Weaving The Dream

More than twenty years ago, I had the opportunity to spend three weeks in August at Haystack Mountain School of Crafts in Maine, while my mother and husband took care of our three sons, who were between the ages of eighteen months and six years.  It was a special time for me to explore my creativity after constant childcare since the birth of the first of our sons.

One night, I entered the women’s bathroom and found a woman at least ten years older than me, standing over the sink and crying.  When I asked her what was wrong, she told me that that day would have been her son’s 20th birthday but he had died several years ago in a car accident.  I didn’t know what to say so I stood and listened to her tell the story.  And, of course, I felt the fear that every mother fears when she hears stories like this—what if?

I have a nephew who, with his wife, lost his child to a rare disease before she had a chance to reach her first birthday.  Attending the funeral, I watched the mother grieve and thought—why?

I have a friend who, as a single mom, lost her only child, a son, to cancer when he was in his teens.  Her journey through grief has been one of desperate courage in the midst of pain and depression.  And I wonder—how?

When we give birth to our children, we give birth to hopes and dreams and possibilities.  But we also give birth to our worst nightmares and to nights of constant worry.  To crossed fingers and endless prayers.  And to all the whys and hows and what ifs.

Once we give birth, become mothers, we are always mothers.  There is never an end.  It is who we are for the rest of our lives.  Even when those we mother are gone before us.

Today is Mother’s Day when, if we are lucky, our children send cards or call to wish us Happy Mother’s Day. 

But what do we say to those mothers whose children are gone?  Happy Mother’s Day seems wrong somehow.  And yet they remain mothers.  Mothers who need to be recognized and honored for the love they gave and for the love they still bear.  Mothers who need to be held and supported as they remember the sons and daughters they have lost to illness, violence, and war.

Being a mother—or a father—takes great courage in today’s world.  And great love.

Here’s to all the mothers on Mother’s Day.

Part of the joy of celebrating a new year is letting go of and saying goodbye to the old year, especially if that year has been particularly challenging.The year both my mother and grandfather died, and the year my husband’s father and then mother died were two years I remember being particularly glad to say good bye to, embracing the following New Years with a sense of hope and relief.

“Change can come on tiptoe, Love is where it starts…”

Barbara Streisand sang Marvin Hamlisch’s tune from the DJ’s speakers as my oldest son, Stephen held me and moved me around the dance floor.

Finally, I thought, I get to dance with my son, even though I had to wait until he was 30 and at his wedding reception to get to do it.

But as he twirled me and spun me, and as I sang the words of the song to him, I realized we had danced together before. Only I did the twirling, holding his small body in my arms, his pajama-clad feet barely reaching my waist, as I sang nursery rhymes to him to ease him into sleep.

“Ordinary miracles, Happen all around, Just by giving and receiving, Comes belonging and believing…”

Where did the time go?  Now, here he was, spinning me, amidst a circle of friends and family, each group marking a stage of Stephen’s life.  His childhood friend, Jesse, who spent so much time in our house each summer he was like an adopted fourth son.  Stephen’s friends from college, with whom he became more steadily himself.  His colleagues at work, a couple of who were the matchmakers for he and his new wife, Mindy.  And, finally, the new circle of friends and family that Mindy brings into his life.

“Every sun that rises, Never rose before, Each new day leads the way, Through a different door…”

And as we sat an hour earlier in the melting Virginia sun, watching Stephen and Mindy say their vows, I wondered, when did Bob and I move through this door?  And where did the days go that led us to be celebrating not only Stephen and Mindy’s wedding that day but Bob’s and my 34th wedding anniversary as well?  How did we get from three small pajama-clad boys who needed singing to sleep to three tall young men in tuxes?  Wow!

And yet, here we were.  Stephen, standing before us holding Mindy’s hands, promising to love her, just as Bob had promised to love me, while his two brothers along with two other friends stood as groomsmen.

