The quilt of life
I do believe only in few things, and serendipity is one of them. The moment you aimlessly wonder through the library isles and a book catches your eye, without a thought you open it and there, on the page you discover the sought after answer to question burning in your mind. I believe in that kind of serendipity.
When aimlessly wondering through the virtual library at my fingertips I came across a quilt by Penny Schine Gold.
I have never met this lady, but in an instant I felt connected to her. She lost her son in a car accident just before he left for college.
In the healing years that followed she returned to quilting and made some amazing pieces telling the story of her loss.
If you google the quilt pictured above you might also find a photo taken at a quilting fare…
You can see people walking by, some stopping and staring at the writing. You see people’s expressions. I now recognize those looks, the sudden, terrified, embarrassed , struggling to be a nice person, but at the same time to somehow escape this unpleasant situation, look on their faces. You only get those when your child dies or your loved one commits a suicide.
I love Penny’s guts for bringing this piece out there.
It’s so simple, just bold, sharp edged letters sewn onto a fabric. But that’s what loosing your child is. It’s that simple, no frills, one moment you have your child and the next day her bedroom is empty. The clarity of the letters is the pain of loosing her, it cuts through your heart and brain with relentless repetition. Some days you feel that the razor blade might be getting a tiny bit dull, but then Monday morning comes and you realize that Reality had broken into your house again and spent a whole night sharpening it yet again.
Your whole life gets covered by this layer of fabric, all colours disappear and life becomes temporarily just black and white.
But I can’t live without colour. And I can’t live without sewing either.
I’m not an experienced quilter by any means, but I I’m finding the almost mind numbing repetitiveness of piecing bits of fabric together soothing. Quilting so accurately mimics my life now.
You take little scraps, carefully or just randomly lay them next to each other until they make what quilters call “the block”. Which is really just a square or rectangle that can be easily attached to another block. Then you sew it all together and hope the finished piece doesn’t make you barf :).
I take little bits that I find each day, put them together and hope for the best. So far I have a pile of bits, mostly.
I started on some blocks, like the house renovation one and I’m very happy to see this block emerging.
With other blocks it’s still only pile of random pieces. I don’t have the mental strength to sort through them just yet, I’m too attached to these piles, I’m still in the hoarder’s state of mind.
I’m waiting for the day when my heart and mind can agree and I can sort through my piles of mementos and can truly evaluate them. I know my quilt will have some bits that are not pretty, some will be pure mistakes, but that makes the quilt authentic. And if you are into the “everything is perfect in my life” feel free to use photoshop, because it only alters your image, the original is still the same, not so perfect.