The Sweater Lady

A hippie nomad knitter in a small mountain town inspires mysteries.

Yes, I know she’s crocheting … Stockcake images

A nomad from England, she landed in a small town near Santa Cruz, CA where hippies still lived in communal households. She shared a mountain cabin with several others, including the man who liked a sweater she was knitting.

"You want to sell sweaters like that at my shop? They'll do great with my shoes." His colorful leather creations barely molded around the human foot, but sold well to tourists. I couldn't resist buying a pair of my own.

She agreed, especially because the crew-neck pattern she carried in her head knitted up in a day. Sometimes the Sweater Lady sat in front of his store, spinning thick, hand-dyed roving into slubby, varieted yarns. Other days, her hands clicked away with huge wooden needles, reeling out one massive sweater after another.

Every time I did errands or walked around town while my daughter was in school, I always stopped to chat. "I'm only 26," she told me, "but they all call me the old rat bag." She laughed as if embracing her cronehood as a badge of honor.

Anyone moving to California and didn't have wads of money would need to live with roommates. I was a loner, an independent woman who would jump in my car to explore. Wasted a lot of good studying time doing that, but I could avoid the reality that people weren't drawn to hang out with me. While I was often included in social gatherings, when I extended the invitation, people had better things to do.

Moving to Santa Cruz in 1979, I managed to stick it out for six months alone in a cool studio that was laid out like the one-bedroom above me. The rent, though, was three times what I paid in Salt Lake City, so I was forced to abandon my California dream.

My roommates drove me crazy. Unlike me, the Sweater Lady seemed resilient in such living arrangements. Used to tramping around the world, she could wander at will, yet I never asked how long she stayed in one place. Perhaps, when the roommates became too annoying or predatory, her belongings could be thrown into the luggage rack of a bus on short notice.

Apparently, things worked out for her as she stayed at the shop for over a year, almost becoming a landmark. She sat in front of the cobbler's shop, eyes closed and a Mona Lisa smile that perhaps benefitted from a bit of weed. Plus, she was blissing out on the brilliant sunshine after living in the U.K. She tipped her face to its benevolence as her hands worked the bulky yarn like a spider building a web. Watching her made my fingers itch to pick up my needles.

No matter how often we chatted, she never mentioned her travels. Certainly making it from England to Boulder Creek included exploits both wondrous and harrowing. At home or abroad, unpredictable things happen when we leave home and the teddy bear on the bed.

Tramping off to Europe or Asia attracted a lot of American kids back then. Media stories pointed out they were from affluent families, roughing it to "find themselves" away from Daddy's money. Most returned with grand stories and moved on to adult pursuits. Some bore the imprints of trauma. A few disappeared, never to be seen again.

I had settled into marriage by the time I met the Sweater Lady, but I did have my own adventures that left scars. She never spoke of such things. Then again, I didn't know her intimately enough for her to reveal her secrets. They were hidden under that Mona Lisa smile and whatever huge sweater she was knitting at the time.

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All my books, Paradise Ridge, When the Horses Come and Go, and Ghost in the Forest are currently available on Kindle. Ghost in the Forest, is also available in paperback. Paradise Ridge is out-of-print, but the Kindle version is re-edited and better quality.

Book Review of Ghost in the Forest:

E.R. Flynn, Illustrator, Cartoonist, Storyteller and Creator of "Escape from Clowntown Comics" here on Substack.

"Ghost in The Forest' is a great read! Take note People. If you love stories about environmentalism and nature, its clash with urban mindsets, as well as personal transformation, this is the book for you!

"Ghost in The Forest" is a quick 126-page read. It's the story of Dori, a woman trapped in a mix of grief over parental loss and refusing to accept how her hometown and her friends have changed over the years. Because of this, Dori has become a recluse and a self-imposed misanthrope who finds more comfort amongst the hiking trails around her hometown of Morristown than in her dealings with the raw reality of other humans.

The book, in some ways, resembled Edward Abbey’s “Desert Solitaire” in that the story follows a protagonist's love of nature and angst about humans encroaching on it. In this case, it’s how Morristown is transforming into a mountain biking destination where cyclists run rampant on trails and nature.

However, a tragedy involving said mountain biking becomes a major pivot point for Dori, leading to a series of events that eventually bring about personal evolution and discovery.

If you're a nature lover, this book is a must-read. It beautifully portrays the clash between environmentalism and urban mindsets and the journey of personal transformation. The book's vivid descriptions of nature and the protagonist's love for it will surely intrigue you.

Paradise Ridge Review by western author D. B. Jackson:

If you draw circle roughly around an area that includes northern Nevada, southern Oregon, and southern Idaho, within that circle exists a culture and people who live a lifestyle largely untouched by modern values. These are the "buckaroos" and Basque characters author Sue Cauhape brings to life in her literary novel, "Paradise Ridge".

Leandro, the illegitimate seventh son of patriarch Xavier Arriaga and his mistress, Gisela, is at the center of this intriguing story that travels exceedingly successfully at both the personal level of the characters, as well as the compelling level where the story is told.

Cauhape writes in a literary style that reminds me of Annie Poulx. Paradise Ridge, on the surface, appears to be an upscale Western novel...once inside the pages, you will soon discover a potential classic waiting to be discovered.

I rated this book a 5...because that's all the stars there were.