...Of Mice and Brides

“Plans are worthless but planning is everything.” –Dwight D. Eisenhower

 Greetings Dear Ones!

Here in the dark underbelly of mid-January, the thoughts of this shivering Seamster turn to ice, mice, and brides.  “Thou saw the fields laid bare an’ waste/ An’ weary Winter comin fast/ An’ cozie here, beneath the blast/ Thou thought to dwell…”

The recent storm was the perfect opportunity to dwell in Snowetry (snow + poetry):   Burns by the woodstove—while outside, the whole forest became its own Poem. Friday is the 260th birthday of Scottish poet Robert Burns and anyone with a drop of Scotch in his/her veins will be wearing “hodden grey” and dining on “hamely fare” of “neeps and tatties” and singing odes to mice and lice and prehistoric-style sausages made of all the mutton the Scots couldn’t sell to the English. This morning, according to Accuweather, it is -2F degrees with a “real feel” of -27 and a wind speed of 17 mph here in my enchanted Forest.  It’s the kind of cold that makes one’s nostril hairs clink if one sniffs quickly.  It’s the kind of cold that has all the Jack Russells piddling on the welcome mat outside the door because they will venture no further into “bleak winds ensuing, baith snell an’ keen” to do their business. (They care nothing for Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening either!) Our wee homestead is a vaguely familiar foreign planet I navigate shin deep in a white, granular substrate. My snow gear, like an astronaut’s suit, impedes any forward momentum as I bring the breakfast hay to the sheep and fresh water to the chickens. It is literally Breathtaking to feel my eyelashes freeze and my eyebrows go crispy as I pause to gaze at the fading morning stars, which seem like local chips of ice themselves, rather than heatless distant suns.

 In the warm bright shop, our “earth-born companions an’ fellow-mortals” come blasting through the front door, stamping their gritty feet, blowing on their reddened hands “wi’ bickerin brattle” and blurting dumb things like “Cold enough for ya?” Most folks seem to hate the cold and can’t believe how COLD it is. “I just can’t believe it is this Cold,” shudders one woman.  I can’t believe she can’t believe it.  “Were you here last year?” I want to know.  It’s Winter… In New England. This shit happens Every year.  And it’s MAGNIFICENT.  The intensity of all four seasons is why we live here! (It’s certainly not for the antics of our fellow motorists in heavy traffic, on macadam renditions of Swiss cheese.)

In the dressing room, the theme of “white and wild” continues.  We have two bridal fittings: First up is a  “wee, sleeket beastie”— standing on the platform in the dressing room.  She is beaming into the mirror and turning this way and that to see the contours of lace frothing about her like she is a dishwasher gently overflowing.  Her wedding is not until October but she is Ready.  Her eyes glitter with deep satisfaction.  “You are so Organized!” I say with admiration.  “Well,” says her mother, nonplussed, “She’s only been planning this since the fifth grade. She has been holding a spot at her favorite venue for the past two years, just in case her man proposed. You know how those prime venues are…” I nod because everyone else is nodding knowingly but secretly Prudence and I are Astonished that Franz, the head coordinator at Top-of-the-Hill-Posh-Weddings-R-Us-Estate knew her wedding would take place there before the groom knew he was going to be a groom!”

Later that afternoon, we have a vastly different fitting with another bride, with “O, what a panic’s in thy breastie!” who, by no stretch of the imagination seems to have been planning her nuptial celebrations since last week.  Who knows?  Maybe she just woke up on Monday and realized she had to get her act together by the weekend. She has been pulling all-nighters for several days. Her bridesmaids are with her.  They look irritated and exhausted.  She just got the gown and it needs quite a bit of work.  We’ve got less than a week to slap this thing together before it gets stuffed in a suitcase bound for a beach resort in the Carribean.

It amazes me that on the Same Day, we could entertain the opposite poles of the Bridal Planning Spectrum.  One girl is methodically ticking items off a long list of Everything She Ever Wanted, the other girl, the now-crazed slacker, is going to have to make mad dashes, split-second decisions, and surrender to the Best that Can Occur in the moment.  Both women will be beautifully dressed and equally married by the time all is said and done but one will have the blood-pressure of a New York stock trader and the other will have nothing to do but organize her future husband’s sock drawers.  No doubt, the friendships of all those in both wedding parties will be tested to the limits.

It makes me think about the clarity needed to manifest what we want—whether we know that years in advance or moments.  We need to ask for help.  We need to rely on our friends. We DO need plans. I can’t help thinking that astute couples will look at how they are getting through the wedding prep as a potential blueprint for how the rest of the marriage could go.  I imagine one couple systematically acquiring a mortgage, coordinating the arrival of their children around their vacation schedules, then saving for college and retirement…the other couple just winging it in a perpetual state of reactive astonishment as Life Choices come at them like asteroids in a video game.  In the Amusement park of Marriage, some couples choose to sit in the Tea cups and go gently round and round smiling; others ride the roller-coasters, holding hands, strapped in, screaming all the way.

You might think that I, or certainly Miss Prudence, might have some judgments around which one is doing it “Right.” (Prudence does not care as long as they all Get married and Stay married, with minimal fuss and as little karaoke as possible.) Truly, I have equal affection for each bride.  Each one is a strong, young woman doing her best, with certain presuppositions about how she manages her world or how her world manages her.  Things change.  If there is anything I have observed from my little sewing table in the corner, it’s that Life usually throws the Best Planners a curve ball or two and those who don’t plan at all lurch abruptly between disappointment at not getting what they think they want and suddenly having things work out for the best anyway.  Fate has a way of grinding the roughest edges off us all. But I’m not saying anything than an Ayrshire farmer turning over a mouse nest in the 18th century didn’t already say way better!

Despite all our anxiety and fretting, the truth is that none of us REALLY knows what is really happening until it happens.  We live for our goals, for our routines, for the constructs and structures we create for ourselves “Till crash! the cruel coulter past/ out thro’ thy cell.”  We all know “the best laid schemes o’ Mice an’ Men (and brides, and parents, and lovers, and seamstresses) gang aft agley,” but what is there to do but plan anyway?

On we slog, in “Winter’s sleety dribble, an’ cranreuch cauld!” and backward cast our eyes on prospects drear—while forward, though we “canna see,” we guess and fear!  So we plan, and insure those plans… and then, when plans fall through, there’s always Poetry! 

Be warm and well, my Darlings!  Button up and aye be cheerie! And do Good Work!

Yours aye,

Nancy

P.S. If you come visit me any time soon, please don’t wipe your feet on the Welcome mat!

All We Cannot Do

Since you cannot do good to all, you are to pay special attention to those who, by the accidents of time, or place, or circumstances, are brought into closer connection with you. --Saint Augustine 

Greetings Dear Ones!

 Winter finally has us in its teeth.  A raw wind whips and licks the corners of the house and icicles drool onto the walkways and steps.  My unpaved driveway is once more a frozen, rutted track for the daily Subaru Luge.  Thirsty animals gulp greedily as I break the ice out of their black rubber buckets and haul liquid water to the chickens and sheep twice a day.  They are remarkably cheery and stoic for creatures with no boots or socks.    

 At work, huddled by the radiator, I am instructed, by means of an attached scrap of paper, to mend the buttons on this coat.   I look over the coat: The collar is also frayed.  The lining inside is hanging in ribbons. The other buttons are limp and in need of a little button Viagra… I sigh. I am tempted to fix everything.  This decrepit woolen puddle of a coat needs an overhaul.  But I am only getting paid to fix what is on the label that has come from the cleaners.  The customers protest mightily when we fix things they do not wish to pay for… It’s sad to say, but thinking about what is best for the garment is often bound to enrage the customer and lose us money in the end.  So I fix the buttons and hang the rest of the mess on the “Done” rack.  It kills me to do this—to walk away from what would be easy to fix if I could just indulge in the impulse to make everything right with that coat.  It’s as hard to walk away from as a dog that needs a good brushing, or a mewling cat that needs feeding.  Without permission, I can do nothing and too many other items await my needling.

 Lady Mothball has arrived with ten pairs of out-of-date summer-weight trousers she wants tailored.  She needs them in a week, she says, when she will return to Florida with the rest of her acrid-scented wardrobe.  Lord and Lady Mothball are what we call “Snowbirds,” which means they are terrified of outdoor cold and so migrate up and down the eastern seaboard attempting to live their entire lives in air-conditioning.  The only ice they wish to encounter will be floating in their gin and tonics. Because most of her clothing is in storage for six months at a time, it reeks of mothballs so badly that as soon as she exits the shop, we hasten to hang her order in the back hall, where it won’t contaminate the clothing belonging to other customers.  Why do people even use mothballs? I wonder, as I press the iron tentatively against her inseam, turning my head to avoid the tiny mushroom cloud of toxins emanating from her inner thigh.   Working on her clothing is giving me an instant headache.   Judging from the look of these pants, no self-respecting moth would want to eat them in the first place.  Prudence Thimbleton is all in favor of quaint home remedies and practices and maintaining the traditions of bygone eras, however, she draws the line at using carcinogenic neurotoxins as pesticides, even for dreaded things like moths.  As a spinner and knitter who happens to store a lot of raw wool around, I despise moths and panic when I see one.  I have been known to store yarn in the freezer, and fill my storage areas with herb sachets, and cedar to discourage them.   The moths know good material when they see it—eating only natural fibers.  Most things today are mixed with polyester, which they won’t eat.  Lady Mothball’s clothing is almost entirely synthetic, so using mothballs is redundant.  We could bury this stuff in a garden and it would never rot.  But there is no convincing her otherwise; she is of a mindset that insists on smelling of indifference and superstition.

 The phone rings.  A woman is lost. “Do you have a sign out?  I can’t find your shop!”

“Yes, madam, it is a large sign.  We actually want you to find us.”

“What is your address?  The GPS system says I am there but I don’t believe it.”

“Yes, that is our address. We are right across from a large yellow diner, you can’t miss that, surely.”

“Oh, I’ve seen that many times. But it’s on the other side of the street.  You are not on that side of the street.”

“No, Madam, we are not.  I merely mention it as a landmark.  If you pause near that establishment and look directly at the other side of the street, you will see our own rather large sign. There is a little driveway on the side and we have parking in the rear of the building.” 

“Ok….” She says hesitantly, as if I have just told her the world is round and if she goes too far in any one direction she will roll unwittingly downhill all the way to Australia, or downtown Fitswell, which she fears more.   That lady, with her phone, motor vehicle, and the full power of the Global Positioning Satellite System at her disposal, never manages to locate us.

 Day after day, we are presented with what a friend of mine likes to call “Opportunities.”  These are opportunities to be humble, to surrender, to make peace with all we cannot or should not do for others, no matter how we might want so to do.  We cannot stand on street corners dressed as thimbles, flagging down potential customers, like the Liberty Tax person.  We cannot make people forego their impulses to poison their clothes.  Sometimes, we cannot even do what we know ought to be The Right Thing for a garment because someone will complain.

