Knitting

Monday as I went in for chemo, I passed a woman in the radiology waiting room, just downstairs from the infusion room. She was clearly accompanying someone who was in for radiation. How could I tell? Easy. She'd been working on the same scarf with big needles and fun fur for three weeks each time I came in for chemo and she hadn't made much progress. Radiation only takes a few minutes, and that department is so prompt that if you're the patient there's no point in taking your knitting. So she was a caregiver. We've progressed to talking about scarves in general and the problems with fun fur in particular, but I haven't asked her about who she's waiting for or the cancer side of things.
Upstairs, I always look around to see if anyone is passing the hours of chemo with needlework. Because chemo takes so much longer than radiation, there's time for big, complex projects. On the other hand, chemo brain and nausea take their toll, so that I haven't seen anyone making, for example, a spiderweb-fine lace shawl while hooked up to an IV.
Monday, besides me, there was only the woman who makes caps for preemies, this time working on a lovely pink one. I haven't seem the woman who does the counted cross stitch for a while, and the caregiver who knitted socks as she sat by her husband has been gone since he finished his treatment. I've wondered if she insisted that he have just one more dose while she bound off the cuffs.
Strangely enough, no one makes chemo caps in the infusion room, though there's a basket full of them. Occasionally someone will check them out, but usually no one takes one.
No wonder. I wish that people who decide to do something nice for those poor, poor women who are suffering so would focus on quality instead of quantity. Instead of making fifteen chemo caps out of the thickest possible yarn and easiest stitch, it would be nice if they made one that anyone would actually want to wear. This mini-tirade is set off by the cap that was on top of the pile on Monday. Sludge-colored, made of the harshest acrylic, it would be enough to send an already-depressed cancer patient into a tailspin.
So am I being impossibly ungrateful? Maybe.
I just want it known that what I'm knitting in the picture above is going to be a chemo cap. It's out of a wonderfully soft wool, and the design is classy. And I'll put it on top of the pile.