In your life, the people become like a patchwork quilt. Some leave with you a piece that is bigger than you wanted and others smaller than you thought you needed. Some are that annoying itchy square in the corner, and others that piece of worn flannel. You leave pieces with some and they leave their pieces with you. All the while each and every square makes up a part of what is you. Be okay with the squares people leave you. For life is too short to expect from people what they do not have to give, or were not called to give you.
She sat still, I thought, and yet she traveled. And when one stitches, the mind travels, not the way men do, with ax and oxen through the wilderness, but surely our traveling counted too, as motion. And I thought of the patience of the stitches. Writing a book, I thought, which men often do, but women only rarely, has the posture of sewing. One hand leads, and the other hand helps. And books, like quilts, are made, one word at a time, one stitch at a time.
It tugs at me, filling me with the kind of seasick nostalgia that can hit you in the gut when you find an old concert ticket in your purse or an old coin machine ring you got down at the boardwalk on a day when you went searching for mermaids in the surf with your best friend.That punch of nostalgia hits me now and I start to sink down on the sky-coloured quilt, feeling the nubby fabric under my fingers, familiar as the topography of my hand.
A plain, brown paper-wrapped package came in the mail recently. Upon opening it, I saw that it was a patchwork quilt about four feet by five feet. Many little scraps of cloth, carefully joined by loving hands. Two squares have suggestions of a black cassock and Roman white collar. The maker of the quilt states, “In its variety, I feel it denotes confusion and the world “mixed” up. There are dark spots for the dark times and bright squares, so, hopefully, some good and brightness will come in the future. The other pieces of cloth were of happy times, mothers and children, peaceful settings, happy things.” A note inside stated that she felt we were “scraps,”—the “scraps” that the abusive priests treated us like. They would use us as a scrap is used and then simply toss us aside. I was moved to tears. Holding it in my hands, I could almost feel others' pain and suffering, as I touched each panel. It is a magnificent work, worthy of a prize. I was deeply humbled by the receipt of the quilt. This woman got it; she really got it. This woman got it; she really got it. She has a deeper understanding of what we have gone through. It is rare.