In 2001, my former husband and I bought a house together.  It was an enormous house—formerly a tavern in the 18th century, that had fourteen rooms.  We were a family of four.  What the hell were we thinking, buying a house that HUGE? Our two children were under the age of four.  In the unlikely event that we were ever each in separate rooms (let’s face it, both kids and two dogs usually even followed me into the bathroom) there were still TEN empty rooms in that house.  It was crazy.  But we bought it anyway.  In addition to the house and five acres of lawn, were not one, but TWO enormous nineteenth century barns in need of constant repair.  When my father came to visit for the very first time, he looked around everything and then asked me a question that haunted me for the next seventeen years. “Can you live with all you will never be able to do here?”   I had no idea what he meant. We could do anything! Over time, I learned the wisdom of his insight.  In the twenty-two hours a week it took to get the gardens in shape, the house would become ankle-deep in dust bunnies large enough to carry off the resident toddlers; by the time you got the house cleaned, the lawn would have eaten the sheep. By the time you found one of the goats eating groceries in the back of the mini-van, one of the barns would have threatened to collapse.  On and on it went.  To live there happily, one had to agree that getting One Thing done each day, of a possible 42,000 was “progress.”

 It takes a lot to get things done.  It also takes a toll to live in peace with all that is NOT done, what can never be done, so that we don’t collapse in despair and overwhelm.  It feels like failure, rather than sanity, to walk away from things that Could be done if we chose to do them instead of something else.  It’s daunting to take the reins of our own Free Will and take Responsibility for what is most important in each moment. We must live with this in the tailoring shop on a daily basis.  There is only so much we can ever do in the hours of daylight we are given.  The work always exceeds the time and energy available.  Learning “when to say When” is very hard, yet learning to take care of ourselves and lock the door at 5:pm is vital to our mental and physical survival.  The jobs can extend beyond our capacity; we cannot.  We have limits. Sometimes, like dogs on a leash, we must strain to reach that limit and then simply lie down next to all that we cannot do.

 As we age, as we parent, as we seek to Serve each other, we keep encountering new things we cannot or should not do.  Some of it we may wish desperately we could do. As we try to update our wardrobes, physiques and bank accounts before our New Year’s Resolutions wear off, it is well to remind ourselves of the prickly peace we must embrace in being able to live with “all we cannot do.”  Perfection is not often an option. Embedded in the Serenity Prayer is the notion that we must be able to discern what can be changed and what cannot. Some things could be changed—but not by us—and that needs to be Ok.  All we can do is all we can do. 

 Choose well and BE Well my Dearies! Be kind to your dear selves and do Good Work!

Yours aye,

Nancy

A Ripping Good Start

Greetings Dear Friends,

I am painfully aware that the following story does not put its protagonist in the best light.  Therefore, I have put it into fairytale language and changed all the names in the hope of protecting someone who vehemently protests her Innocence—even though we all know she is NOT!

Once upon a time, a certain Seamstress, inspired by the first three chapters of Marie Kondo’s The Life Changing Magic of Tidying Up, decided to take the contents of her entire closet and pile them on her bed.  With the New Year energy driving her to make a Clean Start, she proceeded to purify the empty closet and dispose of all sorts of rubbish she would not like to mention here because it involves nests of mice and empty pizza boxes.  When the floor was polished and every dust mote removed, she returned to the pile on her bed and began the process of holding each item of clothing to see if it “sparked Joy.” The things that didn’t were thanked, blessed, cleaned and folded to be donated.  The Magic was EVERYWHERE.  Because this is a Fairy tale, the mice were talking mice (very rude mice—not the kind that help you with stitching your ball gowns at the last minute), and the clothes talked back to her—though most of what they said cannot be repeated here.

When nothing but Joy was hanging neatly and ecstatically in the closet, the Seamstress was exhausted and fell into a deep slumber amongst the rest of the sadly departing clothes that she was too tired to pack into bags for donation.  She slumbered for a thousand years but no knight in shining armor hacked his way through the jungle of tangled laundry vines to give her love’s first kiss, nor did the peas and pizza boxes bruise her tender skin. She is a Seamstress, not a Princess, for Heaven’s sake! So she woke up in that mess and struggled in the pre-dawn dimness to find something to wear to work that day.

At the foot of the bed, near one of the snoring canine “footmen,” she could discern a folded pair of jeans. “Ah!” she thought, “I’ll just wear these and have a casual sort of day.  It’s our first day back and the weather is lousy. These will be fine.”  She worked them over her hips in the dark.  They fit beautifully.  “Gee,” she thought, “I don’t remember having these.  How did they get in the donation pile?” she wondered. “These look great!  They feel great! I need to keep these!” she thought happily, sparked with Joy.  (It is important to note that At No Time did this beloved heroine ever ONCE actually look in the mirror.)  Off she went to feed her sheep and chickens and have the local flora and fauna sing to her just like they do in fairytales.  She had porridge for breakfast and left her woodland cottage only a hair late for work, which was progress for her.

At work, because this is a fairytale, all she had to do was wave her silver thimble over things and they got better: Lumps got smoothed, trousers tapered, dresses hemmed, and zippers fixed with a mere whisper.  All the customers danced and clicked their heels and sang show tunes. It’s “zipper time” in the shop—the time of year when every second customer needs to have a zipper fixed.  Noblemen and peasants alike approach with ratty coats saying “Can you help me? I know it’s ugly but I only use it for shoveling snow.”  (It’s beginning to dawn on our heroine that she may be the only resident of New England who shovels snow in her pajamas.)  The “emergencies” that are not zippers are for funerals.  There is a certain percentage of the population of Fitzwell that chooses to shuffle off its mortal coils rather than face another three months of snow and jammed zippers.  Right away, there are three funerals this week and our fairytale seamstress spends a good bit of the morning crawling around men’s ankles, getting their hem lengths just right.  Yes, this is very important to the story: picture a woman CRAWLING on her knees, with mirrors on both sides of her, mirrors she does not see because she is so focused on her work and her attention to her customers. Bending down. Bending over. Crawling...

And now, the fairy tale continues…

A middle-aged man comes in.  She asks him how he is. He gives a stock standard, typically stoic response born from years of snow and funerals and jammed zippers, “Well, I can’t complain!”

“Would you want to?” she wonders. “Why can’t you? Are you not allowed?”  She is curious. Perhaps it is another one of those New England things. Or maybe it’s because this is a fairytale and no one is allowed to complain in fairytales, except the evil ones.  This man does not look evil.  He looks tired.

“I need these pants hemmed for my mom’s funeral on Saturday,” he says.  She nods and leads him to the dressing room. “Your mom just died and you can’t complain???” she wonders in awe. Just WHAT would it take to make you complain??? When the door opens, she crawls around his feet for a few moments, then he leaves.

Over lunch, one of the other seamstresses starts talking about how they have to get back to going to hot yoga together.  Cookie season is over.  It’s time to get serious about having their pants fit again.  First, our heroine wonders idly what would happen if they ate a bunch of Raw cookie dough and then went to hot yoga? Would it bake? Then she looks down at her mystery jeans and thinks again “I must be getting a little squashy in my head.  I seriously don’t remember buying these but I’m glad I did.  I never have jeans fit this well so early in the year!”  Out loud, she says to her co-workers, “Wouldn’t it be great if we could have a second brain that we could have resting on a charger while we drain the first one, like the battery packs on a cordless drill?  Mine runs down too quickly during the day.  I really need another brain! I don’t remember buying these jeans.” They nod understandingly.  It happens to everyone.

She rushes home to feed the dogs and animals, then rip off all her clothes as fast as she can to change for yoga class.  It’s your standard fairytale yoga class with everyone feeling virtuous and supple and smugly sweaty.  By the end, everyone is magically smaller and more toned and infinitely more flexible and spiritually healed, and probably wealthier too, since the class was on discount…

This Whole peaceful, happy FAIRYTALE ends abruptly that evening when the Seamstress gets a call from her daughter in college. “Hi Mom, how’s it going?  Have you gotten a chance to fix the pair of jeans I left on your bed?  It has two large holes in the bum, kind of underneath the cheeks. I’m not sure what happened.  The fabric just kind of gave way and it needs a patch.  I’d get rid of them but they are my favorite jeans.  They are so comfy!”  Suddenly feeling dizzy, the seamstress hastens to her laundry basket and holds up the pair of jeans she has worn all day.  This is the first time, since dressing in the dark that morning that she has actually LOOKED at them.   What she sees makes her want to pass out.  Her whole fairytale day fast-forwards in front of her eyes…the crawling… the bending… Oh dear God… She probably looked just fine standing up but standing up is not the only thing she does all day.  Visions of dough bulging through two holes haunt her. Is it even possible, to be THAT oblivious that a bit of one’s arse can hang out ALL DAY (no wonder those jeans fit better than any she owns!) and not be physically present enough to realize it?  Yes…apparently, it is… Suddenly, she has to lie down.

WHY DID NO ONE SAY ANYTHING???

Because, well… Here in New England, “we can’t complain.” Also, maybe we don’t really look at each other all that closely.  Maybe we are all more swept into the concerns of our own chattering minds. Perhaps a seamstress in bombed out jeans is no surprise to them: “Physician, heal thyself; Seamstress, mend thy ways and cover your bum while you’re at it!”

In any case dear Reader, I sincerely hope that you can stop weeping over this tragic tale long enough to appreciate that, like all good fairytales, this one contains a rather stern Moral: The life changing magic of tidying up is nothing to the life changing magic of looking at your damn clothes before you wear them! If something seems to fit too well, check again!

Be well, my Dearies!  And may your new year be off to a Ripping Good Start!

Yours aye,

Nancy

In the Beginning was....

“Be at war with your vices, at peace with your neighbors, and let every year find you a better man.” –Benjamin Franklin

Greetings & Happy New Year, Dear Ones!

As the last sands rush through the hourglass of 2018, a December man, looking a bit like Father Time himself, comes into the shop, tottering on three legs, to see if we can alter his new suit.  “How old do you think I am?” he bellows. We shrug.  We have learned not even to guess such things.

 “Twenty-nine?” I tease.  He chortles.

“I’m ninety-six!”  It’s true; he looks great for ninety-six. “You ever hear of a ninety-six-year-old getting a new suit?”

“You can get a new suit any time you want!” announces my friend from behind the counter.

“You ever see a trailer behind a hearse?” he shouts.  We shake our heads.  He smiles and slaps the table. “I’m getting a new suit because you can’t take anything with you when you go.  My grandson asked me if I was getting it for my funeral. ‘What the hell,’ says I, No Way man.  I ain’t buying a suit because I’m gonna die!!  I’m buying it because I’m gonna LIVE.  I’m gonna live. Live it UP until I go. I’m spending your inheritance.  What else am I supposed to do with this money? I can’t take it with me…Yeah, and that men’s store in town is going out of business and so I thought, what the hell, might as well save a little. It was half off. What a bargain. I couldn’t resist.”  We are tired and he is garrulous. He tells us we are crazy to be so tired at our age.  We are just babies.