Ordinary miracles.  Often our children may seem more ordinary than miraculous but then there are the moments, like the sudden slumping of an infant’s body against my shoulder into sleep, or like that Saturday evening, when I was held by my now-adult son, that we know…

“No lightning bolt or clap of thunder, Only joy and quiet wonder, Endless possibilities, Right before our eyes, Oh, see the way a miracle multiplies…”

Who would have thought that a wedding 34 years ago would lead to this?  A wedding anniversary, three grown handsome, healthy sons, and the wedding of our oldest to a lovely young woman who loves and supports our son.   We could only imagine.  And when by cooperation of the Fates, it happens? 

Ordinary miracles!

Yesterday I received an email from the husband of a weaving customer of mine.  He works for the Library of Congress and had discovered that my book, Weaving a Woman’s Life: Spiritual Lessons from the Loom, was there, properly catalogued and shelved.

Wow! I thought.  My book.  In the Library of Congress, where my sons can find it and, when the day comes, their children can find it as well.  When I shared this delightful information with a friend, she said it was one of my legacies.

And that got me thinking about the word legacy—something handed down by a predecessor, sometimes a gift in a will.  Something we leave behind for others.

My house is filled with legacies.  There are the paintings and sculpture created by my mother who died of breast cancer at the age of 53.  An avid antique buyer and collector, she also left me the large Early American china cabinet in our dining room, my collection of antique sewing collectibles, and the oak washstand in our family room, among many other things.

My father gave me the small, etched water glass that belonged to his grandmother bearing her name, Cornelia, and “Chautauqua 1895”.  I also have the oak kitchen table that belonged to my father’s mother and father, which he and his sisters used to run and hide under when they were growing up.  My paternal grandfather gave me the mantle clock that sat in his parlor but didn’t run.  Years after my grandfather’s death, my father repaired it and it now sits ticking on our mantle.

As a young girl, I always longed for a vanity table.  After my mother’s aunt died, I received one of hers along with the mirrored tray, hand mirror, and face powder holder.

The interesting thing about legacies is that you usually don’t just receive the item—you also receive the memories about the person who handed it down.  In this way, a small part of his or her spirit or presence remains in your life.

One of the best examples of this, and for me one of the legacies I treasure most is the collection of daylilies my father has given me.  An avid aficionado, my father has raised and bred daylilies for years, even earning certification as a daylily judge.  His flowerbeds trumpet over 50 types of daylilies.

Knowing that he and my stepmother intend to move soon, last year he carefully went through and divided his daylilies to give me fans or rootings of each type.  Some I planted last year and some are still waiting in pots for their permanent homes.

They are in full bloom right now, many of them, and I perambulate along their beds, talking to them, complimenting them on their exquisite beauty, removing the spent blooms, and all the time, I am thinking of my father and the care and commitment he gave to these flowers. 

Like the lilies, if given care and commitment, our children are living legacies.  How we raise them, who they become as people can affect family, friends, communities, and the world well into the Future.  My three loving, compassionate, creative sons are my and my husband’s most significant legacy.

Legacies are important.  They provide connection and foundation for the present and the future.  They can give us something to hold onto or push away from.

What legacies have been passed down to you?  What are you leaving behind for others?

It is a bright Sunday spring morning.  Bob and I take Duncan for our weekly walk at a nearby wildlife preserve.  The morning perambulation will be followed by a breakfast of blueberry pancakes and sausage cooked and served by Bob.

As usual, Duncan stops every few feet to sniff at bush and branch, and to leave his own pungent note.  Unfortunately, one of his off-the-path investigations nets him a cluster of burdock burrs in his right front leg.

Arrggh!  The thing we hate most!  Duncan is a collie with long hair.  And collies are sensitive, especially this collie, whom we adopted from a shelter after he had been left on a chain for nine months with minimal grooming.  Matted hair does not a happy dog make.

After ten years of loving and patient grooming, Duncan still whines, yips, and barks at Bob before, during, and after the extensive combing and trimming.  Even with a steady supply of treats.

