The Blanket Grandma Stitched, 28 Years Later

It was 1990.  The Trucker and I were newly returned from our voluntary service assignments, and looking toward the future.  I was not yet the Passenger.

The Trucker was again headed west on regular runs to the coast.  I headed west every morning, a fifteen minute drive to the local insurance office.

On a weekend home, the Trucker expressed interest in another blanket for his bunk.  I had minimal experience with this, but a desire to learn.  And I had Grandma, who with her scissors, sewing machine, and quilt frames, had thousands of quilts and comforters to her credit.

A romantic scenario formed in my thoughts.  Grandma and I shopping for fabric, me choosing just the right colors to match the truck and bunk, she advising on the type and amount.  Then, me doing the cutting, stitching, and knotting under her watchful eye.  A chat with Grandma assured her willingness to participate in the project.

But alas, the romantic scenario escaped her.  Or I didn't explain it clearly.  Grandma's practical nature kicked in immediately.  Next morning when I stopped by to plan the anticipated shopping trip, quilt frames were set up in her "long room."  A flannel comforter was pinned into the frames, half already knotted and rolled at the ends.  Grandma was busily stitching and knotting.  Cheerfully, she announced that by the time I was home from work that evening, she would have it out of the frame, bound, and ready to head west.  And no, I wasn't to pay for any of it!

Oh.

My dreams took an abrupt left turn.  The shopping trip plans collapsed, along with the intention of doing the comforter myself, under Grandma's guidance.  

Always having plenty of fabric on hand, Grandma had pieced her gift of black plaid flannel backing, with alternating squares of black and bright red for the front.  She completed the project by binding the whole thing with maroon strips.

The stitching was beautifully and rapidly accomplished.  The fabric, warm and cozy.  The colors,  all wrong for the truck's interior and for each other, to my way of thinking.

The selfless, loving heart and careworn hands that produced this gift, without compare.

How could I refuse such a gift?  I couldn't.  Swallowing disappointment, I manufactured a smile, and thanked Grandma.  And I was grateful, really.  How could I be otherwise?  

And when the Trucker came to visit, the colors didn't seem to matter, nor whose hands did the stitching.  What mattered was his surprise of having his blanket done so quickly, and how perfectly it fit the bunk.  And how warmly it sheltered him through cold nights on the high plains and mountains.

Twenty-eight years have passed.  That comforter has kept the Trucker warm through nearly three million miles of travel.  The fabric is thin.  The seams are ripping out.  The watting bunched and disintegrating.  Though repaired and redone several times, it's the end of the trail for Grandma's gift.

A new blanket is in progress, this fabric chosen by the Trucker.  Though sewn on my newer machine, the patches were cut by Grandma's old scissors.  Who knows?  They may well have snipped through three million patches in their time.  

Grandma's skill and speed are not mine.  I cannot even lay claim to the depth of love she shared so freely....yet.  In time, but not quite yet.

Still Growing after 27 Years

For my first post-marriage birthday, my new mother-in-law gifted me with a lovely green planter.  She didn't always do gifts, her style was more random.  No less appreciated, though!


Similar to this, but smaller.  Six different plants, I believe, though their names are unknown to me.  Amazingly, they lived, in spite of the fact that my thumb is not very green.  As they grew, they were separated into individual pots.  Through the years, though, most died off.

A few remain.

The tall plant has grown to reach our eight feet high ceiling at least twice, been cut back, and regrown.  More stalks have been added by replanting a section of stem, which then sprouted from each end.  A suggestion from my mother, not that it would have occurred to me to do this.

The vine skirting this pot has received numerous haircuts through the years, and cuttings have filled many other pots, as well as a daughter vine that grew round three walls of our then approximately twelve feet square kitchen.

And this plant.

More slow growing.  It traveled to various rooms of the house over the years, staying strongly upright when the source of natural light was just above.  Putting it outdoors in summer caused it to become limp and lazy.

Rather like our spiritual lives.  When the source of strength is above, and almost-but-not-quite out of reach, we are strengthened by the act of straining toward the life giving Light.  When life is easy, we relax, become apathetic.

