The Knitted Sweater (A Small Story)

This is a small story I wrote in February 2023 and originally published on my 2nd blog called "Small Stories & Commentary" on Wordpress. So, if you want go check it there too and read some of my other posts if you want!

Now, onto the actual story! Enjoy!

In a small town, there is a rustic red knitted sweater resting on a white plastic hanger.

That sweater has a long history!

It was knitted by the grandmother of the family and halfway through its creation the daughter took over and finished it. The daughter wore it for the majority of her young adult life. She was wearing that very same sweater when she spent her first Christmas with her husband as newlyweds!

The very same sweater she wore when she was a few months into her pregnancy with her first child! And she wore it when she and her husband with their firstborn spent Christmas with her parents and her in-laws. She wore the same rustic red sweater as she introduced her second-born daughter to her firstborn daughter returning from the hospital.

The wool-knitted fluffiness embraced both daughters many many times throughout their lives!

The daughter gave this precious sweater to her first daughter when she was 15 years old and was heading to her first snow lodge trip with her school. The granddaughter felt intimidated by the bulky fluffy sweater that in her mind weighed a ton!

Yet, the frosty cold was calling her; and like that the rustic red knitted sweater was worn by the granddaughter as she enjoyed a hot cup of chocolate by the fire with her classmates exchanging ghost stories and laughing about their day! That trip sealed who was going to be the new owner of the sweater, the granddaughter!

Years will go by and the granddaughter would wear this sweater to many coffee outings with friends, cold days at school, and many family road trips! But one of the most important tasks this sweater did was to give comfort to the granddaughter when she spent her first cold day and night as a college student alone in a big city! It hugged her keeping her warm as the granddaughter silently cried feeling homesick and she wiped her tears with the sleeves, as she watched the scenery pass by on the public bus.

Then the pandemic hit and the rustic red knitted sweater spent two years in the dark depths of a duffle bag as the granddaughter traveled back home and spent it inside. When the world finally started back up the granddaughter wore the sweater on her first trip back to her college city and she felt immensely nervous and scared!

After that moment the sweater was back in business! The granddaughter wore this sweater on her first coffee hang-out with her friends post-pandemic! She wore the sweater on her first job interview that she didn’t land.

She wore the rustic red sweater when she decided to go to night school during the cold winter nights. As she tried to learn something new and potentially add a skill to her arsenal as she tried to enter the workforce.

The granddaughter wore the knitted sweater when she went on her 2nd Erasmus trip yet her 1st winter one as she watched the frozen Italian Alps through the moving train wagon as she smiled full of excitement and hope! Life would go on and the granddaughter would be wearing the sweater when she would rush off the bus to visit her best friend as a surprise in her fancy apartment in Naples and her sweater got caught on a seat’s handler and ripped a bit.

The granddaughter felt as if she committed the worse act of treason! The world seemed to slow down for her but it didn’t and that is why the guy behind her stumbled on her and worsened the tear of the sweater! In a panic the granddaughter and in annoyance boarding anger the guy rushed off the bus and started verbally fighting about whose’s the fault, was it. Unknowingly to both, the fates of the universe and the sweater were front-row spectators to the meeting that would change the granddaughter’s life!

The fight would settle with the granddaughter exclaiming that she didn’t have time for this and rushed to get on another bus to her best friend’s apartment. Several days later, the granddaughter would take the sweater to a professional in Naples to fix it since she had no knowledge of knitting. The small clothing repair shop was located in a small neighborhood where it felt like time stood still and that the modern way of life hadn’t reached its claws yet. There in broken Italian and English, the granddaughter explained what she needed.

“I will give it to my grandson! He can fix it!” The woman promised and the granddaughter smiled relieved as she wrote down her phone number and name.

Two days later, the granddaughter got a call from the old woman telling her the sweater was good as new and she should come by to get it. If the granddaughter could teleport she would have heard this, she got to the shop as fast as public transport could get her. To Fates’ amusement, the woman wasn’t behind the counter this time but the grandson was, or as granddaughter knew him...the guy from the bus!Both stare at each other in startling realization and the grandson smiled amused.

“How much do I owe for the sweater?” The granddaughter managed to ask once her shock wore off.

“How about a coffee?” The grandson bargained amused.

The sweater would be worn on their first date, a year later. And again when the grandson proposed to the granddaughter on their 6th Christmas morning together in front of the Christmas tree and the granddaughter and his family.

And history repeats itself as we all know, and just like how the rustic red knitted sweater hugged the pregnant belly of the mother, it now hugged the pregnant belly of the granddaughter!

Eighteen years will go by, and the granddaughter would rest the sweater on top of her firstborn daughter’s suitcase the night before she left them for college. And many years down the line the great-granddaughter’s daughter found the sweater in her mother’s closet and declared it was now hers!

The sweater would be worn for the last time by the great-granddaughter’s granddaughter as she stared into the night sky one wintery night with a cup of hot chocolate with whiskey in the embrace of her wife.

“Hey, I think it’s time for the sweater to retire...” The wife said in a whispering voice as she noticed the elbows and shoulders of the sweater had started to tear. Nowadays, you couldn’t wear the sweater by itself you needed to add a shirt underneath, it was almost see-through from the years.

“Yeah...I guess so...”

And like that, the rustic red knitted sweater on its plastic white hanger was put inside a protective bag and a box placed inside an attic where it would be seen for the last time.

Years later it will be found again and would be held by the descendants of the granddaughter’s sister as they would laugh and reminisce about the adventures sweater had gone through.

A sweater that hugged generations of women of this family reminding them of home, comforting them and most of all keeping them warm.

After all, the creators of the sweater pour their love and hopes of taking care of the people they loved, that was the job and it was done to perfection!

For that was the life of the rustic red knitted sweater!

So? What do you think? I really loved this story because it was inspired by my very own rustic red knitted sweater that was at first started being knitted by my maternal grandmother and my mum finished it when she was in college. Then she gave it to me when I was off to college in early October 2017.

I unfortunatelly wasn't so careful with how it was meant to be washed and I shrank it a bit but I still plan on hand it down to my daughter or son.

Tell me in your comments what do you think of this story, but please be kind, it's my first post here!

Thank you for reading!