THE CRUSH CLUTCH aka the "Emojo bag"
Here is a most useful item. Perhaps the most useful item one can ever knit. It has been named The Crush Clutch. This is a device designed to alleviate agony for people who are suffering from a pitiless crush.
About two years ago I developed a crush on a handsome fellow. The situation was extreme. I dreamed about him at night, I saved his messages on the answering machine for weeks, and, on the occasions when we should happen to associate, I rattled off at the mouth, endlessly yammering. Oh the foolery! I was a whole heap of flapdoodle. I was filled to the lip with feelings! Once after spending a few hours in his company, I was utterly overcome. I tried to get home but could not make it to my front door. I swooned. As I lay in the grass just next to the sidewalk, I wondered what would become of me, and what I would say to a passerby. “Oh no, I’m fine. I haven’t been hit by a car. I’m just racked with an acute case of puppy love. Please, carry on.” Lord only knows what would have happened if he had ever kissed me. I probably would have been on bed rest for a full week.
My feelings for the gent were certainly making things a bit difficult for me. I couldn’t go about laying in the lawn all willy nilly and languishing in attacks of bittersweet hope every few hours, this isn’t France after all. And so, for medicinal purposes, I developed the Crush Clutch.
This clutch is designed to be a repository, to give a respite to ones weary heart. I made my clutch because I felt I had no other choice. I had to put my feelings somewhere as my chest was already full to bursting.
I looked up the word repository in the dictionary. Repository has a few meanings which I find most suited to the description of The Clutch! The word repository is defined as:
1) A receptacle or place where things are deposited, stored, or offered for sale. Yes, Yes we knew this, well and good
2) An abundant source or supply; a storehouse. Certainly ones crush clutch will be holding an abundant supply of many things: Love, hope, lust, passion, doubt, excitement, monumental embarrassment and of course, terror.
3) A person to whom something is entrusted or confided. In our case, not so much of a “person” but the sentiment remains.
And 4) A burial place; sepulcher. This is really good. Isn’t it true that a crush always leaves one feeling on the brink of hopelessness? At any moment, you might feel that you could wither away into a poof of sand by a simple act of one human being. Oh! You may feel desperate and ill-fated. As you knit together your crush clutch you may be weeping with certainty, sighing repeatedly, knowing in your throbbing little heart that your love is doomed. You will die alone, with only this sagging yarn mass grasped within your loveless fingertips. Oh… oh.
How to construct a Crush Clutch.
1) Chose yarns that represent your feelings. I chose some bright colors because I am a weird-o. I felt that should be accurately portrayed in the physical manifestation of my heartstrings I was about to construct. I chose black because it felt like a safe and protective color. Also the color black seemed to best describe the gentleman recipient of my severe affections.
2) Decide how big you want your clutch to be. You can make your Crush Clutch any size of course. I made mine small so that I could attach it to my hip and pat it now and again. Sometimes I just carried it in my pocket.
3) Go be alone. You should be somewhere pleasant where you can revel in your feelings of love, hope, doubt, hopelessness and obsession. Maybe you want to listen to music. I listened to the radio. It was the Free Radio Olympia station as I recall, playing some broadcast from Canada.
4) Knit and Feel! Sighing is also recommended at this point.
I constructed my dear clutch in two pieces which I then knit into each other. I don’t know why I chose to make it this way. I was winging it. A far easier method (which I will explain to you here) would be to knit the clutch in one piece which will then be sewn together on the sides.
To do this, cast on stitches until you reach the desired width of your clutch. Next, knit or purl and change colors at will. You may want to add a pattern to your design. I knit in this lopsided heart for instance.
As you work, now and then try folding your piece in half. Is that a good depth for your clutch? When you feel that you are satisfied with the depth of your clutch you can begin decreasing stitches to create your fold-over flap. Exits are at the front and rear of the aircraft. In case of emergency your clutch with inflate and you will be able to breath out of it. You can decrease your stitches rapidly or slowly. If you like you can sew a button onto the clutch to keep it closed. I just used a safety pin. Maybe that is why nothing ever came to fruition with the chap. I didn’t have enough follow through. If you chose to make a non-pointy flap you can simply cast off your last stitches and sew in the remaining yarn. Your flap can be rounded, flat or pointy. But for God sake do not try to read these instructions while attempting to create the clutch. Just wing it. Wing it and be there. You can’t make the clutch wrong.
6) You may want to line the clutch. I chose to line mine with some fabric from an old pair of underpants. I thought it might enhance the vibes.
7) You may want to put some things in your clutch. Actual items. You may decide that your clutch is full enough with your emotional mayhem or you may stuff it with trinkets.
Here is what lives in my clutch
Nothing every happened with the fellow. I never confessed my feelings for him...
I don’t want you thinking that just because things didn’t work out between me and my crush that the crush clutch does not hold legitimate clout. The Crush Clutch is primarily meant to sooth you and help you enjoy your delicious suffering.
I don’t want you thinking that just because things didn’t work out between me and my crush that the crush clutch does not hold legitimate clout. The Crush Clutch is primarily meant to sooth you and help you enjoy your delicious suffering.
But what to do with your clutch when the worst of it is over? You may want to throw it away or you may want to cherish it forever. You may want to throw it away as a method of cherishing it forever. As for me, I still have mine. It went unused for many months. The object of my crush and myself have both found love in the arms of others… Of late however my old crush clutch muse has been about the town, as handsome as ever (more so actually.) looking like a wild elk and talking like a slurring leadbelly. It pays to have a the clutch handy at these times. But please, don’t mention it to my boyfriend.
Photos by Berd Whitlock