Next in are two December Women in their early nineties.  Their niece drops them off out front and they manage to squeeze each other through the heavy front door before it chops them both in half.  They are sisters and still act like it.  Nothing fits them at all.  They come from an era where fabric is supposed to owe them a lifetime of service. “We don’t want to buy anything new at our age,” explains one. “We aren’t going to get the wear out of it so what would be the point?  There’s still plenty of wear in what we’ve got.” What they’ve got is a collection of pants suits hanging off them like they are both supposed to wear them simultaneously. After about twenty minutes of good-natured bickering and teasing, the fittings are done and their niece collects them again.  They insist on paying for all their alterations up front. “At our age, you never know!  Take the money while you can get it!” says one, writing out a check.  She hands it to my friend and then these dear, fond sisters grab each other by the elbow and head for the door, arguing about where to eat lunch. After they are gone, we look at the check.  It is made out for a hundred thousand dollars more than it should be. There are way too many zeros.  “Wow! That’s a big tip,” I say.  My friend shakes her head. “We can’t even cash it.  It’s not made out to us. I don’t know where she thinks she was, but this is not our name.”

These were among our final customers of 2018.  I enjoyed contrasting their attitudes about age and money.  I reveled in the fact that they were so old, like the year itself, and yet so vibrant and so determined to look their best at any age.  Their work is waiting for me as I head to the shop today to pick up my thimble and begin another year of sewing.  I cannot help thinking of them without a certain optimism. 

 I remember last year, on our first day back, a man rushed in with a pair of pants and said, “Here, can you take these in?  I’ve been on a diet for about 24 hours and I think I’ve lost an ounce or two. It would do my mental state a lot of good if you had to take these in already. I would feel like I made progress.  Go ahead and measure me. It would keep me going.  In fact, I want you to make them too small so that I don’t quit.”

I love bodies.  Truly, I do.  I love them in the way that Walt Whitman celebrates them in his poetry.  I can’t help thinking that the ancient Greeks, with their ideas concerning denigration of the body, favoring Spirit over flesh, were wrong.  I feel a pang for all the bodies out there this morning, under the tyranny of fresh resolutions, that will be forced to march on treadmills and drink nothing but spinach juice and chlorella until noon or until this latest impulse at self-improvement crashes. I feel sorry for all the hearts and minds that, three to six days from now, will be tortured around the idea that they “failed” again.  I have done this to myself so many times:  I set a resolution to do something to improve my wretched lot, like practice my fiddle every day, then I miss a day and I think, “damn, the Week is wrecked.  And now there goes the whole Month. Which ruins the year…Now I have to wait until NEXT year to be any good at the fiddle.”  For this reason, I hate resolutions! (I resolve not to have any!)

 Still, the notion of self-improvement is intoxicating.  Who Doesn’t want to be an upgraded model of themselves? Prudence Thimbleton adores the idea that, at the start of the New Year, so many people become dissatisfied with a certain moral mediocrity in themselves and rebel against the idea that they should follow their desires wherever they take them and approve of themselves as long as they aren’t hurting anyone.  She is all for having us take stock of ourselves and find ourselves a little less impressive than we had hoped—to realize there is a humiliating gap between our actual selves and our desired selves.  To her way of thinking, we are going to have to return these bodies and souls, like the abused rental cars they are, to their Maker and be given a huge fine for all the damage we’ve allowed. We should be ashamed of ourselves and do something about it.

 I, on the other hand, rebel against the notion that we can divide ourselves into parts that are unworthy of us and still love and celebrate our wholeness. That a young woman might say “I am a loving mother, a darn good accountant, and a dutiful spouse but these thighs are unacceptable,” feels tragic to me. Your Wholeness includes all the parts of you that you might change, but at a level that is Unchanging.  That is what it means to truly love yourself. I cannot help thinking that if we really want to be better humans (which IS a darn good plan!) we need to be more Whole, not more punishing. The business of being Total means we equal the sum of all our parts and perhaps then some.  It is noble and to follow through on the Higher callings of our best selves—to choose discomfort and trade it for deferred Good, rather than immediately present comforts—but not at the point where we must divorce a fundamental part of who we are.   I cannot think that my aim is to be “happy” all the time. That is not Whole. Being Whole means I am a deeply sad person who also knows joy; I am a deeply joyful person who knows sorrow.

Rather than choose a “resolution” this year, I am choosing a “word” that I wish to live into.  I was inspired to do this after a conversation with a friend who said she is doing this as well.  The plan is to choose a word for the coming year that becomes the lens through which you view your opportunities and choices—like “Powerful,” “Abundant,” “Thrive,” “Flourish,” etc… and ask yourself how living into that word will inform your options.  So, you are sitting on your couch, about to dive into a giant bag of Doritos and you pause and say, “is this helping me live into “Vibrancy” (if Vibrancy is your word)? You get invitations to do things over the weekend and you ask yourself, which choice offers the most of (your word). 

 I like this idea better than a resolution (at which I will most certainly fail) for so many reasons.  For one, words have extraordinary power.  Our Western society and the entire Judeo-Christian tradition is based on the idea of Logos—that a Word can create Order out of Chaos. (Our entire judicial system depends on it.)  Also, choosing “a word to live” reminds me of Benjamin Franklin’s attempts to cultivate his “manliness” (Vir being Latin for “manliness”) by practicing one of thirteen Virtues each week.  Much of his success in life relates directly to his drive to improve himself constantly around Temperance, Silence, Order, Resolution, Frugality, Industry, Sincerity, Justice, Moderation, Tranquility, Chastity, Humility, and Cleanliness.  But the key is that he did not strive to do it all at once.  He focused. He worked on one at a time for a week at a time. Lastly, choosing one word incorporates a satisfactory amount of “grey” area into the mix—there are gradations of (Flourishing), not absolutes.  Perhaps we were not  as (Accepting) as we had hoped but we lived into it somewhat, to the best we could.  There is always the chance of being more (Graceful) tomorrow.

 The world needs more people living into words like “Vibrant,” “Flourish,” “Generous,” “Strong.” If you drop a dress size because that happens to be the outcome of living into “Vibrancy” then, who are you to complain? But believing “the world needs more people to be a size six by March” is just ludicrous.  

I think of the racks awaiting me at the shop today. They are a metaphor for the new year ahead: There is too much Good needing to be done in this world to be able to do it all at once.  Don’t get overwhelmed. Just Pick one thing.  Do what you can. Do one thing at a time. Do your best. Forgive yourself often and make better choices as a result of your learning.

Love and Joy come to you, and to you your Wassail too (or green tea or Kombucha, as you see fit), May God bless you and send you a Happy New Year!

Be well, my darlings! Live into your Words and do Good Work!

Yours aye,

Nancy

Bonus Telescope Included!!

“For it is in Receiving that we Give”

 Season’s Greetings Dear Ones!

Christmas has begun!  It’s the Second Day!  All those of you with true loves out there should be getting your turtle doves any moment now.  No?  (Maybe your true love is a little worn out at the moment and needs a foot massage and a nap after getting up at three a.m. yesterday with the excited Believers in your household.)  I am relieved that everything that needed to get done finally got done and none of it really matters anyway, in the big scheme of things.  As my daughter and I finished wrapping up the last parcels on Christmas Eve, she looked at the empty cardboard tubing leftover from the wrapping paper and sighed. “Just think of all those Bonus Telescopes everyone is throwing away!” she said.  We laughed and laughed.  Every year we retell our favorite family Christmas story that goes something like this: (with a few Em-Bell-ishments of course!)

 Once upon a time, there was a happy little family whose father came from Scotland.  Every few years, they would journey back to “The Auld Country” to celebrate Christmas and New Years (Hogmanay) with their relatives and cousins far, far across the sea.  They would pack a minimum of clothing and a maximum of chocolates and sale items from discount stores and big-box retail outlets in their British Airways luggage allotment (with plenty of room for duty Free additions). The children assumed that Scotland was “up in the sky” very near to Heaven, because they could not drive to get there. They had to fly.  (It had not occurred to them that the plane came down as much as it went up.)  When the children were infants, their parents had not had to worry too much about where Father Christmas would deliver their presents.  Of course, he would leave them at their home address in America.  But this year, the children were a bit older—at six and eight, they might not be able to understand that they were not going to receive anything from Father Christmas in Scotland—especially when they saw their cousins receiving gifts—and it might be hard to delay their gratification for another two weeks until they returned home.

            “We told Santa that we wanted him to come to our house in America,” explained their father, “because we don’t want to have to pay for extra luggage on the return flight.  We need the room in the suitcases for other things.”  The children nodded as if they understood completely. They did not really care as long as they got to be with their Scottish cousins.

            “So you’re not going to get any presents, understand?” asked their mother, worriedly.

            “But did you tell him we have been very good?” asked one of the children.

            “Yes,” said the daddy, “and I think if you are willing to wait until you return from Scotland to receive your presents, maybe Santa might even bring you an extra one—if you keep being good, of course!”  

All throughout the advent season, as the candles got lit each week on the wreath in the center of their dinner table, the parents reminded the children again and again why they would not be receiving any presents from Santa on Christmas day.  It was not because they were bad children. Goodness and Badness had to surrender to the supremacy of Logic. The mother continually doubted that the children would actually be ok with this on the day but the father had complete faith.  This was a Good Plan.  It was sensible. What could possibly go wrong with a Sensible Plan?  The presents would be waiting for them under their tree in Massachusetts. That was that.

These horrible, Practical parents even instructed all the Scottish relatives to give their children only the tiniest of presents that would not take up too much room in suitcases.  Things like sweeties they could consume or tickets to a Pantomime would be ideal—Nothing that might take up space or last long enough to inconvenience the baggage handlers at Heathrow Airport. 

For a while, the children really did seem fine with this.  They were so thrilled to be in Scotland with their Grandmother and their Aunties and Uncles and cousins!  There were parties and pantomimes and long walks in the glens and everyone playing music and singing in the evenings.   On Christmas Eve, they all ate mince pies and left out one pie and a frothy pint of Guiness for Father Christmas and some carrots for his reindeer, then went to bed in a big nest of sleeping bags with their cousins.  Their parents tucked them in and told them again about the “deal” where Santa was going to go to America instead and that only the Scottish cousins were going to get parcels under the Scottish tree.  The Scottish cousins had a flicker of pity for their American cousins.  “It’s going to be sad that you don’t get anything,” said one, “but we can share.”

“It’s NOT because we have been bad,” said the wee American boy, though his sister was not of the opinion that he had actually been very Good either.

Downstairs, the adults enjoyed their adult beverages and wrapped presents by the Christmas tree.  The U.K. cousins were having a “big” Christmas.  There was a lot to wrap.  Their dad had just gotten a big promotion and there were two new bikes, a play kitchen, and a huge Scalectrix thing to build, as well as a myriad of other things.  The brother-in-law went through four giant rolls of wrapping paper to cover it all.  “How is this actually going to be tomorrow when our kids open all this stuff and yours sit by and watch?” he asked. “This is awful!  I feel so sorry for them!”

