And now take the time to write, knit, weave and crochet... I eat good food, I walk the dog and I care about what people think about everything. While I have shelter and sustenance, I am calm and peaceful, but I'm not assured that the serenity I live in now will abide if I were to lose my income and lived under a bridge. I do not live under any illusions that life is fair. I have had too much heartbreak to believe in justice and so have you.
You know, this crosstitch quilt took 40 years and more hours to create than you could ever imagine. I loved every minute of those hours.
There were years when it languished in a closet, partially completed, while my life was filled with family, going to school, traveling, and other obligations. But it was always there, waiting for me to come back to it.
Now that I’m older, crafting is what I do. It’s all that I do. I do it for joy, peace, and the satisfaction of creating something beautiful. While stitching, be it crossstitch, crochet, crewel work, knitting, bookbinding, or tapestry, I forget about the troubles that face me, that face us in this incredible yet troubling world that we live in. Podcasts, audio books, documentaries, travel vlogs, and the like fill my days while I craft.
Beyond the stitching, however, there was the cost of taking the quilt to the “long arm quilter.” By the time I finished the cross stitching, I was not inclined to hand stitch a queen sized quilt. Three hundred dollars was a small price to pay.
For those of you who don’t quilt, you may not know what that is. A long arm quilter is a person who owns a very large, almost room sized machine in which they can feed a quilt of almost any size. That machine is connected to a computer on which many patterns are programmed. A pattern is chosen, and off it goes with the expertise of the long armed quilter. For those of us who quilt, it is a marvel.
At that point is when the long arm quilter saved it from more time sleeping in the trunk or closet. I had started to quilt it by hand, but after months of working on it, I realized that the task was too daunting. I just wanted it to be done. When I got the quilt back a week later, I then hand stitched the binding. It was finally ready to use.
But, by this time, this quilt is so precious that I can’t use it on my bed… Only because I have two cats and a dog that often share my bed. Claws, hair, and dirt would most likely destroy it.
So for now, it’s folded and safely sits on my ottoman with a pillow on top where Fran Ham, the cat, loves to sleep. I can only enjoy the parts of it that peek out from underneath.
Just recently, I found the answer to a mystery I had given up on resolving many years before. I mostly didn’t even know that I was still looking, but the search was hidden away in my heart to emerge only occasionally.
There were few things of value that I even cared about because Mom left so little behind. But there were a few of precious value to the heart only. Nothing she ever owned was embued with monetary value.
But there was one mystery to solve, known only to me as, “The Missing Heart.” I would have found the answer if I had known to ask the right people. Why did the loss of this small charm occur to me again? Oh, yes, I remember! My niece, Sharon, was going through her mother’s (my sister’s) jewelry and came upon a bracelet she didn’t recognize, and neither did I.
I asked if among her things, had she come upon a small silver and marcasite heart with a mother of pearl inset? At first, I couldn’t remember the stones, so it was hard to describe. Her first answer was, “No”, she said, but she would keep an eye out for it.
I looked online to see if I could at least find something similar to help her identify it. Why did I even care, you might ask. Because, as a small child, like all curious children will, I loved to look in my mother’s jewelry boxes and in her top drawer to see her linen hankies and soft gloves of silk, cotton and leather, small veils of soft netting, hat pins, hair barretts and other small pieces and mementos.
On top of her dresser, among the crystal bowls, was her hair brush, a handheld mirror, and containers of face and body powder and fancy glass bottles of perfume and fragrant lotions.
There, also sat my favorite music box. It was a small wooden piano with just enough room to hold a few small pieces of jewelry.
The music box
Mom’s dresser was always dusty with the powders she used liberally. Her favorite perfume was Tweed. The fragrance is strong, with the tiniest bit of floral notes to keep it feminine, but mostly, it is dark, moody and earthy, woody, and resinous. Perfect for Mom, but not for a small child or even a teenager. I was never tempted to use it, but it smelled spectacular on my loving yet stoic mother.
But, back to the heart.
I sent my nephews and neices online images of similar items. Sharon said she would continue to look. She said she would also ask the other girls. My sister had three girls and four boys that she left behind way too early. She also said that there was a story that went with that heart, if the one I was looking for was one that she remembered. I didn’t remember any such story.
Not long after, another of Kristi’s three daughters, Shauna, sent a message with a photo of the heart. “Is this the one you’ve been looking for, Auntie?” she wrote. I couldn’t believe my eyes.
There it was! She explained that her mother had given it to her, before she passed away, to wear at her wedding. Sarah, one of the three daughters, now had it to wear at her upcoming wedding.
She went on to explain the story behind the heart, a story I had never heard: It was a gift from Mom’s first love. If that’s true, why hadn’t I heard it?
I should have been happy just to know that it was still in the family… but. I wasn’t. I was hurt, confused, and frustrated. When did Mom give that to Kristi? Not known to lie nor even to be secretive, could Kristi and Mom have kept this gift giving a secret? When did this even take place?
