Knitting and Other Weird Things People Do In Public

I am a knitter. This means that I basically want to spend every free moment playing with sticks and string. It means I treat waiting rooms, long lines, and delays as opportunities rather than annoyances. It means I am magic and can create wonder and wooly goodness using the bare minimum of raw materials. To me, knitting is practically a super power. It defeats boredom, it creates wonder and amazement, and it is generative in ways so many other hobbies are not. Knitting is bad ass.

With all of the awesomeness, however, being a knitter also makes me weird, unabashed, and old-fashioned. Especially because I frequently knit in public. The hype surrounding knitting in public has always seemed odd to me, and for the most part I have ignored it all and knit anyway. Daily life is full of knitting opportunities--queues, waiting rooms, coffee shops, car rides. It never occurred to me that it would be weird for me to try to use my time productively. Even as a new knitter I was willing and enthusiastic about whipping out my work at every opportunity.

Despite my own willingness to bring my knitting out in public and my confidence (read: obliviousness) while doing so, I have still incurred some strange looks and comments. Apparently knitting in public is strange. People aren't supposed to do it. A part of me is okay with that. Generally I accept that I'm going to be weird and I'm going to knit. But recently, I had a colleague ridicule me for knitting during a conference presentation and it got me thinking; people do far stranger things in public. Things that are far more intrusive, offensive, distracting, etc. For example...

• Making phone calls. It just fosters some weird kind of voyeurism and no one really wants to hear all about your personal business.
• Taking selfies. Just plain awkward.
• Changing babies diapers. Public exposure. Fecal matter. How is this not something people think twice about?
• Breastfeeding. Not remotely meant as an insult. I have absolutely no problem with public breastfeeding. But it is certainly more distracting than knitting.
• Mouthing lyrics to an iPod. Just makes you look crazy. That music you're enthralled with? No one else can hear it.
• Making out. Again with the voyeurism. And the swapping of bodily fluids. And the grossness.

Me working on my husband's Elevator Sock at school.

So really, in the end, I don't think knitting is that weird. It's virtually silent. It doesn't take up space. It doesn't require me to expose myself or invade on anyone's public space. It doesn't make me unapproachable or self-absorbed (at least not if the number of people who approach me when I'm knitting means anything). Quite frankly it is one of the more normal things that a person can do in public. So I knit in public and slowly the people I see everyday have stopped staring. My knitting, at least, is starting to normalize. I have just become that one weird instructor who knits in the coffee shop in the mornings. Personally, I see this new apathy as progress.

If you are interested in helping to normalize knitting (and maybe gain some converts), I recommend you take part of World Wide Knit in Public Day. It's awesome, it's widespread, and it is a great way to meet other knitters who aren't afraid of being "weird" if it means they get to play with sticks and string whenever they want.