“They will get stuff at home,” insisted their father, who grabbed a cardboard tube and began mock sword play with it. This gave him a Splendid Idea. “Don’t throw these away!” he cried. “I’m going to give these to my kids for Christmas!”

“You’re Joking!” insisted the Scottish brother. “What? We give our kids all this lovely stuff and you just give yours rubbish? That’s not on… That’s worse than giving them nothing!”

“Nonsense,” insisted the Americanized brother. “It’s all in the marketing.  Watch this. I can market anything. They will love this.  This is going to be great!”  He grabbed the clear plastic box the wrapping paper had come in and made a sign.  His wife helped him cut one of the rolls into smaller pieces that became hilts when she cut circles through their sides. 

“They won’t fit into the original box if we attach the hilts now,” she pointed out.

“Even better!” he screamed. He scribbled “some assembly required” on the sign he was making. “Every good marketer knows that ‘some assembly required’ means the buyer has to invest his own creative energy into the product.  This makes it way more valuable, psychologically,” he said, slugging back the last of Santa’s Guinness.  His brother shook his head.

“We have enough to make three swords, with this bit left over,” said his wife, holding aloft a section of cardboard tubing about eighteen inches long.

“Bonus telescope included!!” roared her husband.  “This is perfect.  There are four kids old enough to play with these—three can fight each other and the forth can watch and report on the battle.”

The next morning, the kids were up early.  First, they saw the empty Guiness glass and the pie crumbs on the plate.  Then they rushed outside and saw the nibbled carrots and the reindeer poop on the lawn, which their father picked up and ATE, saying “Yum!  Reindeer poop tastes just like raisins!” to their shrieks of disgust. Their aunt showed them the tiny footprints the elves had left in the butter while they hastily ate a few required bites of a breakfast none of them could taste.  Then they saw the tree, shimmering with lights, with heaps of presents under it.  The young Americans looked at it with shining eyes, then wilted visibly.  None of this was for them… The young Scots tore into their presents and the mayhem began.  

After a few moments, the father of the Americans announced, “Hey look!!! Santa DID leave you a present!  Look!!” He produced the box.  All the children paused, stunned.  They had not expected this.  The older sister lisped out the large sign attached to the box: “It says ‘To Katie & Calum: Genuine Imitation Viking Do-it-yourself-sword-making-kit with BONUS telescope included!! Made in Hong Kong, packaged in Brussels, shipped by way of Cape Ann. Some Assembly Required. I have left the rest of your presents in Americay. Merry Christmas!  Love, Santa”

“Bonus Telescope included?!!!” roared one of the Scots cousins! “Wow! Did we get one?” The Scottish boys began pawing through their presents in search of similar boxes, looking for their “sword making kits.” “Aww…didnae Father Christmas bring anaither?” they wanted to know.

The adults looked at each other in astonishment. They had not expected this! Meanwhile, the Americans were busy assembling their swords and pestering the adults for cellotape and markers.  The Scots had paused in their unwrapping and were watching in envy.  They dropped their gifts and began to help make the swords.   Within moments, three out of four cousins were hacking each other to bits while one looked on through the telescope, and the other gifts went ignored.

“Look what you’ve done!” said the Scottish father to the American father, “You’ve ruined Christmas! Think of the money I spent on all that crap they aren’t even playing with!” which delighted the American father no end. 

“Come now,” said the American father with a twinkle in his eye, “the Spirit of Christmas is not about presents but about family togetherness and memories and having a herd of armed children all hopped up on sugar doing battle in your house for the next four days!”

 That Christmas has become cherished family folklore that gets better over time.  For me, it was a profound lesson in how “trash” received in the right spirit can become treasure.  It’s not just the thought of the giver that counts; it’s very much the thoughts of the Receivers as well… I think the best giving and the best receiving are when we are able to bring our authentic selves into the equation—when we bring our own creativity and imagination to the “present,” in every meaning of that word. That’s when macaroni necklaces colored with magic markers become more precious than anything from Tiffany’s. 

 Allowing ourselves to be Loved, is every bit as much about Receiving as it is about giving.  Feeling “unworthy” is the most selfish feeling of all, it turns out.  Refusing to receive, or “feeling crummy” when someone does something extra special for us that we did not think to do for him or her, leaves us walled off, separated, unable to commune. It aborts the cycle of giving and makes it crash into an emptiness that replaces the Good with Nothing, Isolation, Emptiness.  We trade Heaven for Hell in those moments.  When we pause and consider the story of Christmas itself—that a King comes as the humblest, weakest, most vulnerable of gifts, in the dirtiest of packages (a stable)—we see that the story of Love is not about flash and power.  Babies are utterly incapable of giving. They teach us Love by being the ultimate in joyful Receivers.  Gratitude for what we have changes us internally in ways we cannot imagine and makes for the best legends over time.  And that is the miracle of Christmas.

 Merry Christmas, Dear Ones!

Yours aye,

Nancy

Prudence Thimbleton's Finishing School

“Well done is better than well said.” –Benjamin Franklin

Season’s Greetings Dear Ones,

 “I want to open a Finishing School,” I say.

“Oh Goody!” pipes up Prudence.  “Are we going to teach people not to slurp their soup? That proper tea is made with BOILING water added directly to the tea, not some cup of tepidness with a dry bag perched on the edge of the saucer? Or how to dance over their OWN feet, and not their neighbors’?”

“No,” I say, “It’s not that sort of finishing school.  It’s where people can gather together to Finish Things.  A communal workshop of sorts, where people can work on their PhDs…  You know—Projects Half Done.”

“Oh…” she says, non-plussed. “And just who do you think is going to teach this little school? YOU? Pah! You never finish anything! Just look around you—you are surrounded by Nothing Done.”

I slump.  It’s true.  I am Un-Done again. Christmas is only six days away and here I am, buried in a small avalanche of needles, pins, yarn, scraps of fabric, and BIG, BIG plans that are rapidly dissolving into eggnog and tears.  How do people Finish Things? I would like to know. Those of us with high levels of Creativity, Inspiration, and Ambition present an awful lot like manic, sleep-deprived lunatics at this time of year as we pull all-nighters to finish knitting a pair of socks, or suddenly decide to hand-embroider new Christmas Stockings for all the farm animals we know. (I don’t even want to contemplate those poor souls living with the additional tyranny of an “elf on the shelf!”) We abandon all capacity for rational thought and simultaneously begin baking twenty dozen cookies and knitting eighteenth century thrum caps out of indigo fleece that we dyed in a traditional manner by soaking it in our ex-brother-in-law’s urine.  (Ok, maybe that last one is just me…)  Then we panic and run to Target or T.J. Maxx anyway, hastily buy a bunch of rubbish that doesn’t reflect our value system, then wait until the last minute to wrap it.  As Nana Kennedy used to say, “the hurrier we go, the behinder we get” all month long.  I have convinced myself that there is no time left even to bake the cookies—we should just eat the dough raw and call it a night.

 Speaking of night, when is it going to be time for that “Long Winter’s Nap” the poet tells of? I would dearly LOVE a nap! My cap and kerchief stand at the ready but apparently, according to other maxims we must obey, I am Wicked so there is No Rest for me.  Thanks to a bunch of Teutonic Victorians, there is shrubbery outside that needs to be chopped down and dragged inside.  There are doorways that need to be festooned with garlands of fresh laurel, cedar, and twinkling lights with extension cords to be tripped over.  There are Battenburg lace angels awaiting their colo-rectal appointments with a Douglas Fir. There are pine needles that must mingle with the dog hair on the carpets, carols to sing, and cider that needs to be mulled.  There are two cords of “Yule-tide logs” in the driveway that still need to be stacked before the snow plow comes again... And Christmas cards to write…I am like an exhausted undergraduate at the end of term—up all night, incoherently scribbling drivel, trying to get my final exam in under the wire.  

 Smug customers come into the tailoring shop, hand us more work they need done “in no rush but immediately would be best” and say, “I hope you ladies have all your Christmas shopping done!” and we groan collectively behind their backs as they leave.  We don’t shop!  We are Seamsters; we seam.  We spend eight hours a day or more on Other People’s Projects.  And yes, we have Nothing Done for ourselves. A customer suffering acutely from PPS (Precious Princess Syndrome) announces that she’s had everything done for a month now.  It’s all I can do to resist the urge to poke her with a pin.  Prudence promptly puts me on the Naughty List.

 It’s that time of year when I need a little pep talk.  It’s not even officially “Winter” yet and already I am sick of the dark and the cold. We leave for work in the dark. It’s dark when we emerge from the shop to chip the ice off our cars and drive home under the stars.  The days don’t just seem short—they are. This Friday night, December 21st, the day will be the shortest of the year and the night will be the longest.  The coming Winter Solstice is the physical embodiment of one of the oldest, if not the oldest, story human beings have ever told—the story of Light vs. Dark, representing Order vs. Chaos.   For now, it certainly seems that the Chaos and Darkness are winning.  Perhaps we create all this seasonal mayhem to keep ourselves warmly distracted with all our rushing about and list-making.  (Santa isn’t the only one making a list! Prudence makes lists of her lists.) Even though we know, intellectually, that the Light will return, the primal parts of us want to hunker by the fire, lured by light, warmth, community and grandma’s fruit cake.   (Ok, so no one actually wants the fruit cake.)   Still, we want to be together.  The part of us that fears the dark wants to make something beautiful to give, to share, so that we will belong forever to that circle in the light.  Long ago, we did this with ceremony and rituals that included feasting, carols, candles, and bonfires which have transformed over the centuries into garish neon Christmas lights, clay-mation T.V. specials, and such enchanting musical compositions as “Grandma Got Run Over By A Reindeer” (Well, that’s one less fruitcake I guess…) Prudence gets panty-bunches in her backside when she hears real Christmas Carols before Christmas (like, the day after Halloween).  It drives her batty.  I have always called our family the “Jingle Bells” around this time of year, while she vehemently protests that “Jingle Bells” is NOT a Christmas carol! (I’m turning into more of a Silver Bell anyway…)  She reminds me every year that December 25th is the FIRST day of the twelve days of Christmas, not the last.  She is NOT a fan of Jingle Bell Rock, nor does she think that manipulative minx purring “Santa Baby” over the loud-speakers at Wallmart should get anything but a lump of coal and a quick trip to Confession.

  But I digress… My inner pagan, the Shadow side of Prudence, (wait…how can a shadow have a shadow? Perhaps I am taking this too far) adores the ancient druidic traditions of bringing both the fire and the forest within.  On Friday and Saturday, I will be lighting candles all over the house (and little old-fashioned ones on the Christmas tree too!), singing, and playing music with my children, who are grudging participants in my rituals.   The Advent season is all about awaiting the coming Light but I like to pause and honor the Darkness too.  Did you know that chickens lay their eggs according to the cycles of light and dark? Mine stopped laying in October and usually start again on February 15th, the day after Valentine’s Day. I’m pretty sure that’s when the sheep start growing their wool again too, as you can perceive their new growth by March.  I love how the seasons of light and dark regulate my little world, even me, and create necessary spaces for rest and suspension of the relentless forward momentum of “doing” rather than “being.”  

