worryingly jolly batman

Posted by Stephanie Pearl-McPhee

https://www.yarnharlot.ca/2025/06/team-knit-2025/

https://www.yarnharlot.ca/?p=9816

If you have been around here for any amount of time at all, never mind the full two decades that I have been at this blogging thing to some degree, then by now you should know that I don’t work on my birthday. I used to explain it at job interviews and other than the years that my kids were little and there’s no choice (and one year at the June Retreat in Port Ludlow- but that’s hardly the same kind of work) I don’t do it. That means that technically today should be spent in traditional fashion, which is doing as I darn well please, but I am breaking away from my regularly scheduled festivities to tell you about this year’s Team Knit for the Bike Rally, because there is nothing I would like more for my birthday than a donation to this terrific cause.

Now, I know there’s a small chance that a few of you don’t know me very well (hi instagram) and so let me take a minute to explain what the Bike Rally is, and what’s going on anyway – we’re going back to basics. The Bike Rally is a 660km (bike ride, not motorcycle) from Toronto to Montreal, in support of three great ASOs. (AIDS Service Organizations, that’s people that help people with HIV/AIDS. The one here in Toronto is called PWA, and that’s short for People With AIDS.) Every year a couple hundred people get on their bikes and ride that great long way (they’re the riders, like me) and other people move their stuff and mark the route and cook the food and keep them safe (that’s the crew, like Cam this year) and other people donate money to cheer them on, and to show gratitude that they themselves don’t have to ride bikes that far to make a change in the world. (That’s you.)

We’ve been doing this for years and years and years. Ken started it, and the rest of us have been doing it fewer years, but still a really long time. (Every person in my family has done the ride, except Joe, who I think we can all agree is sort of crew.) ALL of Team Knit (with the exception of Fenner this year but she’s practically a baby) hold this cause in such high esteem that we have held some sort of leadership role or in the case of me and Cam and I may have really maxed this out) MANY leadership roles to keep it rolling. That means that not only are we committed to riding when we can – which is a ridiculous amount of time when you think of the training and fundraising and then the week to actually ride… but decided that this needed more of our time when we’re not riding. That’s an endorsement, right?

These ASOs provide practical, meaningful help to people who have HIV or AIDS and were a response to the under-response of the AIDS crisis that began in the 80s, and over the years what they do and who they do it for has shifted. What was originally a tragedy centred on the gay community and the death sentence that was AIDS has become something really different these days, and in fact globally (and here) women make up the majority of people with HIV/AIDS, and the rate of new diagnosis is higher in women, immigrant women, and first nations women, and women of colour. Across the board HIV infection is associated with underprivilege, discrimination, fear, poverty, lack of power, lack of sexual power or decision making ability, and access to prevention/treatment meds.

Nowadays science (with certainty) that U=U, and that means that if treatment for HIV/AIDS has the amount of virus in your blood Undetectable then it is Untransmissible and you can’t give it to anybody. Not everyone knows this though, and grownups and children can face tremendous stigma and shame, not to mention that the medicine that gets you there is expensive and in many parts of the world, difficult to access, or stigmatizing to access. (If you’re not sure about that, just imagine living in Canada or the US, and having to have your whole neighbourhood and community (including the other parents at your local school or the local dating pool) see you turn up at the HIV/AIDS clinic to access meds for you or your child, and know that’s how it is a lot of places if you seek help.)

Anyway, Team Knit thinks that’s trash. Furthermore, I don’t know about you but the world is such a complicated and heartbreaking place lately, that I am relieved to come up against a problem that we’re already equipped to relieve if only we had the money.

This year Team Knit is a group of knitters that are once again going to get on their bikes and try to make things better, and we are:

Me

Ken

Jen

Fenner (that’s Jen’s kid)

Cameron (Cam’s crewing instead of riding this year, he’s still committed to the cause, still giving up a week of his life to be with us, and though he’s not able to ride this year, you can still donate to him.)

We’re regular knitters, not pro-cyclists or anything, and each of us has so far been on ONE training ride (and they were short) so may the force be with us. (This is the first year that the Rally hasn’t just struck fear in the hearts of one or two of us, but ALL of us. Except Fenner, who has the strength and enthusiasm of youth, which is a whole other kind of amazing thing. You know many teens who would do this?) We ride August 3rd and we would love your support. For years I’ve been writing about the magic of cumulative action, the concept that while one small donation might not mean much, many small donations can make a whole sweater, I mean… an entire cultural shift, but you see how knitters are particularly good at understanding this. Absolutely anything helps, and for years and years we’ve stunned people with what Team Knit (that’s us together with you) can accomplish, especially when we remember that there are many, many ways to help.

It seems like such a good time to come back to basics doesn’t it? People helping people, making change where we can, relieving suffering where we are able. (Sounds like a birthday party to me.)

Let’s go.

(PS I am 57, for those of you who like to donate my age out of sheer moxy.)

https://www.yarnharlot.ca/2025/06/team-knit-2025/

https://www.yarnharlot.ca/?p=9816