I like the chairs but didn't get one the whole time.

[seryn]

I really dislike children. Sadly one of my nearby knitting groups is almost entirely children. I never get any knitting done when I go. It's really annoying to constantly be asked to teach. Not just give advice but to show by doing-for.

I learned to knit with a pair of chopsticks, a book from the library and a skein of yarn I got for less than a dollar. It took me ages to figure it out on my own. I know that I should pass along that knowledge because there's no sense in everyone re-inventing wainrightry after seeing their first wheel. But at the same time, it is incredibly frustrating to see people who do nothing to practice or learn on their own expecting me to give of my time to help them.

I don't go very often because of this. Today was my first time back in 6 weeks. Got chided. Feel really resentful.

I don't mind showing someone something once. "I learned to cast on, but saw someone doing it another way, can you show me that one too?" But then I expect that person to show the next person. How did I get to be the expert? I've been doing it longer but I don't have any secret knowledge that wasn't easily found.

I guess I shouldn't go back since I don't enjoy myself. I do feel useful, but the mule-load of resentment I bring home hardly seems a worthy purchase of my time.

If I could share the "teaching" responsibility I wouldn't mind so much. I could teach the mothers and they could take home enough extra skills to help their children if there were rough patches. I like being useful, but I hate feeling used. And that's what I feel when I'm asked to kneel for 20 minutes and finish a random stranger's kid's project.

I wanted to go to the knitting group because it says all experiences welcome and it's nearby.

Comments

[thistleingrey]

Standard dictionaries are unlikely to tell you this in any detail--"wright" is the person who has wrought something, literally, and thus "wright" is a back-formation from the old spelling of a form of "to work" (OE wyrcan or wircan, depending on dialect area, and those initial vowels weren't quite the same then). By the fifteenth century, perhaps under influence from Dutch and Flemish industry in London, the simple past-tense form (preterit) had shifted from "worhte" to something closer to continental German forms, and thus we now have "worked." "Wright" and "wrought" were left as fossils, which is one reason you're having trouble connecting *wrighting to anything: "wrighting" was never a word because the -t encapsulates a finished product (something worked, the way that iron or wood can "be worked" to create an aesthetic object). Something like *wirchende wouldn't occur to most English speakers without historical awareness, but it's a viable earlier spelling for "working."

And yes, "wain" is a wagon: soften the -g- towards -h- and you'll hear that they're originally the same word. The Big Dipper was called the Great Wain for a time.

Half this game is knowing the sounds that certain sounds can become in other contexts (like the -g- / -h-), and knowing when they're unlikely to shift to any other sound. I could go on, but I'd better get back to work.