However, he has learned over the years that it is a far, far better thing to let us remove the burrs as soon as possible before they become even more entangled.  Sure, we could just take a pair of scissors and cut the burrs out but then I am not sure the punk look is really in this season for collies.  So he will stand or sit with dog-saintly forbearance while we remove burrs, because we have learned the secret (No, not that Secret.  This has more to do with the law of detraction than attraction.)

The secret?  To not pull the burr away from the dog, but to pull the dog, or the dog hair, away from the burr.  By holding onto the burr and gently pulling the hair away from the burr strand by strand, the snarl comes undone and the burr releases its grip.  Pulling on a burr just entangles it in the hair even more and makes a dog growly.

This approach is similar to the one I use for dealing with tangles of yarns or threads.  Most people get a snarl or tangle in something, be it thread, hair, relationships, or creative project, and they just pull and tug and even yank, hoping that sheer force will bring the desired result.   Instead the snarls and tangles get tighter and more resistant and someone or something gets hurt.

As a weaver, who has had to untangle many snarls of yarns and even fine threads, I have learned that gently teasing tangles open from several angles will loosen the knots enough for me to follow a thread end back through to the source of the problem.  Pretty soon, voila, a nicely rolled ball of yarn instead of a nasty nest of knots.

Untangling anything, whether it is burr-matted hair, snarled yarn, a messy relationship, or a creative problem, requires a Zen kind of patience.  I have to be willing to sit patiently in the moment following the problem back to its source, loosening and separating the threads of thoughts, feelings, and actions, loop by loop, hair by hair, idea by idea, until things fall into place.

Untangling is a great meditative practice, and great way to approach a problem—if we can just slow down long enough.  The reward?  A ball of yarn that can be used instead of thrown away.  A relationship that is renewed.  A new approach or technique for creative action.

A happy dog who nuzzles you, tail wagging ecstatically, and barks, “Now where are those blueberry pancakes?”

This past weekend was my last craft show.

Wow!  I say that and then I want to put all kinds of qualifiers around it.  Like maybe it was the last craft show in Virginia.  Or maybe it was the last craft show for the foreseeable future.  After all, I have been exhibiting at craft shows, both wholesale and retail for 15 years. 

Putting an end to something we have invested a lot of time and energy into is difficult, especially when it is a relationship, business, or career.  Who we are, how we think the world sees us, and our source of challenge, growth, and fulfillment can get too tied up in things outside ourselves.

And I did put a lot of time and energy into growing the business.  I was office manager, marketing and sales person, and shipping clerk as well as designer and weaver.  I spent most of the 10 hours per day, at least six days a week winding warp, threading looms, weaving, and tying and re-tying fringe.  I often spent three or four nights before a show awake until 2 in the morning to finish work and ready it for my display, making sure seams were straight, threads were snipped, and labels applied.

While my business was successful enough to pay the business’s bills and make payments on the college loans my husband and I took out for our three sons, I never made enough of an income to support myself or anyone else.  My husband did that.  But the business, especially the shows, provided other benefits, usually intangible.

The craft show circuit provided a place of community, learning, and growth.  As a weaver and writer, it is too easy for me to isolate myself in my woodland studio and forget the world.  Going to shows in places like Philadelphia, Baltimore, Chicago, San Francisco, Sarasota, Boston, and Washington DC allowed me to move out into a world of new sights, sounds, and tastes, and meet new people.  The show circuit also forced me to learn the importance of niche marketing and not under-pricing your work, how to engage and understand the needs of your customer, and to get over my fears of driving in unfamiliar and heavily trafficked areas.

While at the shows, I discovered and acquired clothing, jewelry, gifts, and art to decorate my home that I would never have otherwise.

Being part of the show circuit also gave me an opportunity to spread my wings as a writer, as I wrote artist profiles and business articles for two different professional crafts business magazines and thereby acquired credentials to write for other publications.

