Russian Grandmothers Within

 

                When I was still in college, my garden was in my mother’s backyard. I would go home for Easter weekend to turn over the soil, arrived in the later afternoon on Friday. First, I tied a large handkerchief over my head to keep away the young and hungry mosquitoes, then I grabbed the pitchfork and headed out, digging far into the twilight. When it was too dark to see, I would come in for dinner. “You look,” my mother would say, “like an old Russian grandmother out there.” This was not a compliment. Years later, I lived next door to a real Russian grandmother who gardened extensively and we exchanged pantomimes of the wonders of cattle manure over the fence. My mother was right….

                And she may be even more right today… Last spring, during the lockdowns, I dug into the cozy room closet for last skeins of Christopher Sheep yarn, a dark grey untreated sheepy wool with lanolin and a bit of hay still in the weave. I found the pattern I had purchased the yarn for in my files: The Coup d’état Cardigan by Peace Fleece, designed to be knit from yarn from Moscow and Maine.  It is a complex pattern of seed stitch and cables, as well a v-shaped ….shield across the back.  This will occupy and calm my mind, I thought. And it did. When I finished, it was late spring, too late to wear wool sweaters. I tried it on. It was…big. Mark looked at it, head to one side, desperately trying to find the words to describe it. “It’s…a little big on you….” He hesitated. “”You did a nice job with the pattern, though.” I nodded. We agreed that thinking of it as a jacket helped.  A few days later, he commented that the back looked a little like a bug.

                I’ve been wearing the sweater a great deal this winter; the house is chilly and my classroom is cold (I sit in front of an open window, wrapped in a blanket). It is quite toasty, like being wrapped in a rug. The nooks and crannies of the stitches hold the heat and provide insulation under my raincoat for winter walks. It’s kind of pandemic perfect. But, this afternoon, I pulled on my old yellow garden boots and headed out to the parsnip bed with an ancient bent pitchfork. Under the leaves, I found the roots, white and muddy in the dark winter earth. I slogged back into the house, looking just like a Russian grandmother, once again.