Tonight, I send you to the newest Scout. If you care about the state of the American quilt — and everyone should — then read this. Why?
Because I bring very, very good news.
Love,
Mar
In the newspaper office yesterday morning, Sophie asked me the best question I have ever been asked.
I was at my computer and Sophie was at her computer and she turned to me with her beautifully lipsticked red lips and her gorgeous tortoise shell glasses and she addressed me as “Miss Mary” because that is how Sophie often addresses me and I love that and she said:
“Miss Mary,” she said, “I made paleo chocolate-banana muffins last night. I have them in my knapsack. Would you like one?”
I know what you’re thinking. “That’s the best question you’ve ever been asked?? What about ‘Will you marry me?’ What about ‘What do you want for Christmas, little girl?'”
No, no, no. Sure, the proposal was great, but we know how that turned out. And Santa? Please. He’s creepy and you never really get what you want, anyway. What you want for Christmas is for peace on Earth and to be deeply, purely, supremely happy forever, which is impossible. No, a question can’t be perfect unless the answer is a) easy to give and b) certain not to ruin lives, regardless of what that answer is. Let’s look at Sophie’s question again:
“I made paleo chocolate-banana muffins last night. I have them in my knapsack. Would you like one?”
Saying yes to this is easy because Sophie’s baked goods are made of unicorns and nutrition. But even if I didn’t want to eat one of these (perfect-for-my-ruined-guts) muffins, no lives would be ruined. So, you see? A perfect question.
When I took a bite of that muffin, I broke into the biggest smile. I actually started laughing, that’s how good it was. Its consistency? Angelic. The chocolate-to-banana flavor relationship? Harmonious. My only complaint? Too small.
How I needed that muffin moment! How I needed Sophie’s unicorns and nutrition. I was coming out of my funk and this was the final, gentle push. I know, I know: It was a freakin’ muffin. But the timing. The timing, you guys.
Eating that baked good — it took three bites and then I licked the paper — I felt like a baby trying chocolate for the first time. That’s how great. And I knew about that feeling because of the picture you see above.
That’s me up there, out at the farm in Iowa, in the Yellow House. I’m pretty sure the photo is capturing my first chocolate experience, though Mom could say for sure. When I ate Sophie’s muffin yesterday, I was instantly reminded of this photo of myself — there’s actually a series of them. I emailed Mom for the picture, apologizing for the random request. But I felt the only way for me to express my gratitude to Sophie and her gift was to show her that picture, show her how she gave me more than a baked good. She gave me a memory of joy.
Mom wrote back right away:
“Hi, honey. Mark and I just arrived on Washington Island…but I have that picture on my hard drive. Tell Sophie hi. Love, Mom.”
I’ve been a little maudlin lately and you’ve all been very kind about it.
My impulse is to apologize for getting boo-hooey, wingeing on about being sick, being vague, and feeling overwhelmed. But I’m one of those people who tends to apologize when someone else bumps directly into me and I’ve been told that’s bad. (Sorry.) So I won’t apologize for being in a bit of a blue, sentimental place lately. I’ll just tell you that I very, very much appreciate you patting my arm and waiting for it to pass (thanks for all the comments and emails, guys, holy cow) and I’ll tell you that I’m pretty sure this particular mini-Blue Period is done.
I owe it all to Nancy Holman.
I’m researching Log Cabin quilts right now for an Exciting Project and I would like to share with you something that I read this morning that popped me out of my funk on contact. It is a passage taken from the “work diary” of this Mrs. Holman, a Missouri homesteader in the 1860s and 1870s. At one point, she describes her chores in full. These are her chores:
“Shearing sheep and washing the wool; twisting thread; making and dyeing yarn; spinning flax and tow; weaving cloth; planting and tending the garden and preserving its produce; rendering lard and making soap and candles; watering and milking the cows; slaughtering the hogs; picking cotton; sewing carpet rags; making baskets and brooms; and, of course, maintaining the routine of cleaning and scouring floors and furniture, as well as washing, ironing, cooking, and sewing.”
If you’re like me, right now your eyes are very big and you are feeling a mixture of deep horror and wild admiration. You may be shaking your head and thinking to yourself, “None of the problems that I have would exist if I had to work that hard doing all those things every single day.”
I’m with you. Who has time to worry if her jeans look cute if she’s got a hog to slaughter and a broom to make? Penpals and stubborn head colds? Please! Get to rendering that lard and spin some flax. Get over it!
In our ways, of course, we are all as busy as Nancy. I’m serious! We’re as busy as any humans ever have been, but there’s no arguing that things we’re busy with are slightly different now and require less literal blood and sweat. We may feel this or that type of way about the things we have to do in our lives that aren’t 100% fun — those feeling are valid — but I for one am very, very grateful that I do not have to make my own soap. Some people would argue that I might find deep happiness, making my own soap. They can go ahead and argue that. I wonder if they have ever smelt lard as it renders. I have. It is not good.
Anyway, thanks, Nancy. I needed to get out of my head and you did that for me.
And she still found time to quilt.
