Intrepid Knitting Part 2

Have you read everything the Yarn Harlot has ever written? Of course you have! But in case you've temporarily forgotten... she goes on at length about her rather poetic feelings about the humble sock and how she likes to show her socks a little bit of the world before they get stuffed into a pair of shoes. A fair amount of her (awesome) blog is taking pictures of places she takes her sock knitting. I think that's pretty cool, so when the youngish man swept me off on an excursion this weekend, I was excited to show my socks a little bit of the world. This has nothing to do with me spending half a king's ransom on sock yarn this weekend and needing to get really, really into knitting socks to justify it. It may have something to do with my desire to both knit and prove to the youngish man that I was thoroughly enjoying myself on this birthday excursion1 .

Shortly after parking the car and working out our sleeping arrangements, we went for a stroll along the Hawksbill River Greenway. It was a really cute greenway with lots of literature and small bits of historical rubble and I wanted to show all of these things to the sock... Unfortunately, there were also lots of ducks. It must be close to duck mating season because, uh... there were unspeakable things happening along that river. It seemed best to protect the sock's delicate sensibilities and also I wasn't in the mood to embark on a career of amateur pornography so I kept my camera tucked away.

After a fabulous meal at the Mimslyn Inn, we retired in order to be properly ready for our adventure the next day - heading deep into the Luray Caverns. These are limestone caverns and I don't want to get into a frothy rant but limestone is one of my pet passions, left over from my concrete and cementitious materials research. It was a good choice of excursions for my youngish man to surprise me with... though I have to admit I was less interested in the prettiness or the size of the various formations and more interested in what they implied, chemically and geologically speaking. I *mostly* kept my mouth shut and didn't chatter too much about crystalline structures, erosion, or precipitation of minerals. Especially since the poor tour guide was being constantly pestered by an excited teenaged boy with no concept of personal space and a million questions.

The sock has simpler tastes and was awe-struck by the natural beauty of the caverns.

And made vaguely hungry by this slab of "Cave Bacon"

And hungrier by these fried eggs!

One of the unique things about the Luray Caverns is its stalactite organ. A series of rubber mallets on wires are strung throughout a large cavern and, when played, the mallet strikes a stalactite to play a note. They are, I think, 36 or 39 notes and they echo, slightly warped and haunting, from all directions. It's very beautiful but it made me feel uneasy, for reasons I can't quite explain. I kept staring at the components while the song was played and watching the mineral rich water dripping on the mallets and wires. I thought about how it would be if people were to move away from these caverns - the water would drip and drip on these components, until new mineral formations grew around them. The notes change very slowly as the stalactites grow - about a cubic inch in a hundred years. Hundreds of years from now would archaeologists or explorers find the remains of this organ and play the warped, out of tune notes?

The plaque next to the organ talks about man's genius and god's hand being in perfect harmony. But I spend a lot of my time thinking about the cost of progress, the implications of our decisions and the damage we're doing. These caves are carved from limestone, the skeletal remains of ancient sea creatures. We take that limestone and we grind it up and cook it at 1450 degrees until it releases a single carbon dioxide molecule. We use the resulting calcium oxide as the primary ingredient in cement. Every ton of cement produced releases about a ton of CO2 into the atmosphere. We have built our civilization on top of and out of that cement, filling our atmosphere with the last breath of ancient creatures. It is hard to believe that we're living in perfect harmony with anything right now.

1. There are strange, sad people in the world who think that knitting distracts from your ability to participate in and enjoy the world. They are wrong. Knitting soothes nerves and allows the knitter to enter a Zen-like state where only joy and serenity exists. Unless the knitting is on a deadline, then all bets are off.