Knitting in Public
It’s a truism that when you live in a city, you tend to live a great deal of your life out in public. This was particularly true in my 20s when I was living in New York in a studio apartment that is smaller than my current open plan living and dining room. The city was where I read, exercised, sunbathed, socialized, fell in love, broke up, and got broken up with.1
Although I have swapped New York for London and a day job that requires me to go into the office for my home-based life as a working author, I still find myself out and about, living my life in public more than you might expect. This is due in large part to the fact that I use public transportation to get around 99.9% of the time, and also because I am a coffee shop person by nature.
As I have tried to incorporate knitting more and more into my life this year, I’ve taken to bringing my knitting with me. My friend Mary gifted me a project bag for my birthday, and if I am taking a handbag large enough to fit it, I will toss my project bag in there too. This means I almost always have my knitting to hand when commuting or grabbing a few minutes before pilates.
Getting some knitting in before a pilates class while working on a test knit of the upcoming Feather Sweater for The Knit Purl Girl
One of my favorite things about knitting in public—other than making progress on my WIPS, of course—is what happens when people notice. I can see the sneaky glances to see what I’m doing on the train, and I caught a man sitting next to me the other day as I headed into a London terminus station trying to figure out how this whole knitting thing worked. However, it’s the women who ask me questions who are my favorite.
I’ve had two recent encounters that stand out in particular. I was knitting on my way home from a day of writing in town when I caught an older woman watching me between the seats. I smiled at her, and she asked what I was making. I showed her my jumper and asked if she was a knitter. She told me no, but she’d always wanted to learn.
The second was a woman who stopped me right after I took that above photograph in a local coffee shop.
“I’ve tried to learn how to knit, but I can’t do it, “ she said, admitting that she’s tried several times.
“There’s a local yarn shop just up the way that holds classes. They’re very friendly,” I said.
“Maybe I’ll try that. Or I might just stick to crochet.”
I laughed. “Well, I’ve never gotten the hang of crochet myself.”
These are just fleeting little moments of people being curious or bemused by someone doing something unusual like knitting, but in a place like London where everyone is usually excellent about minding their own business when they are out and about, these simple interactions bring me a lot of joy.
I had good friends whose apartments I’d never been in because everything just felt so small and New Yorkers tend to meet each other out.
I do love a bit of knitting in public. And it's even better when you connect with a fellow crafter and can share a secret nod or two across a train carriage. It's like a secret handshake - but better.