I come from a family of craftswomen. My grandmother and an aunt primarily sewed. They taught me to sew. My mother crocheted and later taught me to crochet. She also knitted booties for her friends’ babies. My mother’s eldest sister, Caridad Cruz Sy-quia or Tita Caring, was the knitter. She loved to design jewelry, knit and, well, cook. I never really saw Tita Caring sweating over a stove in the kitchen. I always saw her cooking or baking through Esping.
They lived in North Sy-quia then and they had a fairly big dining table. I remember Tita Caring walking in and announcing, “I will bake a chocolate cake for our merienda.†She takes a recipe book and sets it up on a bookstand at the head of the table. She sits on the chair there and brings out her knitting. I think she was knitting a sweater for one of her children. Then she shouts, “Esping!†who runs forward. “Line the table with newspapers. We will bake a chocolate cake. Bring out flour, etc. . . . bowls and measuring cups. Tell me when you’re ready.†Then she knits and talks to my Lola who sits beside her. Behind them my cousin Didit and I sit at a small table playing Trip to Shanghai on a tiny mahjongg set.
Tita Caring was an early multi-tasker. She continued to knit and “bake†through Esping, and converse with Lola. “Measure three cups of flour and sift three times,†she reads from her recipe book. Esping complies. The baking proceeds smoothly until it is time to fold the dry ingredients into the wet mixture. “Now fold in . . . you know how to fold in? I taught you how to . . . not like that . . . you use the scraper, cut through the mixture and turn it over. . . okay. . . like that. . . remember. . . that’s what’s called folding in. . .â€
After a short time the cake is ready for the oven and Tita Caring’s knitting is about two inches bigger.
She loved sending her children and nieces to Baguio with our grandmother while she and her husband stayed in Manila. They would come up for the weekends. One summer she taught me how to knit. I forgot what it was but it used white thread, which turned gray by the weekend when she would check up on it. I did not finish anything but I learned how to follow instructions and to knit.
Knitting remained tucked in the back of mind until I went to Switzerland to study. There was so much time on our hands there so I decided to knit again, this time following French directions. Since then I have not stopped knitting for too long. I knitted booties for my children and little sandos made of cotton thread for them. I was always knitting something so I got very good at it. Today, I don’t mind saying, I am an expert knitter.
I grew older and had a stroke. I could not read, the words would scramble and I would immediately forget what I had read. I decided to continuously knit again. I think knitting helped me get my mind back because it is at once creative and mechanical, right- and left-brained. I even once tried to teach people how to knit but they found it too difficult. I, on the other hand, have always enjoyed knitting.
These days I’m endlessly cleaning my house, trying to get my life fixed and in spotless order. This means tidying up my many hobbies. I have lots of unfinished jewelry. Then I discovered a stash of so much thread that I bought before but never got around to making. Now the idea of knitting and adding beads or stones is fascinating me, mixing my two pastimes and coming up with something excitingly glamorous for my children. Of course, I don’t know if they’ll wear it. I notice sometimes that they don’t much care for my taste but so what, right? The important thing is that I love them enough to design something difficult, then to sit down and actually make it, so it looks extremely wearable.
So once again I am knitting continuously. Every afternoon I sit before the TV and knit for my children and grandchildren. Thread or wool comes from a bag on the right side of my feet. On the left side of me is a jar of butong pakwan (watermelon seeds) for the breaks I take when my hands begin to tire. On the coffee table in front of me is a large icy glass of Coke Light that quenches my unquenchable thirst this long hot summer.
Yes, this is the life!
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