The counteract

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So I was out on my run this morning, but let’s call it more of a walk seeing as that I was doing for the majority of the time, when I walked past an older woman who was KNITTING WHILE SHE WALKED. At first I thought to myself that I must have caught her as she was popping in next door to see a friend who could help her as she had dropped a stitch. But then about 40 minutes later, there she was again. Walking & knitting. And she had taken off her jumper because she had obviously worked up quite a sweat, what with all that knitting and walking.

For all you knitters out there, is this a thing? Surely it takes away from the enjoyment of both the walk and the knitting? Is this the equivalent of a texting while walking…but for the crafter?

Got me thinking about all the other things that we do that counteract the joy of the thing we are doing. Like the way you see people holding up phones to record their kids concert rather than you know, watching the kid in concert. Same as music concerts – the iPad being held up in front of you so you really only see the screen and not the performance. The going for a nice relaxing drive through the countryside….with kids. There ain’t NOTHING relaxing about that. The bacon and egg roll I just scoffed the minute I got from my 6km walk. There’s that.

What else can you think of that we do while doing something else that neutralises the initial act?
Do you think this woman was on a knit-a-thon?
Is walking knitting a new movement? Should it be?

Comments

  1. Danni Reichel says

    Sure isn’t for me… or any of my friends. Maybe she had a knitting deadline or just hates walking? Who knows?

  2. Well, I don’t like walking, but I do like knitting, so maybe I could follow that lady’s example!

  3. She’s a woman … she was multi tasking.
    xx

  4. coffeewithstring says

    I’m a knitter, I’ve knit while on the treadmill, and sometimes while on the stationary bike. It’s relaxing, and if I’m only doing a walk and not something like, a zombie run workout, it easy enough to do. Knitting activates the same part of your brain as meditation and prayer, so maybe she was cramming some super relax time into her busy day.

    • BabyMacBlogBeth says

      I can kind of see that…you do go into a zone where your brain clears out. happy knitting to you!

  5. Stephen King was renowned for reading while he walked along country lanes near his home, until he was hit by a car! I think knitting whilst walking may be on a par with that.

  6. I exercise because I have to for good health–not because I like it. πŸ™ If I can find anything at all to do to take the, what for me is, incredible tedium out of exercising, I will do it. What’s the difference between walking with an ipod and walking while knitting? Good for the lady! And maybe her child or grandchild will get a sweater or scarf or cap out of it πŸ™‚

  7. Catherine Harding says

    I love knitting and I do like to zone out when I do it but if I tried to do it while I walked I would literally fall over!

  8. If she’s short on time she may have been multi-tasking her own down time which is a kind of a bummer. But if she’s been advised to knit and walk to combat arthritis (as has been suggested to me) maybe she just wants it all out of the way for the day πŸ™‚ Some people hate exercise so maybe she was avoiding “Just one more kilometre” thoughts!

  9. I used to knit while on playground duty when I was a teacher. Have knitted while walking but also on a treadmill. I rarely watch the knitting so it’s quite possible to do both. Yes, it’s meditative and great for release of tension.

  10. Archie Lane says

    I’m a total in the moment kind of person and try to limit all distractions and concentrate on the thing at hand. Perhaps I am not a good multi tasker, maybe that’s my problem? Or maybe because although I am a knitter I can only knit at that time and cannot manage to do it and something else at the same time? Like when kids ask for your attention and you reply with ‘hang on let me finish this text’ or when you are eating dinner as a family and someones phone will announce a text and they instantly attempt to get off the table to attend to it.

    You did make me smile when mentioned holding the phone up to record rather than remember it. Last year I went to see Dallas Green perform with my daughters. Side note – if anyone has not heard of City and Colour then you really should! He asked everyone in the crowd at the beginning of a particular song to hold up their phones high in the air and show him them, then he asked for everyone in the crowd to put them down and not reach for them again until this song was over. He said ‘humans as a race being are so hell bent on recording every single aspect of life rather than simply allowing themselves to create a memory, a special moment their memory can recall and relive. Lets create a vision we can replay in our minds rather than watching it back on a screen” It was a poignant moment of the show for me. Interesting when I talk to my daughters about his concert that song is the one which they talk about the most. Was it because it is the one that the memory reaches for first? I am not sure on this. All I know is that it was a great moment to remember and not have the convenience of pressing play.

  11. Lisa Mckenzie says

    Not sure about knitting and walking at the same time,though I suppose each to their own!

  12. I do all my blogging on an app on my iPhone. I have a terrible habit of blogging while hanging out the washing…

  13. I can tell you exactly what was going on there. She has crossed over from casual to ‘terribly serious’ knitter, and somewhere along the way has done a calculation of the years/days/hours left in her life multiplied by the amount of projects in her ‘queue’ divided by the time it takes to knit a row, and she figures she needs to look for more knitting time. If she’s anything like me, anytime her hands aren’t busy with something else and she’s not knitting, seem like an awful waste of valuable life. I used to shove the ball of yarn down between my boobs so I could knit while moving about the house attending to various things. As long as the knitting isn’t too tricky (no cables, increases, colour changes, you hear?) you can leave your hands to it and your brain can focus on other things. All of that said, I’m yet to bring my knitting along with me when I exercise, but I have seriously considered it. Perhaps next week…

    • BabyMacBlogBeth says

      I can’t even tell you how much I love this comment Greer. You are DEAD RIGHT. I’m going to go and have a chat with her tomorrow x

  14. Flicking around on the iPad while watching

  15. I try to do too much. I try to read a magazine but. I’m listening to a podcast instead. And Even with the newspaper, I’ve got one eye on twitter. It’s like we have too many tabs open – tabs in our lives!
    I used to write notes at concerts, note the set list and take five rolls of film. I had to stop because I was missing out.
    Great food for thought πŸ™‚
    (Am in Milan now and have only taken four photos!)

  16. This is literally amazing!

  17. Brushing my teeth – I need to be doing something else at the same time so that I brush for longer. Usually watching TV or scrolling through Instagram. That’s why they have TV screens on the ceiling at the dentist, right…?

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