Tuesday's Red Hat / Red Forehead Adventure

So Kathie, you mentioned the Norwegian Protest Hat,* the red hat knitters are making to wear to anti-ICE protests.

So here's a story:

My workplace, Evanston Stitchworks & Union Pizza had a fundraiser this past Tuesday -- $25 one free drink and all the pizza you could eat, everyone buy the pattern ($5 goes towards immigrant support groups) bring your yarn & needles, knit-a-long. It was a success: 200 people, over $5000 raised. I was waiting at home for Richard to get back from the library so I could head up to Evanston. I sent him angry texts "when are you getting back" only to hear his phone ping from the kitchen table. I kept getting phone calls from unknown numbers. Finally I answered one -- it was the phone of a security guard at the library he'd borrowed -- the EMTs were about to take him to Swedish for stitches. He'd tripped in the foyer and gashed his forehead on the inner door and was bleeding all over the place. Gigi was in a panic listening to my end of the conversation. The two of us hiked over in the freezing cold to get the car at the library about a mile away then drove to the ER where there was no sign of Richard.  Long wait. Then Richard shows up in a wheel chair looking like the flute player in that famous American Revolution painting. 

Finally they got a room for him -- in the psych area because the other triage areas were being used (no locks on the bathroom door, no pictures on the wall, etc.) Gigi & I sat with him. We were there for 5 hrs! Didn't get home until almost 11pm. BUT...

I had packed my bag for the knit-a-long. Richard & I had a bet -- would I finish my hat first or would they finally show up to give him his stitches? Hat finished first!

In the meantime we posed Richard to be Jacque Louis David's "Death of Marat." Nine stitches but he is recovering nicely.         

That's the update from here. I started on another red hat because this one was supposed to be for Richard and it isn't long enough to keep his ears warm. Send requests for hats to me and I'll make them until I run out of red merino wool...

Karen

*In the 1940’s, Norwegians made and wore red pointed hats with a tassel as a form of visual protest against Nazi occupation of their country. Within two years, the Nazis made these protest hats illegal and punishable by law to wear, make, or distribute. As purveyors of traditional craft, we felt it appropriate to revisit this design.