Yesterday I spent the day at a workshop about Dependency Law (concerning children who have been abused or neglected). Other than having an uninterrupted chance to knit and for one incredible story, the day was pretty much a bust.
I had been knitting a scarf from some Noro Silk Garden in a basketweave pattern. The yarn has greens, grays and some teal, very different, but beautiful. I had been using a single strand on size 8 bamboo needles. The yarn is uneven and the result was some parts that knitted up beautifully, with others that had big holes. I frogged the scarf and started a hat (Hot Head) though my needles were too small and too short for the job...I made it work and used two strands. The natural striping of the Silk Garden has been interrupted, because my two balls of yarn are not in sync, but the result thus far is a cozy, soft, pleasing panel of 2x2 ribbing that may make a hat that is too small for most people I know.
As I sat at my table amid lawyers, social workers, CASAs, probation officers and the like and the yarn ran through my fingers, a woman named Cheryl Jacobson (www.cpyp.org) who works to find permanent connections for children in foster care spoke. She tries to find family and build relationships for children who have been in the system and are deemed "unadoptable".
She talked about a 17 year old girl who had been in 28 different foster homes in her life and had no connection with her birth family. When asked if there was anyone that she would like to see again, anyone at any time in her life who she would want to reconnect with, her answer was that she didn't think anyone had ever loved her.
They continued to talk and Cheryl asked if there were any teachers she remembered fondly (this girl had moved many times as a child, her mother trying to stay one step ahead of Child Welfare). She stated that teachers never liked her. Cheryl insisted, going grade by grade, trying to jog this young woman's memory to anyone she might have had a connection with at one time.
Finally, the girl remembered her kindergarten teacher and for the first time in the conversation she looked up from the floor. She told Cheryl about how she would get teased by the other students for being dirty and her teacher would hold her and rock her. She remembered her name, "Miss May." Cheryl went on the hunt.
After many twists and turns she located the school where this girl had gone to kindergarten and no one had heard of the teacher. A district wide teacher training was occurring and Cheryl requested to speak in front of the group for a few minutes. She told the story and a gasp went up in the back of the room.
The kindergarten teacher's best friend was there and recognized that Cheryl was speaking of her friend. She said that Miss May married that same year and had changed her name which was why the school did not remember her. She told Cheryl that Miss May was retired, but agreed to phone her.
After explaining the situation to Miss May, her friend handed the phone to Cheryl. Cheryl explained the reason for the call. Miss May was silent for a time and said that there was not a day that went by that she hadn't thought of that little girl and she often wondered about her. Miss May was never able to have children of her own, but nine months after that initial contact she adopted her former student and this young woman, who was almost an adult finally found her family.
Well, I cried into my yarn right there in the Embassy Suites Ballroom and continued my knit 2, purl 2 routine. I have decided to give the hat to one of my very best friends (she has a rather shapely, smallish head) and is a part of my extended family.
We so often feel frustration and anger with the people we love, with our own circle. I come from a big, crazy, loving and annoying clan; I can't imagine anything different. Where I come from helps define who I am and gives me a place to feel grounded in this big, fast moving world. There are so many people out there who don't have connections with other people...
I could now come up with some kind of cheesy metaphor dealing with knitting yarn together to make fabric and connecting people to make communities...but that would be really over the top...I think I'll just go back and try to sew up the seam on this beanie and get to the next project on my list. Until next time...
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