The Process of Knitting with Mom

"My mind isn't what it used to be, I forget things" is something my mother frequently tells me when she's frustrated that she can't remember an event, a person, what she had for breakfast that morning, or more recently, how to describe a fountain that she had just seen. I can't even imagine what it's like to know something is wrong, but not know what.

As I've mentioned before, the 'what' is Alzheimer's and because of our history of a loved one with this disease, I don't think we've ever used the word Alzheimer's with my mom, at least I know I haven't. What would be the point of telling my mom why she 'forgets' things? It's not going away. It's not going to get better.

And yet, in the midst of all this, I am amazed at what still resides in her memory ... like knitting. 

I don't remember my mom being an avid knitter when I was growing up.  I know she knit out of necessity - mittens, hats. At this point I have no way of asking her when she learned to knit, or who taught her. And I'm pretty sure she didn't teach me. Knitting was not something you saw my mom do often. If she was knitting, it was because something needed to be knit. 

It was product, not process, that drove the knitting.

Fast forward to the present. My mom knits. 

Constantly. 

Ask her why and she'll tell you it's because she has always enjoyed knitting. It makes her happy and keeps her busy. 

At this point, it's process that's important more than the product. 

Because the product is ... well ... um ... we're not entirely sure.

She casts on as many stitches as the needle will hold and then just knits, dropping stitches as she goes, randomly adding others. In the end what you have is a skein of yarn that has become rows and rows of garter stitch but not much else. Except that it has made her happy to work with pretty yarn, and she's content in the belief she's doing something useful. 

Often, when I visit, we sit and unwind what she's knit. She holds the knitted piece, I wind the ball. When I ask why we were doing it, she just smiled and says "Because we're having fun." To her, just being with me, sharing the time, is what is important now. It has become part of the process.

So while she forgets people, places, and events from her past, for now she remembers me and she remembers knitting. I visit, we sit, we knit. And sometimes we rip out and rewind what she's knit, but that's ok. 

It's part of the process ...

And we're having fun.