Learning to Knit

Learning to Knit

I.

The fates, otherwise known as Moirae, are three female deities that knit the story of my life into a tapestry. Clotho spins the wool, Lachesis allots the length of the yarn, and Atropos does the cutting. Joy may be a knit, sorrow may be a purl. Sometimes they drop a stitch. The finished product, made from random bits of colored wool in a chaos pattern of no discernable stockinette, garter, or cable, is uniquely mine. I imagine that every decision that I make is woven in, but the reaction to follow the action is worth lighting a candle to those three: a little drunk, they stitch, they bitch, and they run a very private knitting bee.

I imagine that the ladies judge most harshly those of us that attempt to live a righteous life and those of us who judge others. The more I try to behave and claw my way up to the higher moral ground, the closer they keep an eye and try to decide if I should fall. The Moirae hate hypocrisy. Clotho, Lachesis, and Atropos listen to how I spit my judgments about gluttony, sloth, and greed, but how would they react to a night in front of the television with a pint of Haagen Dazs? Small clots must form in my legs. Each time I disobey my own rules of human conduct, the clots grow more dangerous until they fail to pass through my heart.

The fates are pristine. They live their lives purely. Yoga, organic yogurt, macrobiotics. They soak in a hot tub of gratitude. They expect this of everyone. For example, each time I fly in an airplane, which already tempts them because humans are earthly creatures and should remain with both feet on the ground, they listen for my prayers of gratitude: Thank you, ladies, for this opportunity to visit the warm weather in the bitter white of winter. Thank you for allowing me to find Michael at the end of that long-traveled, steep and rocky trail towards love; thank you for the baby in my womb, who spins in my belly at thirty-thousand feet. Please note the sincerity and gratitude in my silent benediction. Please stop this metal bird from rocking. Note that these panicked tears are for real.

II.
At eight months, with more calendar of fetal days marked with an “x” behind me, and very little ahead of me, the baby does a headstand on my bladder. He pushes my digestive juices into my throat and he presses the soles of his feet against my diaphragm. His space has gotten too small for comfort, and so he tries to muscle a little more room, the brut. I try and rub him back to sleep, but he does his best impression of womb pacing. Easy there, tiger. Should I name him Rilke? Elliot?

The baby blanket grows faster during commercials, but the hands slow when the detective show comes back on. My knitting is careful, because I am a novice, and so I must watch my hands when I do it. Who killed the D.A.? There are two blankets in the works. I am only working with knit, because I forgot how to purl. I am knitting blankets because they are simple squares. His confession will be omitted. What makes them pretty, I think, is the softness of the baby yarn. One blanket is a weave of familiar pastels in blue, yellow, and green. Will he get the death penalty? The other blanket is orange and yellow with multicolored threads woven into the yarn. The pastel blanket will be finished with fringes. Mistrial. The yellow and orange blanket will earn a blue crocheted border of the same yarn with multi-colored threads. Oh, it was the wife. Of course it was. During the commercial, I take a break to fetch the frozen yogurt as a sort of pregnant dietary compromise.

III.
In my eighteenth year, summer to summer, I had two identical experiences. I can only remember them as one, because if you were to view them as transparencies, you could overlay them and see the experience as a singularity.

There must have been seasonal differences beyond the windows of the bus. Memory only gloms on to the larger themes. Events are sequence of sceneries. Let’s say that it was fall the first time, and summer the second. The bus ride was ninety minutes, give or take. Those of us from the small town who dated without condoms had to travel to the larger town to deal with our problems. I had a license but no car.

On the way to the clinic, a belly full of worry; on the way back from the clinic, a belly full of clots. The ride there was, first time, sun at the angle of cooling, the colors of the phoenix, and then, second time, sun right above, hot, the phoenix risen. The ride back was both end-of-the-day, end-of-the-day. The ride back was some pain similar to contractions, as I imagine. My teenaged body sought to expel the remainder of my uterine lining. Ninety minutes of wrenching, overlapping.

In the waiting-room, he sat beside me, both times. He read magazines about music. My chart had two circle stickers on the tab for two visits. Some folders had as many as four that I could see. The chairs were very likely molded plastic like all waiting-room chairs.

We lived together with his mother who started drinking Gallo at noon. She was a Spanish beauty once. We smoked pot because we were too young to buy booze. I watched him play his red guitar in the unfinished attic, and I watched him beat his younger brother mercilessly. We listened to hard music where people died for the devil. He slept with other girls downstairs while I was actually asleep upstairs. He had the facial features of a girl, long dark hair, and the testosterone tinge of anger. He never finished high school. My nails were always painted black.

After the procedure, they give you juice and cookies and a little time to recover. The procedure was more expensive if you chose general anesthesia over a local. I wanted to be knocked out. Both times. He helped to pay.

The genes of the unwanted children? A man whose father was a drug addict, whose mother was an alcoholic. A man who called my new boyfriend after he and I broke up, and he told my new boyfriend that he shouldn’t date me because I had two abortions. I was damaged goods.

IV.
One blanket may be for swaddling and the other for the stroller and car seat. I thought to knit a swimsuit and sew in a liner for when I shrink back. I may knit a hat next or maybe some booties for the baby and a scarf for my husband. I need to refresh my memory on how to purl. I need to learn how to increase and decrease. Knitting is for the ages. My mother has done it since I can remember, and she will continue until her knuckles no longer bend.

V.
How many times have I been unconscious? Half-a-dozen. It occurs to me that twice I have been intentionally so. The other times I dropped into a faint. Pregnant women are prone to drastic changes in blood pressure.

The experience progresses as such: First, you get dizzy and light-headed; second, you get nauseous; third, you break out in a cold sweat; fourth, you experience a sudden need to shit; and then, finally, you wake up staring at ceiling lights. And, then, when you can stand or crawl, you make your way to the bathroom to take care of step number four.

I was alone in my kitchen, which has very hard ceramic tile floors. I had to lie down on the floor twice, on my side, so that the blood missing from my brain could get there. When my fainting spells passed, I was able to get up. I drank water and made sure that the baby was still whirling around in my belly.

I count fetal movements. One kick is good. A little roll feels better. Following a knee’s movement beneath the skin from navel to the top of the uterus is affirming. When he sleeps, I worry. He moves most when I’m driving. I lift my shirt above my belly so that the baby can hear the car stereo, and I believe he likes Eric Clapton, unplugged. He moves when I am still, like when I’m knitting his blankets, which grow with each row to cover my belly.

VI.
I would have a 20-year old. No, I would have two children. No, I would have a 20-year old. If I had kept the first child, I would have been pregnant when I would have conceived the second child. It is likely, however, that I would not be pregnant now.

Do I regret? If asked about regret, never answer the question. The fates are listening. In their great room filled with spinning wheels, beeswax candles, and skeins of yarn, they each keep one fickle ear to the wall while deft hands dip and weave, and they don’t even watch the needles fly. Beware.

If I say that I do regret my actions, then the Moirae will take insult because I did not like how they stitched a row. Beware.

If I say that I do not regret my decisions, they may reconsider their generosity, given the clarity of hindsight. Beware.

I have two months to carry this child. Let him emerge unharmed by his mother’s fate. Kick, squirm, roll, and quiver. I have years to raise him up. One wrong word, one wrong move, and Clotho, Lachesis, and Atropos could tear him down. Be kind.