Yesterday, I drove almost to the Iowa border to give a lecture for a lovely audience in Morrison, Illinois. The lecture went great, I met 116 wonderful people, and I very much enjoyed my time on the road. Driving 2.5 hours there and 2.5 back, even though it rained almost the whole way, gave me some much needed thinking time. It’s hard to multitask when you’re driving; you just have to cruise. It was nice to cruise.
The car I was driving was a rental. I’ve mentioned before, I don’t own a car, because unless you absolutely have to have one, if you can avoid owning a car in the city, you should probably avoid it. But by the time I got back downtown, the Hertz location was closed. This wasn’t a surprise: Carmen told me I’d have to return the car the next morning.
I parked my little red Ford Focus in the lot near my house and paid the overnight parking fee. My voucher would expire at 7:27 a.m., so when I went to bed last night, I set my alarm for 6:30 a.m. to give myself plenty of time to have some tea and get down to the lot to purchase either a new voucher or get the car moved to a different parking spot until it was time to take it back to Hertz. This was the plan. (See what I mean about having a car in the city? Bleh!)
But because I am behind on sleep, I hit my snooze button…multiple times. When I finally realized it was way past time to get up, I did not have time to make my tea and have a cup of it before I needed to go down and deal with Little Miss Focus. This made me very, very grumpy. Usually when I wake, before I do anything — before I scratch my ribs or yawn or rub the sleep from the ol’ peepers — I roll out of bed, stand up, and go directly into the kitchen to put the kettle on. I don’t use the bathroom. I don’t check my phone. I don’t even look out the window to see if the world fell down while I was sleeping. My first impulse is make sure tea is on the way. Once the burner’s on, other things are possible. Barely.
Yeah, well, that wasn’t gonna happen this morning. With grunts and protestations that could put your grumpiest, orneriest Grampa to shame, I hollered and shoved my feet into my sneakers, stabbed my arms through my jacket, threw my wallet into my pocket, stuffed my keys into my pocket and went down the elevators and out the back of the building to deal with the (blinkin’) car.
I got down there and got right inside because it was raining, of course. I sat there. I took some deep breaths. I thought about how I was about to pay $12 for more of parking only to turn back around in a couple hours and take it to Hertz. I sighed and thought about how my Tea Moment was already sort of ruined. I thought, “Fons, why not just take the dang thing back right now?” And I decided, after rubbing my forehead a little while, that that is what I would do. I could get some tea at the Peet’s across the street and just be done with it. I didn’t have makeup on. I hadn’t showered. But as long as I didn’t see anyone I knew, it was the way to go.
After dropping the car off, I stepped out of the Hertz parking garage and found the rain had stopped. It was just barely 8:00 a.m. The city was so…calm. I had a nice cup of tea in my hand and — this is important — I didn’t have a purse or anything with me. My wallet was in my pocket. I had my sneakers on. It was a straight shot down State Street to my home. (Later, when I looked it up on Google’s map, I learned it was a 1.4 mile walk. Nothing, really.)
I sort of cocked my head and went, “Hm!” And I just walked home. In the morning, with nothing but my thoughts and the wwwwsssssssshhhhhhhh of the occasional street sweeper on a cross street or the trundle of the El trains crossing the river. I saw the homeless folks on State sleeping in the doorways; it was still quiet enough for them to stay in their strange nests. I saw a couple joggers. I saw some cops. It was beautiful to be there, unfettered, in my city.
When it happens that I am up and out and walking in the morning — it happens when I have, say, a rental car to return — I am reminded how much I love to walk in the morning. I did it on New Year’s Day, actually, and I swore then I’d try to do it more.
My tea ritual is so ingrained. It’s rote. I love my morning tea. It’s been my morning thing for a good ten years. Ten years! But the sweetness of early ambulation, the freedom and perspective of the walk down State Street this morning, it’s stayed with me all day.
And so, to you, I am going to make a promise: Starting tomorrow, for one week, I am going to take my tea outside in the morning. I’m going to walk, you guys. Half-hour or so. The weather is nice enough to try. Let’s see what happens.
What if it’s the key to everything?
I waxed on about my penpal yesterday and today, I’ll wax off. (That means I’ll wrap it up. I had to make the joke!)
The question posed on a postcard from my mystery penpal asked if there was more to life than pure biology. And I said I’d answer today. But when I sat down to write, I remembered that I don’t tackle spiritual/religious topics on the ol’ PG, as a rule — it’s just too personal a topic, I guess — so I am going to hereby back out of the question.
What I will do, however, is list ten things that I believe are pretty wonderful:
I could keep going, of course. But those things, to me, cause me to believe that life is more than biology. I mean, dulce de leche? That is divinely inspired stuff. And marmalade kittens? And my sisters? Come on. It’s all pure good.
Maybe my next letter to my penpal will answer this question more fully; it would be good for me to write more about it and after all, he asked. When I’m done thinking on paper, I’ll send that paper through the mail — that incredible, magical system that transforms mere words into something more official, more real, more meaningful.
Thanks, [PENPAL], for your friendship and for giving me the opportunity to write letters. PaperGirls like that stuff.