Good grief. Typing this to you from bed- eyes barely open, four year old flaked out diagonally beside me. You know those days where every time you look at the clock you can’t quite believe there was apparent international consensus to speed the earths rotation and thus shorten hours, but that’s the only reasonable conclusion? I woke up this morning and thought there was real potential here, but every time I glanced at the clock the thing had speed on to some impossible time, and the next thing I knew it was park/wading pool time with Elliot.

(Elliot pictured here driving this toy car that someone donated to the park earlier this year. It’s broken, the door is weird, the steering wheel doesn’t steer, you have to move it with your feet like Fred Flintstone and every kid for a kilometre around is bloody obsessed with it. Competition for drive time is high. When it is Elliot’s turn he practically squeaks with joy.)

Now, here is the thing. Me, a park, a kid – I got that scene.  I practically invented that scene. When the girls were little in the summertime we did chores in the morning, had our lunch noontime and then went to the park/pool every single weekday until it was time to come home and get supper on the table. That was even simple because they drain the pool at 5 and it’s a natural signal. They’d pull the plug and over the girls would trot, trained right up to the schedule.  I would have 4 hours every afternoon to read and knit and write and I loved it. Loved it I tell you, and so this summer it seemed like a no-brainer for how Ellie and I would spend our afternoons together. It is the same park and everything, and he is a supremely civil child (far more than the wild things I raised) and yet… nothing gets done there. Not a thing. Not one.

(Completely gratuitous picture of Penny, a very good dog. I am not a dog person, but I am a Penny person, and though I’m not usually responsible for her I was today, and I cannot blame her for my lack of production. She lay on the grass and smiled. It’s hardly a complication.)

I have been dragging this sweater to the park for weeks (Pattern- Simple Summer Sweater – scaled for my skinnier yarn. Yarn: Rowan Cotton Cashmere that Ken gave me for my birthday.) and making almost no progress. I couldn’t figure it out, it’s park knitting. When the girls were wee I got so much done there, but today I figured out what’s gone wrong.

It’s not Ellie. As I pointed out, he is a tremendously easy and sweet child. (We will not mention the other day when I asked him to do something and from the living room, he shouted “THAT’S A NO FOR ME DAWG.” Blame his mother.) I realize now that it’s the Covidtimes. I’ve got eyes on him 80% of the time to make sure he stays reasonably distanced from the other kids (we’re not saying no to playing of course, but their wee unvaccinated heads together unmasked is a no, naturally) and that surveillance takes a toll on the knitting, and also, without any friends really (he’s just starting to make a few as we open up a bit) he’s used to having and needing his grownups as play-buddies.

I can walk and knit, and talk and knit, and do all sorts of things and knit- but I cannot play soccer and knit. I cannot “watch this!” and knit. I cannot help on the monkey bars and knit. I cannot build the best sandcastle you’ve ever seen and knit, and neither can I teach him to float and knit. He has no pack to run with, but for his grownups, and I am all in. I’ll finish the sweater eventually, and I’m sure it’s going to be great.

Likely not as great as being a light in a little one’s life, so I guess when his wee voice rings out “Gammy, come play with me!” …

Thank goodness yarn doesn’t go bad. Maybe I’ll finish the sweater tomorrow.