I have been feeling the darkness deeply this year—trying to embrace it, to see my internal lethargy and melancholy as the part of myself that needs to rest and go to seed.  It is time to go inward, be a small “something-that-is-not-yet”—not a pumpkin or a flower, or a vine, or even a shoot— held by a rich, mysterious darkness.  We are all like a bunch of garden pumpkins, softened by the frosts.  Our flesh sags and pulls us towards the earth and we grieve the loss of recognizing ourselves as we once were.  We have aged and sometimes not for better. But inside us, after everything else rots and falls away, is the seed, a condensed blueprint of all we really need to grow once more from our former ashes towards everything we love.

We must take the time we need to grieve the passing of another year, and all the sweet memories that may never come again.  This year, we have known dear Loves and lost them in the tides of time.  It seems treasonous to release them too soon, so we are given this moment with the Darkness to dwell with our sorrows and regret.

It’s challenging to consider the differences between Finishing and “quitting” at a time like this. It can be hard to continue to press ourselves onwards towards our goals at harried times when we feel simultaneously rushed and suspended, despondent and depleted…Waiting.  This is why I want to start a Finishing School. (Yes, I am aware of the Irony inherent in that statement!)   The dream is to have everyone drag his or her unfinished projects to a shared workshop space where we all help each other FINISH what we’ve started, lending tools, talents, and communal as well as moral support.  Both the physical and the metaphysical require that we somehow bridge this gap between Beginning and Ending so that the eternal Cycle may continue.  Some of us get stuck and need a little push.

 How do we know when something is done? Calling something Finished that is not quite as good as we had hoped it would be is really hard.  You know that by “finishing”—either by completing or abandoning a project—you are saying to yourself “I really can’t manage to do anything better than this right now” and if that is not perfect, that can be really hard to accept. When something ends, when something is complete, when you finally Finish—it is to give you new space in which to grow a new dream. You are on the right path to Create more of everything that makes your heart sing.  Even Sorrow is here to redirect our efforts towards a Better Good.

In this liminal space, take a moment to meet and feel the Darkness all around you with openness and curiosity, with your own breath as your only companion.  This is Ancient Magic. Your breath is the oxygen you are giving to help burn all the tiny fires inside of you.  Dance then with the Cold and the Dark, knowing that you yourself are warmth and light.  It’s true, you come from dust, and to dust thou shalt return—but RIGHT NOW you are dust that is magically on fire.  You are dust mixed with Light.  You are Magic and absolutely anything can happen.  Any sort of Miracle at all—like getting all those presents finished, wrapped, AND to the post office on time or making peace with cousin Betty!

In the midst of Constant Change, lie deeper things that never change. We are part of something Bigger than we could ever imagine.  Let your inner tree-sprite sink her toes deep into this darkness and anchor you firmly, as you reach towards new seasons coming with the returning Light. May you too find your rest, your bliss, and your new growth—perhaps your heart’s own Love—in the stretch between the two.  You are not alone in the dark.  I’m cheering for you from over here!  When we Finish really well, what do we do but usher in a New Beginning?

Solstice Blessings Dear Ones! May you be Merry and Bright and do Good Work!

Yours aye,

Nancy

Tis the Season...

“Real Generosity toward the future lies in giving all to the present.” —Albert Camus

Greetings Dear Ones!

Well, the Holly Daze is in full swing here at the little corner of the world where I spend my days looking at the world through the holes in your pants.  Mishaps with pants have been a running joke in the shop since Thanksgiving.  First, there was the young woman who brought in three pairs of yoga pants because her dog had eaten the crotch out of all of them.  She wants us to patch them as best we can…crotchless Yoga is definitely NOT a thing here in New England, at least not yet. (“Lord, have Mercy!” exclaims Prudence)  She notes snarkily that if this young woman hadn’t left these pants in little piles on her bedroom floor, this would never have happened.  “Her room is probably a pig sty!” she mutters. 

Next in is Mr. Winchester, a senior gentleman whose pants have been very hard to fix.  The fabric, which probably dates to the Geneva Convention, is fraying badly and the very act of patching it is creating more holes.  “I’m not sure there is a whole lot of life in these pants,” I start to explain.  His eyes widen with astonishment and his nostril hairs quiver as he snorts, “Young lady, I’m not INTERESTED in having life in my pants!” He seems quite put out by the very idea.  I can’t help being drawn to him. He would make a fabulous New Year’s date for Prudence. 

Another woman comes in with a bag of pants to hem.  She plops them on the counter and says “Betcha can’t guess where I just came from? Holy Mackerel Cemetery is having a sale!  Yeah, get this—their little niches are usually a thousand dollars a-piece but all this week they are going for seven hundred!”

“What’s a niche?” I want to know. 

“It’s when they cremate you and you have a little hole in the wall to put the ashes in after,” she explains.  “I decided to go for it.  It’s probably my only shot at getting a smokin’ hot body in this lifetime. Anyway, you should go for it!  I bought two—one for me and one for a friend so I know who my next door neighbor is going to be.  The sooner you do it, the cheaper it is.”

“Which church is Holy Mackerel?” I ask.

“It’s that big old cathedral on the south side of Main Street. Their two main gripes are about loose living and tight giving,” she says with a roll of her eyes. “I don’t go all that often but I thought I should end up hanging out where everyone I know is going to wind up eventually. My parents are there already. But they’re in the ground. I ain’t going in the ground.”

Mrs. Merryweather pops in then to collect her order and says “I’m sick of all this rain.  I hear it’s going to snow.  Well, at least you don’t have to shovel rain.” She sighs to indicate how hard her life is under an umbrella all the time.

“Wadda ya expect?” says the cemetery lady. “It’s New England.  It’s supposed to be cold!”

“I don’t mind the cold so much,” says Mrs. Merryweather primly, “It’s the snow I hate.”

“Really? I’m just the opposite,” announces the other one. “I’d take four feet of snow any day just as long as it’s ninety degrees out! I’m back to Florida as soon as Christmas is over.”

They leave together and I pick up a tiny pair of pants to hem.  “It says ‘hem as marked and pinned but there are marks all over this pair of pants.  Which one is right?” I ask my friend who did the fitting.

“Oh,” she says giggling, “those belong to a little boy who asked why I was marking his clothes.  He was fascinated with the chalk and wanted to draw some of the lines himself.  These are his lines,” she points out a series of marks, “and this is where the finished length should be. Leave him plenty of hem for growing.”  I nod.

And so it goes in our cozy little shop…an ordinary day of gossip about the weather, the afterlife, and our various plans for growing and dying and trying not to get too cold or wet or miserable in between.  As usual, it’s a balancing act of appreciating the absurd and having heart-touched contemplation as we Prepare… both for Christmas and what comes next.

I finish hemming a batch of pants and dial the telephone number on the order slip to let the customer know he can come any time before five p.m. to collect them.  A woman answers the phone.  I ask to speak to the name on the slip—a man’s name. “Who is this?” she asks in Alert, Suspicious tones.  I am taken aback and pause, confused.  She must not have heard me identify myself and the shop when she first answered.  “I don’t recognize this number,” she says, her tone escalating sharply, “Why are you calling my husband?!” For one delicious, wicked moment, I consider responding in my most sultry voice “well, madam (breath…) if you MUST know (breath…breath…) your man left his pants here when he came to visit me last week…(squeak) and I cannot divulge my identity but he knows (breath…sigh…squeak) where to find them if he wants them… And honey, please remind him we only take cash for our services…He usually remembers but…just in case…” Luckily, Prudence steps in and smacks my inner harlot upside the head before I can go through with it. 

There is a lot of seasonal sewing and attaching-red-plaid-bows-on-things to do.  Luckily, it’s the time of year when customers are most apt to bring us plates of cookies!  Hannukah has been and gone—not that there is too much sewing to be done for that—and all the Nutcracker costumes are finished being tailored to fit the dancers.  (All excepting the wee boy who played Fritz, whose britches kept falling down during the entire party scene.)  The bulk of what we have left to do consists of commissioned Christmas gifts and all the formal gowns for New Year’s Eve events—three of which are actually weddings.   Thanks to a kindly aunt, nine lucky grandchildren will awake on Christmas day to find their deceased Meme’s blouses and shirts turned into pillows they can hug.  A border collie named Molly is getting a new hunting vest in neon orange, and a rabid sports enthusiast is getting a custom-made sport coat made of eye-wateringly “busy” Red-Sox-patterned fabric his wife dragged here from the quilting section of Jo-Ann fabrics.

This fabric was never intended to be used for a garment.  But this is Red-Sox Nation.  Baseball is a religion. Apparently, this man is going to wander his village as some sort of loudly dressed prophet, with his clothes silently screaming about fly balls, foul balls, and whatever other sorts of balls they have in baseball.  Does he really WANT this? The mind boggles.  To see his excited wife bounding about the shop, clapping her hands with glee worries me.  Is this something he actually wants or is this something she is relieved she has designed because better ideas were not available?  At the end of the day, does it really matter? It’s the thought that counts.  And the hours of labor… She has no worries about how much this will cost.  “He’s going to LOVE this and you have NO IDEA how hard he is to buy for!” she gushes.  She is so excited that she has hit the jackpot on Ideas this time.  With the Bruins, the Patriots, and the Celtics—each with their own garish, god-awful fabric designs at Jo-Ann’s, his wardrobe expansion is set for the next 3 years to come.  “Can you make matching suit pants?” she wants to know. 

As deadlines approach for mailing things and finishing things, we grow a bit more frazzled and frantic.  “The Most Wonderful time of the year” can often be the Most Stressful too.  (No…wait, that’s Prom Season!)  It’s dark and bitter cold by the time we close the shop.  At home, it’s a deadly game each evening on my little homestead, as I skitter to bring water to my chickens and sheep over an alien topography of residual snow that has turned to icy cement.  Survival, for any of us, is not guaranteed.  It’s a blessing to distract ourselves with happy projects and thoughts of giving and anticipating another person’s delight.  It’s a privilege to be creatively involved in other people’s impulses to share.  We need things to warm not just our hands but our hearts and minds as well.

Our lives can seem small and rough and drearily mundane sometimes.  It can feel like we aren’t getting what we wanted or that we are unable to give others what it is they might want.  Some of us are prompted to ridiculous, over-extended extremes.  Giving itself can be a tricky form of asking—asking to be special, asking to be loved.  Sometimes, as George Bailey learns in “It’s a Wonderful Life,” it’s not about getting what we want after all.  It’s about realizing all we already have—and what we give daily, without even thinking.

