Fitter Happier

How silly of me to blog about my history with notebook computers yesterday of all days, when the iPhone was made available to adoring throngs. Time will tell if the new Apple device will be as revolutionary as claimed.

Knitting time has been elusive this week, but I do have a way of tying it into the tech talk. Bear with me.

Technology is all about moving onward and upward. What we're able to do today without thinking twice about it is pretty incredible. Maybe that's why I've been on a bit of kick reading books about advances in global communication.

Aside from music's vinyl collectors and analog purists, more often than not we tend to favor the latest, greatest thing over old technology. I remember listening to a General Electric AM/FM transistor radio with a single earphone to bide the time as I mowed yards as a kid. It might be nice to still have it out of some sense of nostalgia, but if you think I'd trade it for my iPod, you're crazy.

The reasons for preferring new technology aren't difficult to understand. If we can do something better, faster, or easier, why wouldn't we do it? Sure, the rotary dial telephone might work perfectly well, but how many of those do you see in use?

And then there's knitting. Making something yourself certainly isn't faster or easier than buying something off the rack. Depending on how good of a knitter you are, the finished product may not be better. It might be cheaper to handknit something, but let's call this justification a push. This begs the question of why one should knit at a time in history when prices and production make the craft unnecessary for fulfilling basic needs.

The answers vary. For me it's about learning a skill that allows me to relax, feel a sense of accomplishment, and make things for others. I like how it connects me with my heritage, what little that I know of it, in that my grandmothers sewed and quilted. I've also found that knitting is a way of joining a community. From a purely practical perspective, there's no reason for me to be doing it, but that's often true of anything that could be called art. I'm sure that those of you reading have similar reasons and some I haven't mentioned.

We are at a point when our time is so valuable that we feel we must maximize it or make sure that it's profitable in some way. I know I'm as guilty as anyone in doing this, although I've been working on it. Creative pursuits can defy how we define success (money, acclaim), but lack of riches or accolades don't make such activities a waste of artistic energy. In other words, sometimes things are worth doing for their intrinsic value regardless of practicality or technological advances.

Here's where I should bring these thoughts together with a grand statement or two, but this is a riff than a treatise on modern life. Umm, knitting=good, new notebook computer=good. How's that?