I was a confident perfectly happy adult meandering through my occupational hazardous day. There were so many things I wanted to do, meant to do, hoped to do, and planned to do, that it was just a matter of choosing what would occupy my time at the moment.
Kids were out of the house, money of my own to spend with no guilt in what ever way I wanted to spend it and enough interests, that there were plenty of choices. I like to be alone, I crave to be alone but I confess, I was discovering that aloneness wasn't quite what I had thought it was when there were so many to do for, for so long.
My empty nest was full of genealogy work and fabric piled, folded, organized, and just crammed all around me to create with. I had reached the point where patterns were secondary at best, I felt able to start putting fabric on the board and seeing where it took me. Oh, yes, early stages of that, but fun, interesting and variable.
Our little firestorm changed that. I "said" I wasn't going to sew. My friend and right arm, Betsy the 830 Bernina that had traveled the road with me so many years had given up and had to be replaced with a Phaff, anniversary expression model. It had taken some months of getting used to her and we were just starting to move with comfort and amity when now she too was gone. No name yet and now no future. Thousands and thousands of fabriholic collection fabric gone up in smoke, a few barely bought and hadn't even been near a design wall, and most of it unremembered shards of creative impulse, smoked to nonexistance.
But it was a void world out there. I had a few Buckeye chickens left to look at that had somehow survived the smoke as the spit and crackling fire moved through their world and left only 1/3 of them behind, homeless and shaken. But it was less than a week later that I found myself wanting a sewing machine beneath my hands and when I ran across a gift certificate from a daughter in my purse given me for my 68th birthday, well, I couldn't waste that.
I had decided to see if my daughter (in-law) would loan me her sewing machine, and then I talked to a sewing friend about it. The next thing I knew, I was going out of her house with a New Home machine, and a load of tools and necessities, and some not so necessary stuff bundled into the trunk of Bessie, my little red 4 runner.
When my husband saw the machine, he demanded that I hem three new pair of jeans for him. That took a long time. Is there anything more frustrating, exasperating and sewtime killing then hemming jeans for someone?
In the meantime, I pulled out three borrowed quilt books and started planning a mindless, meandering quilt project. Something simple, and just casual sewing was what was needed. Oh, "The Road Home Block", that looks and sounds perfect.
Somewhere along the way, the Road Home was needing more variety so it is being enlarged to contain other blocks that fit into a square in a square pattern. There are pages of notes of how many blocks of what, and color planning of the triangles that will fit it together into a cohesive eclectic collection. How did that happen? Where does the mind come up with this stuff? When did it just take off and start running on its on? This is crazy! Who is in charge here?
My little 2 x 3' space allotted to my "sewing" is creeping, oozing out from its designated tiny corner of this single wide trailer we are renting. I think a monster is growing over in that corner of the kitchen that will just take over if I am not careful!
Meanwhile up on the hill, a block away, our "Home' has been cleared away. Trees have been chopped down and brush hauled away, rubble removed and ashes dug and carried out.
On our dining table, there is a drawing in progress of "the house" to be and on the hill, there is a foundation poured and stem wall forms ready to be poured tomorrow.
I have always designed houses, and wanted to build "my own". That won't happen. This house is not a creation that I 'wanted' to design, no architectural masterpiece from my free spirit, but instead an extension of need. No, I didn't want a prebuilt home. No, I didn't want anyone else to design it. But it had to be done and done quickly. One of my children said its different than our Home, but kind of laid out in much the same pattern.
The first thing I discovered is we can't live in a small tiny bit of space. What are you to do? Your kids can sleep elsewhere when they come home, but you need space to eat and drink in,and thats the real heart of home. So- well, its going to be interesting. I hope it gets built. I hope the funds arrive when necessary. I hope, it goes well. It looks sure and steady on the lot, and bigger than our old house. It isn't is it? Bigger I mean?
We worked out a two bedroom house with an office for Dear Husband, a bedroom, studio and laundry for my daughter in her own upstairs suite. ( interestingly enough, she didn't want her own kitchen??)
And I get what dear husband calls "mom's great room" a combination of mud room for barn chores and gardening, laundry room for maintenance and a space for computer, designwall and sewing machine and a LITTLE fabric. Since there was space under the roof structure for it, we threw in two guest bedrooms. My mind is already venturing into the future yard, trying to decide on trees and shrubs, bird shelter and so on.
I guess there is still life in the minds eye anyway.
So am I changed? Or just alittle bruised and rising from the ashes of the storm?
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