 Blessings Dear Ones!  Keep Giving!  Keep Creating! Keep doing Good Work! May your hearts, hands, and homes be warm and merry and bright.  

Yours aye,

Nancy

Who is Prudence Thimbleton?

“We are all failures—at least the best of us are.” –J.M. Barrie

Greetings Dear Ones!

Few things in life are quite as satisfying as making a very neat job of turning up a sleeve on a man’s tweed sport coat and replacing the buttons and buttonholes precisely, in such a manner as to be indistinguishable from the original.  Lucky for me, I have good old Prudence Thimbleton, that internal nit-picker, watching over me to make sure I do it right.  She does not deal well with praise of any kind.  Her job is to find fault.  So when I hand the coat over to its owner, a distinguished looking man with a stern countenance and eyes the color of the sky after a summer storm, and he says, “hmmmm…. You do not disappoint.” Prudence goes all giddy and burns with so much Pride the poor thing nearly rushes herself off to Confession right then and there.  She does not know how to deal with such glowing approbation!

“Am I Prudence?” asks one of my friends.  Others have asked this too, wondering if I am writing about them.  Heavens No!  Prudence lives in my head.  She is the amalgamation of every wretched little old lady I have ever known, as well as one gay male horse trainer (he trained female horses too) and two truly terrifying nuns who have haunted me since grade school. She is simplistic and inflexible.  She does not take the ambiguities or subtleties of life into account what-so-ever. There is not even one shade of grey for her, never mind fifty!  She assumes that for every crime, there is a criminal who must be brought to justice.  She is like an over-active immune system that, with nothing “real” to fight, will turn on me and attack me.

Where did Prudence come from? I don’t really know. When you grow up with 19 Barbies dressed as nuns under your bed, you tend to attract some interesting “characters” into your life.    She is full of fantastically bizarre ideas such as killing two birds with one stone by translating the license plate in front of her into Morse code with Kegel clenches at traffic lights.  (This keeps your Morse code skills at the ready, should you ever need to signal that there are German U-boats off the coast of Maine, using only your vagina.) She makes all her own clothes and has despised “today’s fashions” for more than 100 years.  She will tell you simultaneously that “Jesus loves you very much” and that “you are going straight to hell” without perceiving any contradiction in the matter.  She likes to hang out in the shop and grumble quietly about the customers who abuse their zippers and brides with blurry tattoos that don’t look right under lace.  She’s from the era where most women knew how to sew and her dry, witty rants about “the state of things today” continually leave me in stitches.  

For years, she was just a horrible sense of dread—a nameless, vague, discontented wretch who seemed to hate everything about me—a heavy rock in my chest I carried about that negated every nice thing anyone said to me.  I once carried her for nearly a half marathon hearing nothing but “Is that a stitch in your side? What’s wrong with you? Why do you sound like a steam engine when you breathe? Is this the best you can do? How come everyone is passing you? At least get by that one-legged woman on the crutches—surely you can take her!  It’s mile 6—how has she stayed ahead of you for SIX miles? Easy now, you are going to get diarrhea in front of all these people if you keep swilling Gatorade at every mile marker—one more bowel-curdling sip and you are done for young lady…” By mile 11.5, when I was limping due to a seizing I-t band, she took to barking. “This is to what happens to people like you.  You should have trained better or stretched better, or at least worn a better outfit so that when the ambulance comes to scrape you off the pavement you look a little more coordinated than THIS…” she snorted with contempt. So much energy was going into beating myself up—and then beating myself up for beating myself up—the concentric levels of beatings going on were breathtaking, literally.  It was like being in a bar fight and punching myself in between jabs from a drunk. (I am astoundingly good at making myself the villain in my own melodramas.) I finally stopped right there in the middle of the road.  I could choose to finish this race or I could lie down and continue making myself feel like dog poo on a running shoe.   I did not have the energy to do both. I told that part of me to shut the hell up and I headed for the finish line. “Once we get our medal and a damn banana, then you can start berating me about where I may have left the car keys,” I told her. She seemed huffy but relatively content with that.

Afterwards, I realized I needed to befriend her or at least put her in her proper place or she was going to kill me.  Like the scary Bumble in the iconic “Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer” television special, she needed to be named, have her teeth knocked out, and be given a proper job.  She can still waste an incredible amount of energy worrying, being fearful, feeling  inferior and at fault.  She still judges harshly things like Winnie the Pooh tattoos and people who grind and smack their chewing gum sideways like they are bovines cudding.  She will “should” all over me at the drop of a pin. One of her little tricks is to point out how horrible other people are in order to make me feel like I could make some progress if I applied myself and overcame their low standards.  This is dangerous. I need only to compare myself to who I was six months ago, or this morning, to see how I am doing. I am my own Ruler, in every respect.

I have thought many times about whether or not Prudence should be killed off anyway. She is bloody annoying when she isn’t put to some constructive use.  There are plenty of self-help books (“Silence Your Inner Critic Forever”) and programs and coaches willing to collude in this murder of the Inner Critic. Yet I have decided against it. Firstly, I am against murder of any kind (though I quite happily usher blood-sucking insects to their after-life and encourage them to come back as dolphins or polar bears). Secondly, having an inner critic I can trust is extremely valuable.  I need this self-critical, judgmental part of my psyche—this is not a “bad” or “damaged” part of me that needs to be silenced or fixed—though sometimes her impulses are ridiculous.   I just need to understand, with extreme clarity, who she is and what her motives are. 

Inner Critics evolved as the part of us that wanted to stay safe. It’s very human to be naturally more attuned to what is negative and that is not a bad thing.  Historically, those of us heeded warnings were safer than our compatriots who perished, leading our species to evolve in ways that depend more on “watch out! That’s a scorpion!” rather than “Gee, Thor, I really admire how you handle that club of yours…” Negatives have an immediacy and a relevancy that positives often don’t:  Don’t touch that iron! (or you will burn)  Don’t eat that mushroom! (or you will die) Don’t wear white after Labor Day! (or we will kick you out of the tribe and you cannot come to our drum circle and drink things out of coconuts).

The importance of discernment cannot be underestimated. To know when a person is talking rot—especially if that person is me—is invaluable! Prudence keeps me honest.  She makes my seams straight.  She is the part of me that pulls out a row of stitches that “might pass” and makes me do them again perfectly.  I need this part of me that says I can do better, because usually, I can.  At heart, I am a Slacker.  She is not always a trustworthy moral guide like a conscience:  I have to listen carefully and discern whether she is saying what I have done is wrong or who I am is wrong. 

I have so many friends who are wonderful musicians, artists, writers and Intensely Creative People.  Through their tales and triumphs, I see that there is nothing more painful about the creative process than struggling against the feelings of self-doubt and self-loathing.  Some of us literally hate everything we write or paint or scupt or make or compose.  Nothing is clever enough, funny enough, good enough—or worse, our best ideas have already been done.   Apparently, this is not only “normal”—it’s often a sign that you are pushing yourself towards an interesting frontier, which is a Good Thing.  True Creativity is NOT safe.  It will definitely arouse your Inner Critic and have her snuffling out of her lair, stumbling towards strong coffee and a crowbar the moment you think you are meeting with some success.

And sometimes we just get it Wrong.  That’s ok.  A healthy inner critic, one who is fighting for us, not against us, will help us to learn. And learning itself is a beautiful thing.   Sometimes, after we learn, we have to try again, risk again, unfurl again and hope for a better outcome.  Sometimes, we just have to ignore those inner voices for our own damn good.  But first, before we do that, we must listen very carefully to what they say and why they are saying it.

Once in a while, that inner voice is not just toxic for toxicity’s sake; there may be a painful but true message that you need to heed.  Plenty of data from social psychology studies indicate that many of us are deluded and are not nearly critical enough.   Maybe your song only needs four verses and one key change, instead of thirty-seven.  Maybe you shouldn’t have composed fiddle tunes in F and expected gin-swigging mortals in the intermediate levels to learn them in a week or less.  Perhaps choosing a mermaid-style wedding gown with hips like yours was indeed a ghastly mistake. 

When should we worry when the inner critic is too strong? When we aren’t taking good care of ourselves; when we are overly self-effacing and cannot receive compliments; when we ignore health issues and don’t exercise; when we spend ten days in a row knitting and binge-watching “Bojack Horseman,” eating (and drinking) out of cans only.…  We NEED a sense of judgment to navigate in this (basically unsafe) world.  However, the intensity of that judgment lies along a continuum from gentle redirection to crippling shame.  It is a life-long process to learn to co-exist and persistently co-create with the parts of ourselves that wish to criticize or complain.  To compound the problem by blaming ourselves for engaging in this struggle is both futile and absurd.  A good friend reminded me recently: “Those who Judge don’t understand; those who Understand don’t judge.”   If we seek to understand, we are on the Right Path.

Incidentally, Prudence does NOT approve of this blog. Every time I click on the “save and publish” button, she has to take two aspirin and go lie down. She surveys my “purpled prose” and feels sickened, over-exposed, distraught.  She would much prefer it if we would Hide and work out our rash creative impulses on the cleaning the garage or sorting out the enormous stash of homespun wool that is attracting nesting Jack Russells.  I pat her hand and say, “my Dearest Prudence, fret all you want; I’m a Seamstress who doesn’t give a Rip.” We are going to be Ok.

And you are too, Dear Reader.  Keep creating!  Keep birthing your Beauty into this world that needs it so desperately.  Let us all strive to possess impressive inner cohesion, despite our fragmented, scattershot lives and abilities.  Our minds can be consistent and our hearts dependable, regardless of adversity from within or without.  We can delight in the flaws we perceive around us as we strive to make things better.  Keep radiating your own Moral Joy as you see what needs to be done and you DO it! Keep doing your Good Work!

With so much love,

Yours aye,

Nancy

Asking "For a Friend"

Greetings Dear Friends!

A woman in her early seventies comes in and deposits a vintage hunter green wool coat on the counter.  The lining is what we call “ripe”—in that any kind of touching it causes it to split and disintegrate along the vertical lines.  There is no sewing a lining like this—it must be cut out completely and replaced.  “I’m asking for a friend,” she says looking at me. “I’ll be your friend!” I say instantly, naively assuming this poor dear is lonely. She purses her lips. “No,” she says, “I don’t need a friend. I already have a friend. This is her coat.  I took it out of her house without her knowing it to see if you could do something about the lining. I’m sick of telling her she needs to get this fixed!” “Gee, that’s too bad,” I say wistfully, “I sure could use a friend like you who would pilfer all the things that need fixing out of my house!” This catches the woman off guard and she looks by turns irritated and confused. “As for this coat,” I continue, “it’s going to be quite a bit of money to replace the lining.  How much of a favor are you willing to do her?” It turns out, not that much.

“I’ll just leave it here with you and tell her how much it is and that she has to call you if she wants to have it done.  At least I have done this much,” the lady says with an exasperated sigh. Yes, at least she had done that much.  How much is too much to do for our friends? It’s a question I ponder for the rest of the day as I marvel at all the boundaries that lady crossed in her benevolent thievery.

