Sunday afternoons, which used to seem packed with all the right things, gape at me with bleak absence, so I use that time to cogitate and scribble -- or something along those lines. But the approaching arrival of babies to people I love has sent me off on different afternoon endeavors.
I know women who are Quilters; I'm not. But I enjoy the search for the right melding of complex pattern and fabric. I draw up a model and color it to scale. I visit at least two different stores, at least two times each -- carrying with me a bag of the pieces I've already bought -- adding, taking away, sometimes starting all over...until I find the combination that fits together in all the right ways.
Although I enjoy the design phase the best, all my graph paper renderings and glued swatches do not a quilt make. I can visualize it, I can describe it, but it isn't actually there until I measure and cut and sew and iron and sew and trim and sew...for as many blocks as I planned.
It feels like faith.
Sometimes I retain the vision and am feverishly snipping and whirring and pressing.
Other times I have to remove three blocks to rework a row. I've probably taken out as many seams as I've put in, using it as break to sit down and put my feet up while I spend quality time undoing the work I thought I'd completed.
When I'm overwhelmed at the immensity of the project, I lay whatever is finished on the peninsula counter and walk all around it. Eventually, the piecework soothes and encourages me until my circling becomes admiration and I have to remind myself that there are thirty-nine more blocks that won't get done unless I start working again.
It is a common condition in this broken world to be stuck in the place of waiting for God to do the work of healing that only He can do. Meanwhile, we continue: picking up small cut squares, matching up the edges as closely as possible, running a straight seam and pressing it open to take a look.
Some days it feels like bewildering insanity to believe that He is real, and is at work...accomplishing beauty no matter how devastating it all appears to be. Other days the pattern is emerging, and the colors are aligning to create balance.
Standing at my kitchen counter, good things are happening beyond that amazingly stunning, cunningly-fitted treasure that will communicate love for a new human being and her parents (if it all turns out according to my modest plans).
I'm laying aside the urgency and hurry. I'm learning to settle into the joy of the process. I'm less angered by the broken needles, empty bobbins and awkward seams.
It feels like faith.
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