Our sons learned the value of careers that don’t involve a 9-5 routine, that allow some measure of independence, and that value things like creativity, passion, and exploration.

Most of all, being part of the craft show community meant meeting and making friends of some incredible people, all with unique stories, a strong desire for independence, and a passion for fine crafts.

Also, through the experiences of the show circuit, I found myself encouraging others to explore their creativity as they stood in my booth and said “I am not creative,” which led to my study and practice of creativity coaching; I spent months and years weaving, giving me the inspiration and knowledge to write Weaving a Woman’s Life: Spiritual Lessons from the Loom; and I couldn’t help but see that though we all start with the same materials, the miracle that is the human brain allows us to create with those materials in defiantly unique ways.  And it is because of the gifts of these experiences that I am ready to grow a new career, a new business.

I will still travel to new places and meet new people, but now I will be sharing weavings of another sort—the weaving of words and events through writing and speaking and coaching.  I want to teach and share with others the magic of dreams, the passionate joy of creativity, and the mystical delight of connecting to the spiritual self.

Will I continue to weave and sell my weaving? Absolutely!  At conferences, workshops, online, and from my studio.  So don’t hesitate to email me if you want a shawl for meditation, or a scarf for your mother.  The weaving I do now will be custom—for you.  It will now just be part of all I do—not all I do.

So I walked out of the show on Sunday after packing up my booth with the help of my son and his fiancée, and I knew I was doing the right thing because I felt no regret, only excitement for new possibilities.  And immense gratefulness to a business and community that gave me so much. 

When I was about six or seven years old, my mother taught me how to spell “procrastinate.”  Why?

Well, apparently I began at that early age to practice how to do it—procrastinate—and continued to practice all through elementary school, high school, and right through college, although I did make rare attempts to stop, and practice planning and completing ahead of time instead.

Not that I didn’t like school and schoolwork, you understand.  I loved school.  In fact, I was one of those annoying kids that was upset when school was closed due to weather.

I just always found so many other things to do instead that were either easier to do or more entertaining or were more important, so that the school assignment or paper fell further and further down on my list of things to do until it was due the next day and suddenly—can you beat that?—it shot to the top of the list.

Unfortunately, at that young age, even though I was very good at procrastinating—I did not realize that procrastinating is not viewed as one of the seven habits of highly effective people.  But, since my mother had anchored that word in my brain by making me learn how to spell it with all its 13 (ah, unlucky number of) letters, I at least was aware when I was doing it.

The thing is, when my mother taught me how to spell it she also taught me this was not a good thing to do.  It could get me in trouble.  As a child, that usually meant an unhappy adult was involved.

And I could see her point because after all, staying up until 4 in the morning to finish a term paper while imbibing huge amounts of caffeine was not fun after the first two or three times, and shipping out scarves to a shop after the Christmas rush does not make for a happy customer.

Still, procrastination has its benefits as well as its drawbacks.  Really. 

In the finest tradition of Scarlett O’Hara, some things should be put off until tomorrow.  And with good reason. In my mind, or yours, some tasks can seem unimportant and requiring just too much effort.  For instance…

Cleaning the oven.  I am a champion at putting that one off.  I can procrastinate on that until something inside ignites or we buy a new one, whichever comes first.  And why not?  After all, the food I am cooking doesn’t have to touch the bottom, top, or sides of the oven, and generally, it doesn’t even have to touch the racks, so unless what I am baking bubbles up and over its container and starts to smoke and thereby set off the smoke alarm, there is simply no good reason to clean the oven.  I like that slightly charcoal patina it builds up.  And just think about how much time and energy I save by NOT cleaning the oven…Time I can spend writing or weaving or reading, or doing a whole host of more important or fun things instead!

So, one good reason to procrastinate: you have better things to do.  And, if you put off doing it long enough, the project, assignment, or task will just disappear.

Or go up in flames!

In my dream, I help two of my adult sons sort and clean out the accumulated toys, papers, and mementos of their childhood in a room that looks and feels like my childhood bedroom, when the third son walks in and asks if his stuffed animal is in here.

