Not Mending or Repairing But Recreating

Not mending or repairing but recreating

When your favorite shirt gets full of holes what can you do? Deal with the heart break you simply let go. Throw it into the basket over your shoulder so you do not have to see it hit the trash pile. Although most of us would love to say that we instantly do this and can still be happy. More than likely, you would hang it up in your closet and reach for it the next time forgetting the holes and get heartbroken all over again placing it back in the darkness. Still, you do that over and over again. Why?

Ugly and stupid. Those where my names as long as I could remember given to me by neighbors and classmates and even my brothers. Ugly because I never dressed in any real fashion, ugly because I am sick. Stupid because I have a speech impairment and dyslexia, and no one is willing to teach me sign language. Communication almost impossible. So, what do these names mean to me?

I want to be able to say, nothing. I want to be the heroin of my own story saying I brushed it off and lived my life being me. I want to, but I cannot. For to say such would be to lie.

So, what did I do when I was persecuted because I chose to be friends with the black girl in a raciest city, or friends with a girl with only half an arm or for my religion? What did I do when I was alone in the world that tried to make me believe that I did not belong and was the reason for every bad thing in it? For those where the lies I heard every single day. I although I moved almost every year, I never moved far enough from the world to escape the pain of the persecution and the bullies and the lies that had already become part of me. At least part of what I believed of myself.

So, like an old shirt hung in the closest full of holes, I believed my only value was to stay hidden and hopefully forgotten. I was wroth enough to keep around, worth enough for those that I stood up to the bullies for, worth enough to those who wanted me.

What I did not see was unlike a shirt just hung in the dark I was not forgotten or discarded I was of great worth not just enough. I felt like I was full of holes and thus could not be worth being seen but such was not the truth. For the truth is and was I was always being shown by my family.

I hid behind a mask I made. A mask not of cotton or silk, not one anyone knew was there. My mask was of the lies, the fronts, pretending and trying to disappear.

I believed that because I was full of holes, I couldn’t be worth anything so I couldn’t be good at anything anyone could see or hear.

One day that all started to change. One day my mask came off. Everyday I fight to not put it back on.

What made this change possible? Honestly a lot comes from my religion but mostly it started when my grandmother saw me as the jewel in her closet rather then the discarded article and want not the world alone to see it but for me to see it. She did this by teaching me a skill. A skill she had always loved.

See my grandmother has been embroidering since she was 8 years old. I mean really since than. Unlike most crafts people pick up for a time and then move on or make it a career she made it her soul. She has actively been embroidering since the first day she learned how. Although she knows many crafts this is her favorite and she saw me worth learning it. None of my 19 cousins know how. She never taught them. She taught me.

She has been making gifts since the first time that she learned. Always a new project. I am one of the youngest of my cousins and for everyone of the 15 that are married she made 7 t- towels, one fore each day of the week, all embroidered and all beautiful. She also makes them quilts that are also embroidered.

A hand crafted present from an old lady who never stops giving love.

She sat me down before thanksgiving one year when unknown to the rest of my family my depression was really bad. Yet they thought all was well because I sat with a smile painted on my face. If my grandmother saw through it or not I don’t know. Yet her love was never masked. So now I do the same thing as her.

I hardly ever get to see her so in a way this is how I can connect with her and make her proud. For each of my friends weddings I make them a personalized towel. For one it was leaves, another a dragon’s eye, and another a koala bear. Each a hand made gift that they actually like and use. One that takes me time and shows my love far better than any other gift I could give.

Now here is the difference between my grandmother and myself. I will do this anywhere anytime. I do not wait till I am alone I have so many projects that no one ever knows when I am working on something for them. My grandmother will wait till they don’t know she is doing anything at all. She also always uses a pattern. I don’t have that kind of patience to find the perfect match.

No, I draw on the fabric what I want to make, thread the needle, cut the thread and tie a knot. Stich after stich is comes to life, on the bus, on the grass in the sun, on the basement floor, or in a tent, around a camp fire. I never have a problem working on it except in the bathroom. So as I go to school and work it lays in my bag waiting for the second I have a minute to spear. Then out it comes as once again it comes to life.

This is the cycle and this is its life as it gives me mine. I may do many crafts but embroidery I get to use with all of them. If I crochet a stuffed animal I embroider on the eyes. If I sew a dress I can embellish it with embroidery. I use my calligraphy in my embroidery. Although it would be easy to sell and make money with this, as many have asked, I rather it be part of my soul and not just something I do. My life I have given to service and when you are too sick to lift your head the ways you can serve are greatly limited. So, I lay in bed embroidery in hand getting it ready to live with a friend as they get married and start their new life, they bring me along.

No longer a shirt full of holes, like my shirt the embroidery does not simply cover the holes but gives it all a whole new life. This is who I am, not what I do. It does not make me happy; I make it worth it by choosing to be happy as I do it. This is how it gives me life. For it makes life worth living.

This is not how I was mended but how I was recreated into something new and better.