Mending

When I was a kid, nearly all hobbies and sports were still divided into gendered buckets. Boys played baseball, girls played softball. Boys wrestled, girls played volleyball. Etc.

I was upset I couldn’t wrestle or play football on an actual team and tended to resent other traditionally feminine hobbies and proclivities being forced upon me.

That went double for sewing. I recall my mother offering to teach me on more than one occasion, and me refusing with nary a thought. “One day you’ll wish you knew how,” she threatened. I don’t recall my response, but it almost certainly involved a scoff or an eye roll. Maybe both.

At one point she even took me to a family friend’s house and had her try to teach me how to use a sewing machine. I don’t recall how I handled the interaction: There are just vague memories of sewing patterns and mind-numbing boredom.

I did, at least, agree to learn how to repair wayward buttons, which has been my sole specialty. It’s sufficed but I’d be lying if I didn’t admit: My mom was right. I’ve often found myself wishing I had (and knew how to use) a sewing machine.

My daughter – much like me to my mother – is very much so my opposite (“complement” might be a less antagonistic way to phrase it). Whatever I try to teach her, she rejects. And whatever I don’t know how to do: She develops a passionate interest in.

Two summers ago she went to an art camp where she was taught the basics of using a sewing machine, and she’s been begging for one ever since. We finally got her one this past Christmas, only to be hit with the hard reality: She didn’t know how it set it up, and I hadn’t the foggiest idea where to start. Because I was too busy being contrarian as a kid to just… listen. I regret that now.

It took us half a day of watching videos to figure it all out: What a bobbin is. How to set them up (there are two?!) when sewing. How to thread the needle once it’s on the machine. And about a gazillion other things. By the time it was ready for her first project, I half-understand the basics – and felt like I’d unlocked the universe.

In the weeks since, the vent in our dryer broke mid-cycle, and various clothes and linens got stuck. Some were torn to the point of ruin. Some have little holes we’re turning a blind eye to. But some – like this napkin – were somewhere in-between, and we had to made a decision: Fix it or toss it.

So out came the sewing machine and with it: My first-ever project. A homemade patch.

It isn’t perfect, and it took me so long to finish I’m convinced it would’ve been faster if I’d done it by hand. But I’m proud of this little patch. It doesn’t match the linen, not even close, but that’s OK. It’s a reminder that it can take a decade or two (or three) before the lessons your parents teach you really catch up to you.

In that, and many other ways, I’m still learning.

What We Have Lost

This has been a year of taking inventory. I count three boxes full of ashes, light and insubstantial, scorched earth where once there was water and weight.  

I can hold my bodybuilding father with a single hand, my mother too, though I wrap both arms around them for good measure. I place them side by side and stare at their oaken reflection in a mirror before my gaze turns to the rest of their once-upon-a-time.  

I count empty beds, empty chairs, empty shirts and shoes. 

I see the Cubs jersey he wore when my big brother was in little league. I see the chess set he made by hand. I see cheap winter boots, still muddy from the last time he wore them.  

I see her hutch full of mementos and tea cups: a collection carefully curated over the course of a lifetime. I see an old cabinet covered in chipped paint that she never got to restore. I see family photos posted alongside grandchildren’s artwork (treasured as if it belonged in a museum).

I see the antique trunks they refurbished together. 

I see the old dictionary he purchased when he was a student, the pages at once crisp and worn following decades of careful use. 

I see the binoculars that accompanied him on trips to his tree stand, where he would watch (but never shoot) deer — the same binoculars she would later use to spy on a family of cardinals that moved into her backyard. 

I see the lists I made when I thought lists might somehow save her.

I see dark where there was once light. Impressions where there was once shape. 

I hear the ringing in my ears where there was once the shuffle of tired feet. 

This has been a year of deprogramming. Of stuttering past the dozens of Pavlovian instincts that marked my day. 

Of taking photos and sending them to no one.  

Of sitting down for lunch and reaching needlessly for my phone. 

Of hearing a pun and clenching my jaw. 

Of seeing a black shadow and waiting for it to move.

It has been a year of distance. Of grandparents disappearing into the dark corners of nursing homes.

Of cancelled play dates and the rise of Zoom.

Of pacing from one white wall to the next and dreaming of life beyond them.

Of relationships strained by politics and politics magnified by social media.

Of six foot distances extrapolated by an infinitude of months.

It has been a year without distraction. A year without movies, without theater, without concerts.

A year without relief. A year where the agony of loss upon loss upon loss has been compounded by the total and absolute lack of everything and everyone.

A year where nerve damage climbed onto grief’s back and clawed its way out, leaving a trail of scars in its wake.

This is our broken year. I pick up the pieces and swallow them whole, dust and decay where once there were stars.