The conversation turned, as all their conversations seemed to, drifting from topic to topic and changing as gently and as suddenly as dandelionseed. As though from sleep, Bob opened his eyes — everything was blue — and noticed for the first time the knitting needles busy in her hands.

“That looks good,” he said. “What are you making?”

“It’ll be a shawl, eventually,” she said, her head bowed slightly over her work, so that hair mixed in with the knitting. “It’s not very complicated… I’m not very good yet.”

He reached out and fingered the edge of it. “It feels pretty good.”

“You’re a sweetheart to say that, but — ” she blew the hair out of her face ” — that, the feel of it, the back and forth of the knitting, that’s the easy part. I could teach you that. It’s not hard. The hard part is knowing what else to make, how to measure and adjust and design, how to put yourself into the work and the work into yourself.”

“You make it sound so Zen.”

“Simple tasks, quiet minds. Sweeping, knitting, whatever. Or mathematics, that’d work, too.” She held the shawl up to her chest. “Simple rules, right, that make complex patterns?”