Volume 33, Number 1

What We Need

We don’t need to invent a god of the Internet. The Internet already holds divine status, is already omniscient, is already totally beyond our control. The Internet couples with wildebeests and capybaras and babirusas and jellyfish, begetting millions of offspring that can’t spell. No. What we need is a goddess of YARN. A goddess who can tie it all together, who can make the long, twisted strand into something to keep us warm, something crafty, something to admire. Who can roll all our strength and all our sweetness up into one ball. A goddess who can set us free, who can let it all unravel with a single tug, who can cut off ties that are binding when we need to be released. Not connections by living things like vines. You can cut those but they have a sneaky way of growing back, strangling new shoots all over again. No. We need clean breaks. And not too specialized. Her domain should include stories, far-fetched weavings of unlikely parts joined up. Like a goddess of surgery but without the life-and-death part. And yes, fetch the yarns from afar. And while we’re at it, she should also be goddess of cat toys. We need more cat toys, more ideas, more understanding of What Cats Want. Let there be YARN.

—Karen Greenbaum-Maya