Sunday, August 20, 2006

The Slanted Eye

I owed you this one: the stuff I brought from Sweden:
lush... lush... yumyum

I went to see Joan as Police Woman yesterday, great, great artist. Maybe a little over the top in her -in between song chat routine- but not to my taste, I loved her. Great voice, funny, bit weird, nice and entertaining to the audience. My kinda singer!

I guess working at different venues over the last years I've seen too many arrogant self obsessed bands and artists. Leaving the stage when the audience made too much noise or just never making contact with the crowd at all. Shyness, maybe, but hey, you're an artist, this is what you want and choose to do, right? I don't go to a venue to see a version of the shy boy next door acting out like an drunk teenager hitting puberty.
Ok, there's the exception that makes the rule, like when a band gets famous for exactly that sort of behaviorur. I saw the Libertines once, when they were still complete, on a small stage in my hometown, making fools of themselves acting like stray dogs on garbage food turned bad. That was pretty entertaining. Actually no, it wasn't at thát point,definitely disliked their attitude while watching the show then too. It was more like I was intrigued and later on after all the press coveredge, it was interesting that I've seen them be obnoctious in real life. (Something to tell my (grand)children...?)

I was starting this post to tell you about something completely different... ehm...

Right!
The Slanted Eye...

raffia balls: I plan to knit it into an open knit bag for the Swedish game 'Kub' we bought, It's played outdoors with lots of wood bricks and poles. You're supposed to knock down the other teams bricks for points. The red stuff is dyed wool, ready to spinn, my next adventure, to be continued sometime this fall.

Before the show I talked to my friend Seema's brother. I've known him as long as I know Seema, about 8 yrs, but we hardly ever see each other. Seema had informed him about my recent career moves and had also let him in on the special thing we like to call 'our knitting gettogethers' (onze brei-eenkomsten).
And surely, there it was... The Slanted Eye!
Brother: 'Say... I heard you are into knitting...'
Me: 'Yeah... -in reaction to The Slanted Eye I alwaimmediatelytly start explaining myself- ... but you know, it's all hip and funky stuff you know...'
Brother: 'Like what? What do you actually knit then?' (The Slanted Eye remains, only slightly relaxing)
Me: ' Ehm... scarfs, mittens, hats, shirts, bags ... you know... stuff'
Brother: ' Right...' (The Slanted Eye is back in all its slantyness)
Me: ' I'm learning all the skills so I can eventually design stuff.'
Miracle!! The Slanted Eye unslants and a smile appears!
I always pull out the 'design card' when talking about my knitting to hip and creative fellow humans, they álways go for it!

...

It's not a lie, I really really want to design eventually. I'm just not there yet. I'm about as there yet as a Yeti is*. (that's a hard one... explanation at the bottom)

Why do I feel inecessaryarry to explain myself?
And whý do I feel slightly embarrassed when confronted with The Slanted Eye?
Is it so important to me to be cool? No, but I really think knitting is cool, I féél it is cool, there's just no way around the coolness.
So why then?
I feel the need to talk about it, I could choose to never speak about my obsession in certain crowds. I could do that. That would be safe. But I can't... even when there isn't a friend bringing it up, there's about a 70% chance that I'll start talking about it myself. I'm like those new parents around non-parents; totally obsessed by a really small piece of the universe while no one else is even the slightest, tiniest bit interested, meanwhile boring the h#ll out off the people around me.

a nice organic skein of hand dyed cotton (will someday probably become either small bag or baby hat), 3 balls of 100% untreated wool for making the Swedish writs warmers with knitted beads in a star pattern (I translated the pattern and wil post it as soon as I finish a pair or wrist warmers) and pieces of sheepskin to line or decorate hats and mittens.


So why?
I just don't know.
I júst don't know...

If some one recognises this, please let me know, I'm way, way interested!

--

The pictures are of the treasures I brought from Sweden. Great, great stuff. It's getting me focused and creative and even more obsessed about this tiny peace of universe that's called 'Knitting'.


Beads for knitting into the wrist warmers, pompom makers, a handmade i-cord maker (punnik 'padestoel')

---
* a Yeti isn't ...

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Heel, heel herkenbaar Saskia!!
Ook ik kan steeds wel over breien praten maar hou me in omdat anderen daar niet op zitten te wachten. Daarom zijn al die blogs zo zalig, al die mensen die hun passie delen en er samen wel over 'praten'.
Het gevoel hebben me te moeten verdedigen naar anderen herken ik. In mijn naaste omgeving is breien wel bekent en geaccepteerd omdat vriendinnen en familie het ook doen, maar als de kring wat wijder wordt,kijkt men er toch naar als ouderwets en 'beppe-achtig'. Ik ben bang dat dit beeld nog lang blijft bestaan. In mijn opleiding was ik veel aan het breien (ipv schilderen of beeldhouwen) maar door de docenten werd er op neer gekeken gewoon omdat ze vanuit hun eigen ideeen en gevoelens van vroeger er naar keken.

Maar ik brei stug door en ben er enorm blij mee en voel me er juist goed door.

Tijm

Unknown said...

Heb ik ook! Nog genanter voel ik me als op een feestje een van mijn mannelijke kennissen met gevoel voor drama op een leeg moment in de discussie zegt:....."Zij Breit......!" En dat hij dan verwacht dat de conversatie voor het komende half uur door mij gedragen zal worden met het soort discussie dat jij in je log zo beeldend weergeeft...(heb ooit een op jouw log lijkende gemaakt, kijk op http://www.smoekkk.blogspot.com/2006/03/hot.html

Anonymous said...

goh! de reacties die ik krijg zijn gewoonlijk: het mededelen van de schoenmaat, de vraag hoe lang ik over een trui (voor hun dus) doe, dat soort dingen. maar ik heb dan ook erg een kommaaropalsjedurft-houding over breien. dat scheelt erg in hoe anderen reageren.
puh. alsof hun nieuwe auto zo interessant is.

Anonymous said...

btw, i do agree with what you remark at froukje's blog, saskia. when i visit friends i don't always take my knitting out of my bag; i do often feel they might be insulted. because however proud i am of my knitting, i do realize that i absolutely hate it when someone else it distracted while i talk to them... like a tv in the background for example. so i won't do that to others either.