Confession: I have startitis. I would say that I have it lately, and only with knitting, but really, this has been a lifelong problem. I think my personal startitis (that is, a tendency to start new projects before finishing old ones) relates to a general lack of deadlines in personal projects. When I’m knitting gifts, they take priority. I start them, and finish them (usually) as they need to go to a certain person by a certain time or lose their value. Well, either that or think of a new gift to get for said person on very very short notice. I don’t like to miss deadlines.
There’s more to startitis, however, than mere lack of finishing deadlines. New yarn, chosen at a specific time for a specific project has a way of beckoning “Pick me! Use me! I’m shiny and new and exciting! I don’t deserve to hide in the back of your stash where I will languish and be forgotten!” Thus began the Glamour Capelet. It helps, of course, that the pattern seems simple enough, the garment wonderfully useful, especially in a place like San Francisco which changes its mind about whether to be warm or cold in the span of oh, five minutes or so, and, unlike anything else I’m currently knitting, this one doesn’t have mistakes. It holds a promise of potential perfection. I’m a sucker for perfection. And I love capes.
Despite my best intentions to finish any given project before moving on to the next one, the allure of the yarn draws me in and I find myself beginning yet another project which, if I think about it, will only slow my progress on the other projects I’m working on. Cold, hard logic, however, isn’t strong enough to beat the draw of the shiny, new and exciting and before I know it, I’m several rows in to project #7… far enough in to add it to my work-in-progress chart on Ravelry. I work on it at home a few nights, while unwinding and watching movies, bring it to a Knitterday with friends… this project has, at least staked its claim among present works, unlike a couple of less fortunate projects that were good ideas that never went anywhere. And it’s taught me a couple of new skills — a beautiful, ultra-subtle increase and how to knit with three needles to make a reinforced hem. Which is, at the end of the day, probably a pretty handy thing to know.
I learn a lot from startitis. Every new project brings new stitches and new techniques… things I haven’t done or tried before and the more of them there are in any given new project, the more likely I am to start it. I’m trying to hold back for a while, now, willing myself to finish the multitude of projects I’ve already started before I start anything else. Or maybe I only have to finish a few… after all, small projects are terribly convenient for long commutes…
I think it’s a Very Good Thing that the yarn I want for a couple of projects isn’t available in stores for a while yet. If it were, who knows what trouble I’d find myself in!