Ours is a Friendly shop.  It goes without saying that the women who work here are dear friends.  Quite a number of our customers are also friends, soon become our friends, or bring their own friends. “Patty Payalayta” always comes in without cash or checkbook.  (Perhaps because she is a long-time friend and loyal customer, she always seems surprised that her work costs money.)  She whips out a credit card and then pauses in shock as if hearing for the very first time that we cannot take any form of “plastic” payment. She will take her stuff anyway, promising to mail a check later because she is such a “good friend” and we know she is good for it.  We trust our friends.

There are a variety of archetypes that come in as “friends” to assist one another with the tedious difficulties of getting their clothes adjusted and setting the needle just right on that fashion dial that goes anywhere from “I was just on my way to church to donate alms to the poor” to “I AM the Poor” to “my services are available for hire on an hourly basis.” We need these knowledgeable people to tell us that carrying around a stained mug of cold tea is NOT a fashion accessory or to prevent us from roaming the streets in tight yoga pants with enough panty-lines to make us look like a well-trussed Easter ham. (Not enough people are getting this memo!)

More often than not, “The Friend” is that annoying person who comes with a weak customer to tell her everything she is thinking is wrong.  Yes, I said She.  That’s because I never see any men bringing anyone like this, unless of course she is his wife.  (It takes the matrimonial bondage of church and state to entice a man to submit to the overwhelming strain of a steady stream of well-intentioned advice.) This friend, while not an actual customer, is the authority on everything that customer does.  She is a fashion expert, a tailoring expert, and an expert on how much things should cost.  She will sit through a lengthy pinning and consultation only to advise her friend that she should go elsewhere. 

I recently overheard the following half of a conversation emanating from the dressing room: “So, where’d you get this little number? Did your ex-husband’s new girlfriend pick it out, or what? What do you mean what’s wrong with it? It’s fuggly! No…I definitely was NOT with you when you bought this.  Take it off.  We’re taking it back.  I’m not going to let you do this to yourself…”

How we long to get our fingers in each other’s clay and take over where the Potter left off!  What forbearance it takes to stand back and allow people to hurl themselves towards their own destinies in coats that you think should be longer, shorter, cleaner, or taken to the back yard and burned.  What fortitude it takes to let them roam the earth in colors that make them look like they are awaiting a liver transplant.  Some friends have no idea where they begin and the other person ends.

I observe a lot of tricky partnerships from inside a pair of pants.   I always feel sorry for Little Herman Peckhen:  He is brought in by Mrs. Peckhen who is here in case Herman attempts to say a word—she will say it for him, and quite a few others besides.  She is vastly irritated with him and follows him in to the fitting room to make sure he buttons his trousers properly and puts his shoes on the right feet. She will tell us everything he needs and how things are to fit him. She will tell us what he likes and what he cannot abide under any circumstances, though in the end, it will matter far more how things look to her than how they feel to him. 

The Siamese Brain—every now and then one comes across this amazing duo getting by on one single brain between them.  Since they have only one mind, and they don’t want to wear it out too soon, or lose it altogether, they keep it safely at home a good deal of the time.  Somehow, through deft use of muscle-memory and reflexes, one of them manages to operate a motor vehicle to the shop without incident.  It is there they discover that their Brain has been left at home, often with the wallet, the shoes, or the garment that needed altering.  Every query directed towards them, such as “May I help you?” is like a pop quiz for which they have not studied.  Immediately one turns to the other one with a blank and beseeching look, as if the answer might be written on his/her forehead.

Straight out of a Geritol commercial, Mr. and Mrs. Adorable are the retired couple who come in to show off how cute they are and how they do everything together now that the kids are grown and the mortgage paid off.  Their affection for each other can be seen in the way they gently correct each other’s anecdotes about how good-looking the other one used to be.  He will talk about how she was such “a looker” back in the day and how tiny her waist used to be.  She, thoroughly pleased, will bat his compliments away with shining eyes that belie her protestations.  Something about the way he hands her his trousers makes eye-brow-arched Prudence think their other errand that day will be stopping at the pharmacy to refill their Viagra prescription on the way home. 

There is something endearing yet ultimately cloying about each of these co-dependent, symbiotic dyads. Like any good partnership or pair of pants, there are two legs to them—two sides, working in tandem to maintain a risky sort of balance.  One submits while the other pushes forward with an agenda. I can’t help being convinced that when a woman can be her own best friend, that’s when life gets easier.  We don’t need to boss anyone else around, nor do we need to submit to bossing. When we trust our own competence and inner wisdom, when we know Who We Are and How We Want to Look the dressing room safaris are much simpler.

Friends are supposed to be the people with whom we dare to be ourselves but sometimes our “friends” can be very hard on us, or we on them. I can’t be bothered to look up the information now but I am sure I have read something to the effect that says our blood pressure is lower around our dogs than around our best friends.  Unless of course, our dogs have just taken a dump on the carpet.  Then the blood pressure is apt to sky-rocket. (I’m pretty sure that last part wasn’t in the original study…but I know it is true.)

I think a lot about the partnerships and friendships we enter into.  I think about the Golden Rule: Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. (Ms. Bridesmaid, ask yourself, would you have someone follow you into the dressing room and tell you your gown made you look like you could play tight end for the Patriots? So why are you doing this? Margueritas are no excuse…)  And that other bloody good biblical suggestion: “Love your neighbor as yourself!”  These two maxims are not really about being Nice to other people—though they seem so at first glance. These are Equations, not injunctions.  They say that we must each be strong.  We must bargain as hard on our own behalf as we do for others’ or we risk slipping into the dynamic of slave or tyrant.  We must be equal partners.  It is much better for any relationship when both partners are strong.  As Carl Jung points out, this means embracing the sinner who is yourself as much as forgiving and aiding someone else who is stumbling and imperfect or trying to wear a shade of orange you cannot stand. (I’m pretty sure he didn’t mention the orange part…he surely wanted to and just forgot.)

In my own periods of darkness, during my long, dark nights of the soul, I find myself often overcome and amazed by the ability of people to befriend each other, to love their intimate partners, children, parents, family and do what they can provide for each other’s good and comfort.  I give them immense credit for their ability to act productively and selflessly.  Navigating healthy boundaries when we are trying to love and serve each other is tricky business indeed.  It takes amazing communication skills—both in speaking and in Hearing the Truth.  I think hearing another’s truth requires the most curiosity and courage.  Plenty of people go about blabbing their truths—the only problem is that no one else is listening.

Eventually, Silence is where the real conversation happens between true friends.  It’s great to be able to say anything you want to another person.  It’s even better not to have to say anything at all…  It is in listening to the great Silence within our own hearts that we become our own friends.  Once we do that, we can be nice to anyone! (Yes, Prudence, even if we fall short of Glory, even if we attempt to mold others to our image instead of leaving them as God’s, and even when we find ourselves tempted to pilfer a friend’s ratty coat for her own good.) 

Be well, dear ones! May you be merry and do Good Work!

Yours aye,

Nancy

P.S.  You don’t have to be crazy to be my friend—I’ll train you!

Which guest will you feed?

“Piglet noticed that even though he had a Very Small Heart, it could hold a rather large amount of Gratitude.” A.A. Milne

Greetings my dear Fellow Pilgrims and Pioneers of Life,

Don’t forget to set your scales back! Tomorrow is Thanksgiving Day—the day when patriotic American families gather to feast on traditional foods, crab about referee calls in football, and give thanks for ALL THEY HAVE in preparation for storming the malls less than 24 hours later to trample their fellow Americans in the pursuit of MORE—spending money they don’t have on things they don’t need to give to people they are not even sure they like. (And so the Holly Daze begins…)  As Seamsters, we know it as a day that is particularly hard on pants (and Turkeys, bless them!).  Some of us will eat until we have enjoyed a polite bite of everything and have had “enough.” Some will eat until “full.” Some of us will eat until we hate ourselves and need to be cut out of our jeans—especially when we find out that there are three kinds of potatoes on the table and something called pumpkin chocolate chip cookies for later….  Come Cyber Monday, when the rest of you are cyber-clicking yourselves into debt until March, seamstresses everywhere will be receiving untold numbers of popped buttons, stressed out waistbands, and shattered pants that look like they’ve just barely survived Custard’s Last Stand (or Sit as the case may be).

But I am getting ahead of myself. Let’s focus on the Thanks and the Giving part of the holiday first. As Prudence Thimbleton primly points out, “It’s not Happiness that brings Gratitude; it’s Gratitude that brings Happiness.” In the shop, we’ve been talking all month about things we are grateful for.  We are thankful for a range of everything from thimbles to safety pins and customers who don’t call us every five minutes to see if their stuff is done yet, which it would be if we weren’t so interrupted by calls.  (I am personally very grateful for this job!) We have been dealing with a flurry of customers who need special outfits to wear in front of their families during the holiday.  Their motivations range from “not arriving naked” to deviously making envious sisters wish they had done weight-watchers all summer too.  The people chat about their plans, or lack of plans, whether or not the grandchildren will make it back from Georgia and whatnot…

I listen carefully at my perch and from what I can tell, most people will be bringing along at least two Unplanned Guests. I know how that goes.  I often entertain those guests too. One is there to make war.  She is angry, defiant, and capable of torching more than the crème brulee if she needs to get attention. She is like a character from the Netflix series “The Norsemen” who arrives breathless, clad in animal skins, on a magnificent current of Righteous Ego and firmly held convictions—Certain Rights she needs to fight for, claim, or preserve. There is a knife in her sock and her Honor is at stake in every utterance and gesture she perceives from those around her.  She is desperate to discuss unhelpful things in unhelpful ways. She feeds on the ideas that she deserves more, better, or something different.  In a crowd of people, she is hollow, lonely, removed. She HATES to sit at the kids table.  She is not there for the mashed potatoes and gravy.  She is there to pick a bone.  She is there to feed on every morsel of Un-lovingness she can glean, gathering evidence for her future case against you and all of humanity.

The other guest is the one you really want to sit with:  She is the Angel of Serenity.  She floats in on light and with just a smile, replenishes all that aches within you.  She catches the pain of others with her deep, knowing eyes, and reflects back only love and sympathetic understanding. She is gentle.  She takes all that makes us want to fight and cradles it in her Unconditional Love.  Over and over again, she loves us Just As We Are.  She is warm. She is tender. She is funny. She takes disasters and makes us laugh with new-found unity at the wonderful stories they become.  She creates community.  All the kids want her to sit at their table! She heals, where the other guest wounds. She serves, rather than severs.  She replaces, restores, and revives where the other robs.

