I fear I'm going to have to do an intervention. On the boyfriend.
He's recently developed an addiction and it's quickly spiraled out of control.
Drugs?
Alcohol?
No... YARN.
He's become a knitter.
It my own fault, really. About a month ago I made an appointment to have my eyes checked. I'd gone two years without a check-up and I noticed I was squinting a lot and having a hard time reading. I had been holding out to try and get in to see my longtime optometrist in LA, Dr, Greenspoon, "Optometrist to the Stars©". But the sad fact of life is I can no longer afford him, so I made an appointment at Lenscrafters.
The appointment was on a Saturday, and when they called the day before to confirm, they mentioned that they would be dilating my eyes and I might have a hard time driving afterwards. The suggested I have someone drive me, so I dragooned the boyfriend into service.
I figured it would probably take an hour, which I knew would be testing his patience, but then as it drifted into hour number two, he'd had enough.
"When you're done, come get me. I'll be next door" he said.
At Michael's. The craft store.
He left and shortly afterwards I was taken into an exam room and had my eyes dilated. They finished the exam and then told me I was done and flipped on the lights and... yikes! Everything was blindingly bright. They had told me to bring sunglasses, but I didn't have any, having recently sat on my only pair. They gave me a flimsy plastic pseudo-shade to cover my eyes and then sent me on my way.
Like a blind man I made my way next door to find the boyfriend. The shade was beyond useless, so I removed it as I entered the store, which proved to be a mistake. The store was an absolute explosion of color, which was all shimmering and vibrating with my dilated eyes. I felt like I'd dropped down a K-hole.
Finally, I found the boyfriend.
And he was holding a loom.
I wasn't concerned, at first. This house is littered with the scattered remains of past hobbies, something I'm reminded of every time I gaze on the piano. This too shall pass, I thought.
That first weekend wasn't bad at all. He took to the knitting like a duck to water and I was shocked at how quickly he mastered it. By Sunday night, I had a lovely new scarf.
But the scarves have quickly started to pile up. He's been making them for absolutely everyone we know. And he's started exhibiting strange behavior. I would see him hunched at the computer, looking shifty. What was he doing? Surfing porn? No... knitting tutorials on YouTube!
Then last Saturday, he said he had to run some errands and disappeared for three hours. When he returned he had shopping bags loaded with yarn. Those enablers down at the Yarn Barn had turned him to the dark side and now he had a loom to make hats too.
As alarmed as I was, I still thought it was harmless. He enjoyed it so much and he's quite good at it actually. But last night he crossed the line and now I think the time has come to shut it down.
Because now he's talking sweaters.