There was the time when a conflict between siblings raged; the reason thereof has long since been forgotten.  It concluded when a substantial junior-high-age posterior landed squarely upon the greenery, bending it sharply eastward.  Amazingly, the stems gradually rebounded, stretching again toward sunlight.

However, this plant was outgrowing every space allotted.  And after twenty-seven years, no amount of feeding and lighting and repotting solved the problem of yellowing, dropping leaves on the underside.  And the "stemmy" look.

So, a pruning was in order.  A drastic one.  

Will it sprout again?  Re-grow?  Hopefully so, larger and bushier than before.  We will wait.

Will our hearts re-grow, after the drastic pruning of two years ago?  Hopefully so, larger and bushier than before.  By the grace of God, we will wait.

House Cleaning that Last Room

Quotes from an old movie, recently revisited:

It's not like ---- was the only one around here you ran out on.

You can have roots and wings.

For the Trucker, short run to Wisconsin this week.  All preparations made, but the need of a friend kept his Passenger at home.  Again.  Will it always be so?  Which is God's plan for my life, serving at home, or accompanying on the road?

A few days later, serving completed, a commitment fulfilled.  The joy of caring, an experience to treasure.  Now to the neglected housework.  This museum of memories in which we live.    General cleaning and maintenance easier to avoid, than to accomplish, because of the need to face attending memories.

One room remains to thoroughly clean.

Since you left.

The big basement room, we called it, to distinguish between it and the bedroom section. Where family and friends gathered.  The place of worn sofas, cozy blankets and pillows, movies, books, games, and a welcoming pellet stove.  Empty now, and cold.  Even the echoes have gone.

It's not like ---- was the only one around here you ran out on.

No, it was more than your parents.  Your brothers.  The one who wished to share your life.  Grandparents, cousins.  Church family, friends.

Time doesn't erase the pain.  Doesn't even dull it.  Not for any of us.

Time does reduce the ability to express the pain.

Stifled, it gnaws slowly into our hearts, like rust.  No amount of sanding, or cutting, or painting over, stops the cancerous spread.

But, once again, memories must be faced.  

The grease spots on the carpet from oiling tack.

The scratches below the pegs on the wall from the snaps of your barn coat and coveralls.

The scuffs near the baseboard from the bin that held your work boots and old sneakers.

The corner where you dumped your saddles.

The scrapes on the far side of the stove, from the swivel rocker where you sat to toast your feet on cold winter evenings.

None of these can I bear to treat, to paint over, to buff out.

I think, is there still some place here, some small unseen place, where you touched, where your hand or finger print still lingers?  And might I unknowingly wipe it away with my cleaning rag?

If I could see, if I could know, I'd never, never wipe it off.  I'd set a guard around it, mark the spot, allow no one or no thing to take that last touch of you from this house, a touch that I could claim as mine.

But time marches on, requiring me to clean and tidy this room, at last.  Dust settles.  Spiders climb and spin, beetles scramble, bugs curl up and expire.  They have no respect for grief.  

And the children come to play.  They have long since stopped asking for you.  But I see their furtive glances at the photos on the wall.  At the closed door leading to the bedroom that used to be yours.  The room that held those intriguing books about horses, the delightful stuffed animals, and the "pretties."  All are gone now.  The room is occupied again, by a masculine lifestyle. Just your shelf bolted to the wall remains, now hung with hats instead of necklaces.

You can have roots and wings....it is possible.  But instead of being permitted to do so, you became a puppet, a pawn.  And your parents were robbed of the joy of opening their hands and gently launching you into a life outside these walls.  Instead, in fearful secrecy, obligated to those whose demands robbed you of serenity and security, you vanished.  Thrust into a life for which you were not prepared, for which there was no safety net.  Forced to wall off your heart, to survive.

How long can you fly alone, before finding a place to rest body, mind, and spirit?  How long can you live, without the nourishment that comes from your roots?

This is What It Is Like