The bright sun warmed the whitewashed rooftop as I padded across to the couch and
table, set up just for this purpose. I set down my bag, coffee, and laptop, happy to bask in the
much-needed vitamin D. I closed my eyes for a few minutes, feeling my cheeks grow red with
the heat as I imitated a sunflower, absorbing as much golden light as possible with my face
towards the sky. Once content, I turned my gaze to the table, where yarn had begun to spill out
of my bag when I set it down.
I took a sip of the coffee I brought, thick with milk and sweetened to my liking, and pulled
out my working skein and hook. I had been crocheting the bottom part of a shirt, working
half-double stitches into the back loops of the rows. It was an easy stitch, one that fell into a
simple rhythm after a few moments. Yarn over, push through. Yarn over, pull out. Yarn over, pull
through. It was perhaps one of my favorite stitches to work, though I was also partial to the
pretty twist that came from a double stitch.
The yarn I was working with was a soft type, made for baby blankets and hats, which I
had bought from the medina a week or two prior. I had about 300 grams of a bright teal color,
which I thought would match my sister’s skin tone beautifully. She was pink and freckled, but
definitely warm enough for a summer color palette. She was already the recipient of several
crocheted gifts of mine, but her enthusiasm for the last shirt I had made her was plenty of
encouragement to continue this one.
As I worked another row, I frowned at the tail. Something didn’t seem quite right with the
stitches. The first few rows are always where things go wrong, but considering I was nearly at
length, I had no desire to pull out the stitching and start over. I folded the ribbing in half,
comparing the width of the working end to the starting end, and sighed. I had dropped a few
stitches in the beginning rows, and while the piece was straight after that, the two ends were
several stitches off in width from each other.
The sun’s heat felt oppressive now, as I looked at the last week’s worth of work,
contemplating if I needed to frog it and start over, or if it was workable. I knew the ends would
get sewn together, which meant I could possibly stretch the smaller end to fit. But, on the other
hand, I wanted to take pride in the things I make, and knowing I left a mistake so easily fixed
would ruin the rest of the work. I sighed and began to unravel.
Frogging a piece was never fun, and I glared at the yarn as if that was the cause of the
lost stitches. I got to my foundation chain and began the work again. Yarn over, push through.
Yarn over, pull out. Yarn over, pull through. Next stitch. Yarn over, push through. Yarn over, pull
out. Yarn over, pull through. Next stitch. Over and over, I repeated the process, this time
remembering to chain two to turn, rather than one. This is where I lost stitches at first, and after working through ten rows, the edges still looked straight, rather than the slant of the first try. I
took an angry swig of coffee and continued my work.
After a few moments, however, I remembered to relax. Gifts always carry the energy with
which you make them, and I wanted this piece to feel content and warm, hence my choice of the
rooftop workplace. I took a deep breath and opened my laptop for some music. I picked out
some music that would remind me of some favorite memories of my childhood. Our family motto
always has been “life is good when you can dance in the kitchen,” and as a musically inclined
family, I took this to heart.
I let Johnny Cash take me back to warm summer nights at home, where the same sun I
was sitting under now in Tangier had just begun to set, and the peepers shouted at the stars.
When fresh garden squash and zucchini were on the table, grilled with the chicken next to them,
and we all sang together, laughing at everyone’s imitation of the deep bass notes in the song. I
continued working the rows, letting these memories infuse the shirt, rather than the irritation of
starting over.