I couldn’t be upset with the girls, and of what use is it now for me to be angry with Mom and Kristi, now that they passed on years ago. I decided to sit with the feeling. I couldn’t shake it anyway.
Now, after a couple of weeks, I guess I’m happy that the heart is in safe and loving hands. Somethings I’ll never know, like when or why Mom decided to give the heart to Kristi. We were and are a close and loving family. I know also that Mom and Kristi hadn’t between them, an ounce of secretive intent.
Each of the girls wore the necklace at their wedding, and if I had it, it would have been enjoyed and cherished by only me.
“I beg you to have patience with everything unresolved in your heart and to try to love the questions themselves as if they were locked rooms or books written in a very foreign language. Don’t search for the answers, which could not be given to you now, because you would not be able to live them. And the point is to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps then, someday far in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answer.”
–Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet (1929)
This inevitably happens with Yum Yum and me. There was a march of heavy rain storms today with a few cloud breaks. Yum Yum and I dressed in our raincoats and went out to walk, of necessity.
After half a block, the clouds opened and drenched us while Yum took her time carefully, sniffing out a perfect spot to relieve herself. By the time we were back in the house, we were sopping wet.
I had decided to fry some cod for an early dinner. I prepped the fish and decided to make a beer batter. These days,opening cans or bottles is best left to Han or Nori, but the fish I wanted wouldn’t wait.
I held the bottle of IPA in my right hand, as tightly as I could, while I tried to pry off the cap with my left. The cap popped off surprisingly. I could easily predict what happened next…. my hand holding the beer, uncontrollably lurched to the right spilling the beer onto the counter, into the tray holding the toaster and coffee pot, then spreading a river onto the floor.
Fortunately, there was just enough beer to make the batter… but that’s not all. While reaching for a large bottle of oil in which to fry the fish, I misjudged the height in which to clear other objects in front of the bottle. It squarely hit the pour over cone, holding this mornings coffee grounds. Not quite dry, the grounds spilled out onto the counter, then bounced down onto the floor, spreading grounds here and there and everywhere.
By this time, I felt hot and sweaty and had lost my appetite for the fish. I cooked it anyway, but it held little charm. I ate a few pieces and now only want to clear the dishes and go to bed. Maybe that’s the safest place for me.
I’ve been wanting to make the Balvoniee Bonnet by Corinne Tomlinson for a long time. Corrinne says that her inspiration for this hat was Balvonie of Inshes in Inverness, Scotland, where she grew up and spent long school breaks there with her family. The bonnet is “traditional Scottish woolen brimless cap; a bunnet (Sir Walter Scott).”
I ordered the kit from Wooley Thistle this winter. The yarn is by Jamieson and Smith, a 100% Shetland wool from the Shetland Islands. But I’ve been stuck in a place of no motivation for knitting except to finish a pair of socks for Hannah. The socks are out of Arne and Carlos Schachenmeyr sock yarn. They were supposed to be done for Christmas. Then they were supposed to be done in February for her birthday. But I just finished them this past weekend. So now I’ve got time to do the bonnet.
Also, if you look closely, you can see the Cascade 220 yarn in lipstick red in the background. That is going to be a striped sweater with bright pink and this red for Hannah. I’ll post more about that as I get into it. The pattern is called the Compliment Sweater. Hannah has asked me to make her something out of yarns that were not my favorite but turned out to be my favorite in the end after completing the project. I think this will be the same. Lots of summer knitting to do.
I could almost feel the warm midwest winter sunshine on your hair.
Your hair is the colors of burnished bronze, copper, and gold. Some strands are thick and lustrous as if made of spun silver.
Unruly, some with a mind of their own are spiraling away from the rest, up into the air with a strong sense of whimsy in defiance of gravity.
Flecks of dust are flying around your head in a ray of sun, animated by the air, stirred by the swish of wool and cotton.
Beautiful visuals punctuated by laughter.
I loved it all on this cold, wet, dark day in Portland on the west coast.
Wordsmith: Enora Hall
I watch a lot of knitting podcasts because I’m a knitter. I love some, and some I don’t love. The Fat Squittel falls into the former… in my list of top five, she’s hard to beat.
She’s intelligent, well-read, informed, and always filled with abundant humor. There’s beauty that isn’t unfounded in other podcasts, but there’s something rare in the presentation… in the filming, in her talent as a textile artist.
Once, I thought I was writing to her to tell her of my appreciation, but sent it unknowingly to some random poster writing about Mary Todd Lincoln. Thankfully, someone commented on my comment, and the lost poem was found. Here you have it.
Dad wore large metal cleats on his expensive brown leather Florsheim brogues. These shoes were weekly tended to until they were softly polished to a warm, soft sheen. Even without the cleats, they were heavy. I can still remember the smell of shoe polish and the soft cloth and brushes in Dad’s kit.
Wingtip leather dress shoes
Every day, after he was done with work, we could hear him coming home from the bus stop around the block before we could see him. The large cresent shaped cleats on the heels of his shoes rang out on the concrete sidewalk. We ran to meet him as he rounded the corner of our street.
