Garter Stitch Therapy

Yesterday, to help focus myself before the show, I put the finishing touches on this rather ordinary garter-stitch scarf.

The scarf is made from Lion's Brand Homespun, and the flowers are out of Knitpicks Crayola. I gave it to my director last night as an opening-night gift.

The flowers are simple little spirals; for the larger one, I cast on four stitches. For the smaller, I cast on three.

It's no testament to superior or challenging knitting. However, the simplicity was desperately needed. The meditative quality of the repeated stitches helped me focus just a bit.

There's this thing about putting yourself out there. It's a thing that many people before me have tried to describe, and if somebody described it accurately, we'd all just quote her rather than keep trying to explain to our non-artist friends why this life is not a good thing, why it in fact sucks really badly.

Just think for a minute about all the people you know who are afraid of public speaking.

Actors are just as scared, in their own way. And actors keep doing it. So do writers, in their own way, and painters, and anyone else who mines the shafts of their brains and experiences for something to present to other people. It's this thing you hate, but it's what you do -- it's your JOB, for crying out loud-- so you take a big breath and go do it again, and again, and again.

So phoo to all those people out there who want to be a Writer, but don't bother to write, or who want to be an Actor, because they think they can do it better than Cameron Diaz. They are looking for a thing that deeply sucks, but they don't have enough of a soul to recognize it.

My show is good. (That's another awful thing about this art thing, that you have to summon the courage to believe in your own fantasies and say good things about them. I don't think accountants or window washers or crossing guards have this problem.) So please come.

And when you come, disregard this entire post. Just try to understand why, even though the show went well last night, all I want to do is run away to a very foreign place with a long international extension on the phone number and not tell anyone where I am until they've forgotten they ever met me.

Only, it's my job.