Super Geek

Every visitor I greet at the O. Henry Museum gets asked the same question. “Do you know who O. Henry was?”

My question is neither sarcastic nor condescending. A good number of our visitors simply wander in, drawn by curiosity and the FREE MUSEUM signs on the lawn, no clue about the world famous author who went viral in the early 20th century. Or they do know him but don’t realize it. Often, once I start describing The Gift of the Magi, the most famous of his 381 short stories, a guest will say, “I know that guy!”

And then there are those rare birds who don’t give a rat’s ass about the museum’s honoree. They are not interested in learning about the man, his checkered past, his body of work. Instead, they have come for the wallpaper. Yes, that’s right. The wallpaper. Every room in the historic house is done up in reproduction wallpaper designed by some dude named William Morris. 

Maybe a few of you out in substackland just gasped with recognition and excitement. Because maybe you, too, are one of those wallpaper nerds obsessed with the maximalist patterns of yore. Though I find your specific obsession peculiar—I like my walls monochromatic—that you are such a nerd freak resonates deeply. 

Prior to 2000, my main obsessions were words and music. As reading and listening are quite common hobbies, I was not yet familiar with how deeply one could fall down more specific rabbit holes and get forever joyfully lost in Super Geekville. 

Then I took up knitting. I had actually learned to knit for the first time in 1986. Me being me, yes, trauma was involved. I’d just had a miscarriage and was in a deep depression. One of my sisters taught me to knit, insisting it would soothe me. Instead I wound up with a scarf that was a perfect metaphor for how I felt—tightly knotted, uneven throughout, pretty terrible. I put the needles down. 

But fourteen years later, I stepped out on my Hyde Park porch and found a bag with a long pair of aluminum needles, a huge skein of purple acrylic yarn and a How-To pamphlet. I never confirmed the identity of the giver, though I suspect it was a knitting-crazed friend who once overheard me say I should really try to learn again.

That gift has been the gift that keeps giving and giving and giving. I’ve spent the past few days revisiting some of the places my obsession has taken me. This happy mental journey was launched when I heard the sad news that Suzanne Middlebrooks, who in 1981 opened Hill Country Weavers—hands down the best knitting shop on the planet—died earlier this week. 

That purple project kept me busy for a very long time. It was probably a year or more before I first set foot in HCW and feasted my eyes upon the inventory. This was not the knitting stuff of Michael’s or Hobby Lobby. The place was full of natural fibers, high end luxury yarn, and endless tools, gadgets and patterns, none of which made any sense to me. For I had initially vowed never to go beyond knitting the most basic scarves. I had taken up the craft as meditation. I knew if I expanded my knowledge I would wind up seeking out complicated projects and defeat my intention.

Eventually though, I got sucked into the culture thanks to time spent at the shop. I did learn to purl. I took classes. I very slowly became a very good knitter. I once free-form knitted a cap with a 3D sculpted menorah on top. 

I was never not knitting. This is not an exaggeration. So well known was I for knitting in public that John Aielli frequently mentioned this fact on air. Once I was in Studio 1A for a live broadcast of The Chieftains. In between songs John did not comment on the wonderful music. Oh no. He told all the listeners at home that Spike was in the house with her needles.

Suzanne was not just my drug dealer. She gave me a job. Back in the good old days pre FB and IG, she hired me to launch the shop’s first blog. She paid me in yarn—anything I wanted—furthering along my tastes for the finest available. She took me to California one year to attend the annual buyers’ market, and I nearly short-circuited taking in all the vendors and their offerings, my swag bag overflowing.

This beloved writing gig coincided with the time in my life when I was traveling the most. And while I needed no excuse to visit shops in other cities, explaining to owners that I wanted to feature them in the blog made those excursions even more fun. 

One time in Buenos Aires I was attempting to converse with a cab driver. My grasp of Spanish being exactly on par with his grasp of English left us floundering. I finally worked out that he was asking me how I liked the wine in Argentina. Employing wild miming and made-up Spanish, I tried my best to convey I did not drink. So he asked (I think) what I thought of the delicious steak. “No carne! Mi no carne!” I said. I waited for him to ask me about my tango skills. Instead he said (I think), “Well why the fuck did you fly so far to the land of beef and wine if you’re a teetotaling vegetarian?”

