'll be 43...and free as a bird. Free to live in an apartment above a bagel shop if I want. Free to dress embarrassingly, live in a bad school district or move to Bahrain...to do those "great" things. It sounds so cheesy...so unambitious...but when you see her...and she's tall...even though she's not...and her shoulders are square...and everyone's telling you how special she is...you know you did great things. The marketing director in you is still rattling around making noises about the corner office, but she looks neurotic to you now...and you realize you can reach out and grab greatness anytime you want...and always could.

[Rhonda]

You might knit a tablecloth ... if you could wear it! Just knit 4 triangle shawls & put them together to make a square. Hey, easy!