PRESERVING THE WORK OF OUR HANDS

On a previous post, Leah commented about her mother’s attitude toward her handwork. Leah subsequently sent me pictures which I’ve posted here together with her original comments.

“I think my mother enjoyed telling others how long it took her to do a certain piece (by hand). She did an huge owl embroidery for the wall 30 years ago as my Christmas gift. This work took a very long time, she reminded me, and also bragged that the design was done with one thread thickness. It was excellent work and I know made with love.

“When I moved to L.A., 30 years ago this month in fact, I had a HUGE disagreement with the moving company. They raised their original prices and I couldn't pay the bill. All my worldly goods (furniture, family photos, china, etc) sat in their warehouse for many weeks. It looked like I might lose it all. Finally after contacting a consumer advocate with a national TV show, the bad moving co. settled with me for the original price. Nothing strikes fear into a big business more than nationwide publicity for fleecing poor defenseless women. What did my mother say? She was afraid I'd lose the owl embroidery that she's just spent months working on. Not the family photos, all my furniture, anything else. Just her owl embroidery.”

I can certainly relate because as my mother got older, she also became more possessive of her work and particular about how it was used. She made each one of her children and grandchildren an afghan – except for Hallie, the youngest. Mother failed before making Hallie’s afghan so she received one that Mother had made for herself. But when Mother visited in my home, she would make comments about how the afghan she made me was treated. She didn’t want it to be used.

I began to think about that even before Mother left us. Those things that we use, we risk using up. They wear out or get broken or perhaps are lost in other ways. If we don’t use them, they have no meaning to us and are lost to us through dis-use.  And those things that we do for others through our pass-times – well, aren’t we motivated by our love of the activity as much as by the love of the recipient?

When I worked at the museum, we talked about preserving photos and documents in archival quality boxes, sleeves, etc. So, when I asked a local artist to frame Hallie's embroidery and requested an acid-free mat, she said, "It will last your lifetime and your daughter's. What more did you want?" Food for thought.

 

At a Christmas gathering last month, I was amused when the man next to me began to talk about all the stuff in storage since he moved -- stuff he doesn't miss. He mentioned in particular a box of afghans. "Can we get rid of those?" he asked his wife, to which she replied in the negative, recounting how they were made for her by special people. He went on to say that they keep their house at 70 year-round and he doesn't anticipate ever having a need for those afghans.

Well, I love afghans and I will keep making them, but it brings me up short when I visit consignment and thrift stores and see all those handmade afghans for sale.  KW