I had my answer ready. “Lana!!” I shouted. “Lana! Lana!!”

Because of the six words I do know in Spanish, the one for wool is at the top.

That trip provided an especially great freak nerd experience, for there is an entire street in BA dedicated to yarn shops. Inside the largest, I used my phone to show the clerk my HCW blog. She fetched the owner. He gave me a tour of the massive warehouse in the back. 

In the mid-aughts, I was paging through my favorite knit porn magazine when I spotted an ad for a weeklong knitting and yoga retreat in Maine. A visit to the website revealed the cost to be far, far beyond my reach. I contacted the owners and suggested they might like to have a blogger along to document. They said yes. In exchange for free attendance I would be their scribe. 

That is how I first discovered my happiest place in the world, Monhegan Island, Maine. The first knitting retreat led to many others. Before lockdown I’d been to the island more than a dozen times.

I have knitted on trains in Japan, England and France. I have knitted on park benches and at bus stops. Always the knitting made me new friends and dispensed with language barriers. For what one may not be able to convey to another in words, one can easily explain by pulling out a project or whipping out a phone to show off photos of one’s masterpieces. These conversations—often wordless beyond exclamative gasps of appreciation— have only ever been joyful and enthusiastic, underscoring every time that the very, very best thing humans can offer one another is warm connection. 

Twenty years into my adventures as a fiber nerd, I went super next level. I got sheep. Then, albeit briefly, I opened my own knit shop. It was a tiny affair, housed inside that historic brothel I also briefly owned. And while the devastation of being driven from that small town will never leave me, some of the pain is mitigated by memories of my little dream shop. I still have palpable happy recollections of late nights when I would wander from my side of the whorehouse over to the shop and just stand there surrounded by all that yarn, feeling I had reached my own personal nirvana. I had stocked the place with truly quality products, taste being another gift Suzanne gave me. 

Sometime during lockdown, my knitting slowed to nearly zero. I think partly due to my sadness at having to close the shop. And partly because much of my knitting happened when I was gathered in person with others. I think, too, some of it had to do with my brain, which, like a lot of other people’s brains, decided it was mandatory to learn as many new things as possible during lockdown. And so my knitting was in part displaced by learning French pastry making and silversmithing, ceramics and sketching, yoga instruction and painting. 

In July, I looked at the very small stash of yarn I kept from the shop. My eye was drawn to a big ball of NORO, gorgeous textured Japanese yarn that Suzanne first introduced me to. I took it down off the shelf and for the first time in a very long time I felt the spark. Sometime later today I will finish a gorgeous sweater, at long last a project I have consistently worked on instead of setting aside. 

In August, as my mental health continued to decline under the heat dome, I decided a tiny bit of retail therapy might give me a boost. I didn’t need to debate what sort of thing would give me the biggest dopamine bang for my buck. I headed to Hill Country Weavers. I regret that Suzanne wasn’t there. And because she was very private about her illness, there was no notice regarding her absence. I actually had not even known she was sick at all, so I did not inquire. 

O. Henry’s legacy is the reason I have a job I love so much. Suzanne’s legacy lives on in that museum now, too. Nearly every day I’m there, I spend time in the parlor knitting, grateful I got my mojo back, revisiting the places I’ve been and people I’ve met thanks to the fire she lit in me. 

Thanks, Suzanne!

NOTES:

Y’all—if you are in a financial/emotional/psychological place to do so, please consider subscribing. It’s $50 per year or $5 per month. If subscribing is not your thing, it still helps if you pass this on to someone you think will enjoy it. Also there’s a tip jar at Venmo: @spike-gillespie (9998 last four of my phone number). 

What’s your freak nerd passion? Please tell me in the comments. I love hearing about other people’s passions. 

I have recently resumed working one-one-one as a writing coach. I am taking a very, very limited number of clients. If you want to know more about my services, just email me. I primarily work with memoirists though I occasionally help with fiction. Depends on the project. 

If you’re in Austin I hope you’ll come visit me at the O. Henry Museum. I’m there W, Th, Fr, Su noon til 5. It’s free and it’s fun!

Thanks for reading, y’all!