Kaylee’s Sock

Happy Valentines Day, fellow Browncoats. No one appreciates a box of chocolates and strawberries like our girl Kaylee Fry, so I thought it would be appropriate to finally set the Kaylee Sock pattern and colorway loose from the Society of Caffeinated Knitters vault today!

The Alliance might’ve won the Unification War, but that doesn’t mean we can’t still be free. They can’t take the yarn or knitting needles from us if we still have Serenity.

You might recognize Kaylee’s Sock from the August 2017 Society of Caffeinated Knitters box, which you can read about it here! The pattern is available by itself on Ravelry, the yarn is available by itself on the Adventure Yarn page, or you can get the set of them together here.

It gets harder and harder for me to write about some of my favorite fandoms. Firefly was on my TV for 14 episodes, but it will live on in my heart forever. As I see it there are three types of people in the world: people that would love Firefly if they saw it, people that have seen Firefly and love it, and people that are wrong. Still, it grows more and more difficult to separate the shows/comics/games/movies/etc… that I love, from the men that make them.

I used to idolize Joss Whedon. I’m a grown up now, and I think it’s fair to say that no matter how hard I might fangirl, I don’t idolize anyone. But I was young and needed a constant stream of escapism, and Joss was there with a big steaming bowl of it. For me, he was the man to which all other men should aspire. His work featured strong women in powerful roles. It’s no secret that Buffy was incredibly influential for Jac and I both. I can honestly say we would not be the people we are without Buffy. A few years back, Kev got me a painting of Buffy sitting on a gravestone knitting and it’s my favorite thing in the world. Each night, after Mabel brushes her teeth we walk past the paining on the way to her room, and she wishes “buff-buff” a good night. That’s how strong we feel about Buffy over here. So it hurt, really hurt, when I found out that not only is he human, but it turns out he’s a kind of a shitty human.

This is a he-said-she-said situation. But I will always believe someone that comes forward until such a time as clear contradictory evidence is discovered. If someone told me that their house was robbed, I would believe them. So if someone tells me that they were mistreated, I also believe them. And since Joss hasn’t even offered any particular denials, one assumes these things are true. And I have to wonder, does this tarnish my relationship with Firefly, or, God forbid: Buffy? As an adult, I take a more critical look at Whedon’s work, and I chuckle at past me for being so entranced by him. Many of his female characters are fairly one-dimensional. But things don’t need to be perfect for me to love them, and not every character needs to change my life. Enough of his did.

Kaylee Fry, Buffy, and many others hold up under scrutiny. Kaylee was vulnerable and smart, and she didn’t need to strap guns to her hip to save the crew. She wasn’t infantilized or over sexualized, and her relationship with Simon felt natural. There’s another box shipping at the end of the month, and we’ll be hitting on another Whedon fandom, and after hearing me talk about how his work impacted me, it’s probably not that hard to guess which one. ;P

For me, most roads will ultimately lead to socks. You could make a strong argument that my life is devoted to knitting socks that remind me of things I love. Sometimes I knit other stuff too, but really, when you boil it down, I make fan socks. I think a lot about what impacts my ongoing fan-girl status might have. Where I come down is that it’s okay to love these things with abandon. I can criticize Joss, and love Joss’ work in the same breath. I’ve got the emotional space for that. So, I’ll keep making my socks and loving my shows and speaking out against shitty people, and I don’t feel bad for that. There is a sense sometimes, that in order to reject a creator’s actions we must also reject the work, but I disagree. Especially since so many other good people put their heart and soul into those works too. That said, if he made a new show, I don’t think I would watch it or infuse it with my dollars. So I guess that’s where the line is for me. This month, I will knit Buffy socks in spite of him, and I won’t let him take Buffy, or Kaylee, or Cordelia, or Zoe from me. They belong to the fans now.

~Megan-Anne

Shiny.