Cleats
It was a comforting sound that we waited for, even though Mom warned that he would soon arrive and we were to put our toys away and clean up our projects and to clear the walkway of bicycles, scooters, pogo sticks and such.
Mom was usually cooking dinner at this time of day, so she had food ready for him, knowing that he would be tired and worn after a long day. Us kids were to make way for him, so it was a peaceful and relaxing place for him to unwind.
As soon as he removed his shoes, he would put his shoe trees inside to stretch and maintain the elegant shape of these expertly designed and sewn shoes. The cleats were not only music to our ears, they were practical.
Shoe tree
The cleats prevented the heels from being worn down. When the cleats themselves wore down, the edges were thin and sharp as knife blades. New ones were applied by the neighborhood shoe repairman.
Shoes in those days that had worn out heels and soles were not disposed of but were repaired. My great Uncle Curt had a shoe repair shop where every morning he opened the door knowing that customers would be coming to drop off or pick up shoes. That was when shoes weren’t disposable.
Uncle Curt’s shop smelled of tanned leather and shoe polish. Behind the counter stood a huge black sewing machine and a workbench with neatly arranged hammers and cutters and other tools of his trade and bins of nails and threads and cords of all types and cleats, of course.
The shelves lining the walls were filled with every type of shoe from heavy work boots and workshoes to dainty women’s high heels. He also repaired purses, belts, suspenders, and anything needing his handiwork. There were also a couple of chairs for customers to wait if they just needed a quick fix, like having to replace worn-out cleats.
Dad took care of what was important to him. I remember the smells of banana from the oil when he cleaned his guns and how his tackle box smelled when he cleaned, rearranged and prepared the hooks, the flies, the bobbers, the sinkers and spools of fishing line… and little jars of florescent fish eggs.
When Dad brought out his shoes, guns, tackle boxes, and other stuff to clean and care for, it wasn’t in the basement, not in the garage and not even in the kitchen. It was in the living room where he was in the middle of his family, in the midst of the most important things in his life… in his heart, where he tinkered.
We loved to watch him and ask him this and that while he taught us the value of our belongings and the importance of what we had. But mostly, he taught us to love family. And we do.
I wish I could hear him coming down the street today. He left us way too young. He was only 52 years old when he passed away. But he left an indelible mark on us all. I insisted on wearing taps/cleats on my shoes, too, just like Dad. I wanted to be just like Dad… I hope I am.
I wake up with a start when a gunshot explodes next to my left ear. I check to see if someone is in my room, but when I see no one, I worry that somebody is in the house and perhaps shot my daughter. It takes just a few minutes before I realize that it really wasn’t a gun. But where did the sound come from?
A bomb goes off in my room, apparently on top of my bed. I’m startled, and fortunately, the sound was just in my head. The shock was such that I find it hard to go back to sleep. My body reacts as though it was real.
As I duck under a large branch of an old oak tree, I bump my head hard on the huge branch. A loud thudding sound is emitted like my head might have burst open. I reached to touch my head to make sure I’m in one piece.
Somebody slaps me across the face with a loud slapping sound. I involuntarily jerk my face away, and I’m suddenly awake but feeling no sting from the hand that hit me.
I’m falling, and I’m falling hard, and I roll on the ground. My real body reaction wakes me with a shock as I keep myself from falling off the bed!
This is real.
In the beginning, before I knew what was happening to me, I was afraid I was having a stroke or was something bursting in my brain? Or was something even more serious happening? Was I dying? Was I going crazy?
Before I panicked, I decided to do some research and look up my symptoms on the internet. This was as easy as ABC or 123.
You can’t imagine my relief whenI found that this was Exploding HeadSyndrome and that it was not attached to any serious illnesses. However, it is a sleep disorder. It is not painful. This condition might last only for one incident or a few times or longer-term, but it comes and goes of its own volition. There really is no treatment or cure.
It is startling and disconcerting. The loud noises seem as real as real can be. Real gunfire or bombs going off is frightening enough. But having it happen right in your bed and in your head is very unpleasant. But that’s as bad as it gets.
I’ve attached a link that has more information if you’re interested in more details or maybe you have this syndrome yourself. I hope this doesn’t happen to you. But if it does not to worry, you’re fine..
There are a plethora of songs and poetry and of stories written about heartbreak. I have had my share, but there are some that still break my heart that are still etched in my memory.
These words hurt so badly because I knew at the time that they were true.
These pierced my heart, and I thought I might die. If you know, if you’ve loved like I’ve loved, you know how bad it feels to lose someone.
As we lay beside one another, he said softly…
“I don’t love you anymore. I know how much you love me. I love her like you love me.”
Why did he have to say those words? It would have been easier if he had just left. It would have been easier not to have heard them.
Some words we can never forget.
Why did these words come to me today? Like any kind of grief, it washes over you like the waves of the sea, and you have no control over your heart and how they make you feel. It was a song that brought them back.
eyeamdust 