The Tell Tale Crochet Hook

Ad for Cartier-Bresson, Famous French Cottons, from McCall's Needlework, Fall-Winter, 1952-53.

Today she’ll be spending twenty hours crocheting the latest accessories out of French Cotton Thread. Only the best cotton will do. It just has to have that lustrous quality, that beauty and delicacy that only Cartier-Bresson can provide.

Twenty hours. She’d work longer, but the man must have his dinner. And then there’s after dinner... but she doesn’t think about that. Instead she thinks about single crochet, double crochet, and crocheting through the back of the loop. As soon as he’s asleep, she slides out of bed and picks up her crochet hook and starts again.

For even more snark:

As her fingers fly she vaguely remembers that her life wasn’t always like this. Back before she’d given up her bridge club for séances and black magic, she’d hardly spent any time at all crocheting. Laughing over a copy of C.B.’s Modern Crochet Fashions and a silver cup of goat’s blood, it had seemed like such a delightful idea to summon a handcrafter’s demon to help her finish all her half-completed projects. If only she’d read the small print about “round-the-clock fashions. . .”

Her eyes are stinging with fatigue and she thinks to herself that if she had no eyes, she wouldn’t be able to crochet. She could finally put her hook down and sleep. But no... the toilet seat must have a doily. So must the trash can lid. And she realizes with horror that the man has no lace to decorate the sleeves of his shirts.

She keeps crocheting.