A Better Way to Wait

This is me in my latest, almost-finished scarf project.


I never dream about being chased, or dying, or going to school naked. The only nightmares I have are about being late. I’m running to a bus for to a cross country meet or I’m a freshman in high school and my dad is driving me to piano lessons and I already know that I’ll never make it in time.

There’s no doubt that these dreams come from my obsession with time in real life. I like my schedule to fit neatly into boxes that can be stacked squarely atop one another. Unfortunately (or fortunately) real life is not an excel spreadsheet, so I have to wait 20 minutes for the bus on Tuesday nights and get up at 8:30 for meetings on Wednesday mornings even though my first class isn’t until 12:30.

That’s why I started knitting. Unless I have yarn and knitting needles, I can’t stop the TICK, TICK, TICK from going off in my head while I’m sitting at the bus stop. I consider myself a patient person, but even so, I can’t stand those boring parts of my day that are too short to start a project and too long to sit happily with my legs crossed and hands folded.

I’ve tried reading, but it doesn’t work as well. My stomach turns into smashed-up Jell-o for about three hours after trying to focus my eyes on a book for fifteen minutes in the car. My ipod does a slightly better job of entertaining me. I can listen to it for hours in the car without getting bored, but it only works when I’m in motion, because something is being accomplished just by me sitting on a pleather seat. When I’m waiting for the bus, I get frustrated and bored with my music much more easily.

Knitting though. On the car ride home from school last Saturday, I knitted for four hours straight. It also works in small doses, too. If I have five minutes to spare before I need to leave the house, I knit. If I’m not that interested in the television program I happen to be watching, I knit.

I still feel a little self-conscious about knitting before class because knitting has a lingering reputation of being a senior citizens-only activity, even though lots of young, hip people do it. Though from my experience, people tend to leave me alone with my needles and yarn without much comment when I knit in public.

I would recommend knitting to everyone, but I know that it wouldn’t be as satisfying an activity for some as it is for me. I will, however, prescribe this: a quiet, independent activity in which progress can be made. Even though knitting isn’t exciting, it does have a beginning, middle, and an end. The closer I get to finishing a scarf, the more furiously I work to complete it. This is why knitting is a better way to wait.

For some people, reading does the trick because every time they turn a page, they are getting closer to having mastered the story. In the car, an ipod helps me get restlessly to my destination, but when I’m not in motion it just doesn’t do enough.

I know that I spent less time being stressed this winter once I started knitting, and I would recommend that everyone find their own knitting equivalent. If you know you’re going to have to wait around at some point almost every day of your life, why not use the time to relax and feel accomplished instead of useless and stressed?