I have been doing book reviews lately that are quilt themed. The fact that they are brought back some old memories. You see, I have always thought I wanted to quilt....that is until my mother-in-law's quilting group tried to teach me. I was very much pregnant with my youngest daughter and the ladies were making a quilt for me. I wanted to help so they invited me to the basement, gave me a needle and thread, and let me go. Wrong move! After I had quilted about six squares the ladies said they were hungry and wanted to know if I would go upstairs and fix them a snack. I was thrilled to go. When I finished the snack and headed back down the stairs I heard the ladies say, "Come on Odel we have got to get her away from the quilt. She is terrible. I have seen men sew better than she does." I sat down at the top of the stairs and cried." I heard them wondering aloud what was taking me so long, so I got up, washed my face, and headed down the stairs. After lunch, when the quilting began again I acted like my back was bothering me and the ladies seemed ok with my response. I went on to do smocking, French hand sewing, candlewicking, needlepoint, cross-stitch....but never quilting. My grandmother Sasser was amazing with a needle and thread and could quilt anything. My aunt Shirley was an amazing quilter. The sad thing is that none of the younger ones seemed to have the desire to do these old arts. One day they will be extinct and that will be so sad. When I look at my quilts they tell me stories, stories about life, stories about family, stories about love. Maybe one day when I retire I will finally sit down long enough to pick up a needle, thread, and some scraps and start quilting my story. Funny.....as I write this post I am humming a familiar tune from Carole King's Tapestry album.
"My life has been a tapestry of rich and royal hue
An everlasting vision of the ever-changing view
A wondrous, woven magic in bits of blue and gold
A tapestry to feel and see, impossible to hold
Once amid the soft silver sadness in the sky
There came a man of fortune, a drifter passing by
He wore a torn and tattered cloth around his leathered hide
And a coat of many colors, yellow-green on either side
He moved with some uncertainty, as if he didn't know
Just what he was there for, or where he ought to go
Once he reached for something golden hanging from a tree
And his hand came down empty
Soon within my tapestry along the rutted road
He sat down on a river rock and turned into a toad
It seemed that he had fallen into someone's wicked spell
And I wept to see him suffer, though I didn't know him well
As I watched in sorrow, there suddenly appeared
A figure gray and ghostly beneath a flowing beard
In times of deepest darkness, I've seen him dressed in black
Now my tapestry's unraveling - he's come to take me back
He's come to take me back"
An everlasting vision of the ever-changing view
A wondrous, woven magic in bits of blue and gold
A tapestry to feel and see, impossible to hold
Once amid the soft silver sadness in the sky
There came a man of fortune, a drifter passing by
He wore a torn and tattered cloth around his leathered hide
And a coat of many colors, yellow-green on either side
He moved with some uncertainty, as if he didn't know
Just what he was there for, or where he ought to go
Once he reached for something golden hanging from a tree
And his hand came down empty
Soon within my tapestry along the rutted road
He sat down on a river rock and turned into a toad
It seemed that he had fallen into someone's wicked spell
And I wept to see him suffer, though I didn't know him well
As I watched in sorrow, there suddenly appeared
A figure gray and ghostly beneath a flowing beard
In times of deepest darkness, I've seen him dressed in black
Now my tapestry's unraveling - he's come to take me back
He's come to take me back"
No comments:
Post a Comment