This was a long, frustrating journey.

In Summer 2019, I got certified to go scuba diving in open water, anticipating an October cruise to Bermuda where I could dive a reef and a shipwreck. Arriving on the ship, I learned the dive I booked was canceled. In Bermuda, I booked two alternative dives which also were canceled. It was frustrating, and my disappointment haunted the entire vacation. The one bright spot of Bermuda was discovering a small yarn store, where I bought self-striping yarn, exactly the thing I like to knit gloves out of. But the gloves just weren’t working—the fit was wrong, the colors not behaving as I’d hoped—and the project went into deep hibernation over the pandemic.

In February 2021, I decided to restart the gloves, making them for my friend Laura. They buzzed along for a while, but then I lost interest.

My 2020 cruise was postponed a year, then postponed another year. But finally, in November 2022, we set sail, and I decided to finally exorcise Bermuda by finishing the gloves. I quickly finished knitting the fingers of the right glove so I would have a template to refer to for the left, which I knit while traveling.

I love knitting gloves. I love the His & Hers Gloves pattern. I love the effect of self-striping yarn on gloves. And yet, I hated every moment of knitting these cursed gloves. But at last they’re done. Like Bermuda and scuba diving, they are finally behind me, and I can move on.