They are twin sisters, these two, in our dual nature as humans.  In the heat of certain family gatherings—especially those kinds of families that Hallmark never puts on its festive cards—it takes incredible courage to choose which one of these guests within us we are going to feed. It’s hard, when one feels ambushed by a comment or a look, to take the Peaceful Angel’s soft hand, rather than the weapons offered by the Warrior.  Weapons we all know far too well how to use—(We could have that certain sibling or nephew sobbing in the car, on her/his way home in minutes if we wanted!) Such power, such intensity is so alluring—intoxicating in its force, though weak at its root.  The gentle choice is far less glamorous. It requires dropping deep, getting grounded, breathing soft full breaths, rather than rising up and spinning like a roman candle on the fourth of July.  It requires holding ourselves instead of hitting another or the bottle.  Every triggering moment will be this choice—which guest will you feed?

The inner warrior is the one we must hold with all the love we can muster in our hearts. She is angry because she is afraid and trying to protect her own softness. She will lead you to eat with a hunger you cannot satisfy, or to drink with a thirst you cannot quench, and shop like you have Croesus’ gold to spend, and it will never be enough.  Then she will blame and torment you for not having filled her emptiness. She will be the one berating you when you are broke, exhausted, hung over, staring at a closet full of “nothing fits.”   Only Loving her will bring her to submission. She can only survive because we have forgotten to love her.  Loving her makes her small, contented, ready to sleep.

There is no question which choice will feel better in the long run.  Our souls are not asking for more anger.  No one will suffer more than you if you choose war, even though you might temporarily enjoy the glory of fighting.  It will be the hollow sort of victory that has you limping for the rest of your life. Living takes courage. Holding ourselves peacefully in the midst of wine, combative relatives, and really good pumpkin pie takes an inner kind of parenting we cannot do without Gratitude.  Gratitude gives us instant access to the love we are longing for.  Even the smallest things can make us grateful and be the tiny handles by which we drag ourselves back towards the Light.

A beautiful girl was in the shop recently.  She was complaining about the shape of her nose and the shape of her thighs and the thickness of her ankles.  I wanted to wrap my arms around her and say, “Aw….Sweetheart, can your nose smell? Do you know the scent of a rose? Or puppy breath? Or fresh, sun-dried laundry right off the line? Can those thick little legs of yours run and swim and climb and dance?” What a GIFT to have a body!  Sure, some of us have gotten into bodies, like bumper cars at a carnival, that don’t look quite like or work like some of the other bodies bouncing around out there—but we can still have fun.  We can still enjoy a good ride. May we be grateful for our Bodies.

Some people in the shop struggle with their mental faculties. (Often, one of them is me!) They drop things off and forget to pick them up, or they pick them up and come back two days later forgetting they already came two days ago.  They think we have coats we don’t.  They call three times in a row. They can’t remember where they lost their shoes. We all get side-tracked, find it hard to focus, battle ADD and lack mindfulness.  May we be grateful for our Minds.

Some people have been feeling alone, isolated, left-out.  Others are nursing long-held bitterness over heart-shattering loss. Some are falling in love again anyway as little kindnesses lap away and melt the frozenness within.  Some are being angels here on earth. May we be grateful for our Hearts.

May we be grateful for our Spirits which long for beauty and music and Connection and Community. 

May we be grateful for Each Other—warts and warriors, bumpy-rumpy bumper cars and all.  Life is the FEAST—we are each of us a unique and necessary flavor—some of us, like Prudence, are crab apples; some are kale; (I think I’m a brussel sprout), some are pure Maple syrup or honey; some are nuts or turkeys…we ALL are needed for our tartness and sweetness and comfort and substance. So let your better angels win today--your pants and seamstresses will thank you!

I am grateful for YOU, dear ones!  More than you could ever imagine.  Thank you for reading, thank you for subscribing, thank you for taking your precious time to comment or share. 

With so much Love and Gratitude,

Yours aye,

Nancy

Wishful Thinking

If you look for truth, you may find comfort in the end; if you look for comfort you will not get either comfort or truth only soft soap and wishful thinking to begin, and in the end, despair.”

C.S.Lewis

Greetings Dear Ones!

I am sewing a bridal gown.  I begin by pretending that taking up the shoulders so much (four inches!!) will not change the structure of the gown.  When I realize I now have to incorporate a disproportionately large sleeve that no longer fits, I pretend that I can just gather it.  When the resulting lumps make it look like the bride will be hiding dinner rolls under there, I pretend that I can just make a center seam where now there is none.  When that is blazing a crooked trail down her arm like the white dot trail on nearby Mount Monadnock, I pretend I can camouflage it with lace and beading… On it goes… my fantasy life with this gown—one wish making way for other wishes—each wish getting smacked by a new, emerging Reality that cannot be denied.  I am looking for comfort, as C.S. Lewis would say, rather than truth.  The truth is that I don’t want to mess with lowering the armhole because there were too many bones involved—both mine, and those belonging to the dress. (Yes, most fancy dresses have more “bones” than a bad piece of haddock. They are little plastic rods added to seams for the dual purpose of supporting the structure of the dress and driving innocent seamstresses to drink.) Besides, this bride does not need the extra space there.  She has skinny upper arms. “Never wielded a pitchfork in her life!” mutters Prudence.  I sew on, with that combination of hasty, lazy Diligence that I do best—trying to atone for my short-cuts with other shortcuts.  I think, not for the first time of that maxim emblazoned on swim-team T-shirts everywhere: “Winners make a habit of doing things Losers don’t want to do.” I am not quite sure yet if I am winning or losing with this gown.

There is a lot of wishful thinking in sewing, as in Life. (Was it not wishful thinking on the bride’s part to think that she could buy a dress so out of proportion to her body and have us wave a magic wand, or needle, over it and have all that extra fabric just magically disappear?) The Wiki definition of wishful thinking is “the formation of beliefs and making decisions according to what might be pleasing to imagine instead of by appealing to evidence, rationality, or reality.”  Also known as thinking that eating salad for six days will make you a size 6, or believing that one tank of gas should last a week, despite three trips to Vermont.

Sometimes, I am blundering my way towards Truth through a series of failed experiments. This is pure Science.  But when the desire for something to be true takes the place of evidence for the truthfulness of the claim, it becomes a logical fallacy or a cognitive bias that causes one to evaluate evidence very differently based on the desired outcome.

Example #1:

I wish I was a size [x]. Therefore, I am a size [x].  Size [x] is what I buy.  I cannot understand why it looks terrible on me.   

Prudence says: Madam, wishing it to be so, and finding it to be so are two entirely different matters. Empiricism wins the day, at least in dressing rooms.  Blind faith should be reserved only for God and rooting for the Patriots.

Example #2:

I know in my heart of hearts that you can fix this for me and make me look like something out of a magazine.

Prudence says: No, Madam, you don’t know that, (unless the magazine happens to be “Cast Iron Skillet” or “National Geographic”) and what the heck is your “heart of hearts” anyway?  You need two EYES, not two hearts—heck, even half a brain would do...  LOOK in the mirror. This is classic wishful thinking -- wanting your closed-eye “vision” so badly that you begin pretending that it is/has to be true.  In fact, it is so possible in your mind that that there will be no one to blame but Everyone Else if we fail you.  (Just because you spent thousands on this gown does not mean this is not your fault!)

Exception: When wishful thinking is expressed as a hope, wish, or prayer and no belief is formed as a result, then it is not a fallacy because no direct or indirect argument is being made.

I really hope that I don’t have to undo all this beading! I really hope she likes this! Is it lunchtime yet?

What I am learning about Wishful Thinking here at my little sewing table is that wishing for something to be true is a powerful technique when and only when, a) you have an influence on what it is you want to be true and b) you take action to make it come true -- not just wish for it to be true. Magic doesn’t happen by wishing. It happens with Doing.  Only Doing changes facts.  As a sewing “scientist” I can mess with the current “fact” that this dress does not fit by changing all the variables within my power to change.  As John Adams said, “Facts are stubborn things; and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passions, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence.”  No amount of wishing has ever made mosquitoes suck fat instead of blood.

I read a lot about the Law of Attraction and about the theory that says “whatever we think about most” will come to us.  It’s an intriguing idea but I must confess my doubts and wonder if it is not just another form of Wishful Thinking.   If it were true, I would have a lot more cookies in my life and no broken appliances in my home. (This week alone, my washer, the stove, and the hoover are all awaiting repair!)  I never think about breaking things.  It just happens.  I think about cookies all the time yet never have them.   I spend an inordinate amount of my days, sewing quietly and wishing fervently:

I hope both arms of this coat turn out the same.

I wish this woman had washed her pants before bringing them in to be mended.

I wish that very tall, skinny young man had not bought all those ragged, portly-short waistcoats at the consignment shop and brought them here to be tailored for himself (It’s wishful thinking on his part to think these things will ever fit him right or remain any sort of bargain after we put twenty hours into remaking them)…

I wish my bank account filled up as easily as my dirty laundry basket.

I wish I could have faith that our government always served the will of its people. 

I wish certain customers came with warning labels.

I wish everyone I knew enjoyed perfect health and vibrancy...

 Not all wishes can come true.  I have a recently-divorced friend who commiserates, saying, “I don’t have a lot of wishes. I just want to play my fiddle, drink some decent gin, laugh a lot, and then take my cute ass home to love the same man every night—why is that so hard?”  I don’t know.   Some days, I wake up feeling so ugly inside I wonder if I should just eat my bag of make-up rather than apply it to my face. I wish I could climb inside the dryer and shrink my skin for ten minutes, instead of my jeans. I wish life was easier for us all.  As Burgess Meredith’s character says in the movie Grumpy Old Men, “Well, you can wish in one hand and crap in the other and see which gets filled first.”

We need to stay away from useless wishful thinking as much as we need to stay away from anyone who makes us feel like we are too hard to love.   Wishes are a form of magical thinking that says we can make wonderful changes without doing any work—though To Wish is one of those primordial, axiomatic elements of Being.  Such is our human condition:  Between the rocks and the stars, we make our home.  We can wish on all those stars but we live here, in the dirt, made of Dust ourselves, so it’s no wonder we crave sparkle. It’s absolutely necessary that we thirst for and create Beauty where we can.  Sometimes, our wishes lead to other wishes; sometimes they conflict with our other desires, or the desires of others. When we come together and share our wishes, prioritize them, evaluate what is actually Possible—then we arrange them into hierarchies of what is Do-able.  This makes them, and us, Sophisticated. We get Organized. We begin to work with each other, with the desires of other people and the wider world beyond our own closets.  Our wishes lead to our values.  Our values become our morality.  Our morality leads our actions.  Our actions become the foundations of the Good we leave behind.  Sometimes we don’t get what we want until we get up and just DO that Thing Which Must Be Done. Don’t tell me you didn’t get everything you “wished for” in the last election or that sale at Macy’s. Tell me how you are now building a bridge to what is Possible.

Be well, be Merry and Kind my dearies—and do Good Work!  Wishing you the BEST sort of day,

Yours aye,

Nancy

P.S. For those of you “wishing” I revealed more outcomes in these blogs, that bride turned out very happy with her sleeves—we got very lucky with the beading and the lace.  Some wishes do come true!