Farm to Feet

I wrote earlier about my good friends in Vermont, Bob and Sue, who raise alpacas on ten acres.  Alpacas are adorable and cute; one or another will on occasion eat out of a stranger's hand.

There were giant piles of uncarded fiber in the basement of Bob & Sue's house, sorted by color.  Eventually these piles became skeins of fiber.  I wanted two ... a tan and a rich rich brown.  I wanted them but didn't want to own them.  I put them on a shelf and I stared at them.  I got tired of staring at them.  I mailed them as a gift to my friend, Ellen, who lives on the Lower East Side (right across St. Marks's place from where W.H. Auden lived!).  "What do you want me to do with them?" she asked.  "Anything you want to do!" I said.  "Put each of your feet on a piece of paper and sketch around the edges," she said.  I had only 8-1/2X11 paper in the house and my feet are longer than the paper, but I did the best I could.  It was two years ago that I got those skeins.  On Friday a package was in the mailbox.  Ellen has made me the best socks anyone could ever want, alpaca-soft, alpaca-warm:

Left sock with valium, tweezer, Xmas glass, and piece of towel.

Right sock with valium, tweezer, Xmas glass, and piece of towel.

Both socks being soft and warming.

Thanks, Ellen!  (She told the people in her knitting club that the man she was making the socks for "even knows the names of each of the alpacas who provided this fiber.")