In waking life, that stuffed animal was a constant companion to my son from infancy through most of elementary school.  His fuzzy companion traveled next to him in the car to the grocery store and on long trips to my parents.  He was carried from room to room in our house and then tucked next to him in bed at night. 

In the dream, I point out the animal, high on a shelf behind some other childhood treasures.  My son pushes aside the stuffed sock clown, and lunchbox-sized vinyl case to pull down his old friend. The vinyl case falls on his head but doesn’t hurt him.  With the animal in his arms, my son is no longer the tall adult but once again a child, his head the height of my waist.

“Mommy,” he says, “he is so clean!”

“I washed him for you,” I say.  Then suddenly my son has the animal crushed against his chest and is crying.  I know, in the dream, that he cries tears of happiness at recovering this beloved part of his childhood.  I hug him to me, comforting him.

I wake up.

Practicing what I teach others, I name the dream “Reclaiming a Childhood Toy.”

Of course, that stuffed animal was more than a toy to my quiet, introverted son—it was companion, pretend playmate, holder of secrets and fears.  Amulet, touchstone, and lodestone all in one huggable being of fake fur and stuffing.

Though the dream seems to be about my son, and on one level it may be, I also know that the dream is very much and more about me.

For one thing, the dream occurs, not in my sons’ bedrooms, but in my childhood bedroom.  The lunchbox-sized vinyl case that falls on my son looks very much like the case in which I kept my favorite doll, Besty McCall, and her clothes.  That case sits in my adult bedroom as I write…

Too, my son and I share the same astrological sign—we are both Leos.

So how is the dream about me?  Well, as we say in dream circle, if this dream were my dream (and it is), I would think that, in fact, I am clearing out things from the past that no longer serve me – that I have grown beyond.  BUT—and this is an important but—while I may put away the things from childhood that no longer serve me, it is also a necessary and healthy thing, especially for the life and well-being of my creativity, to hold onto the amulets, touchstones, and lodestones of childhood imagination, and thereby hold on to that precious inner child.

My son’s tears of joy in the dream were for a rediscovered part of his childhood—the part that held his imagination and inner peace and contentment, all things that we struggle to attain and maintain, especially as creative adults.

Could this be one of the cures for creative block?  To find a toy or some other beloved object from our childhood that can invoke the joy of being a child again while reminding us of the creative power of our imagination?

So, what am I going to do to honor the dream?  Well, I am going upstairs to get out that doll case…

My husband, Bob, and I just returned from attending the wedding of the oldest son of our good friends, Bill and Patty.  Like us, they have three boys and this is the first son to marry.  We were excited for them and for us since our oldest son will be married later this fall.

For a number of reasons, Patty had much of the responsibility for organizing and preparing for the wedding and reception.  Her loving care and efforts were evident in everything from the organist to the wedding program, and to the reception in the church hall afterwards.  There, Patty had recruited friends and neighbors to help decorate the tables as well as prepare and serve the food and beverages for the buffet.

During the ceremony, as Bill and Patty watched their son repeat the age-old vow promising to love, honor, and cherish his new bride with his “I do!” I couldn’t help but think about how Patty and Bill first had to say, “I do”, to Mike and his brothers.  For in giving birth, the most powerful creative act for many women, we must say, “I do,” promising to love, honor, and cherish our children, without reserve and often without reward.

As I mentioned in a previous post, commitment is a scary thing whether to the children of our wombs or the children of our inspiration. Like our flesh and bones children, our creative children also need us to say, “I do.” If our songs, our paintings, our novels, our weavings are to have life, find a home, and grow into the fullness of their potential, we must commit to giving them our love and our respect without reserve – and often without reward.

The challenge, of course, is to keep saying, “I do” when we are tired, short-tempered, and frustrated, to continue to love and honor our efforts to create what has meaning, beauty, and significance even in the face of criticism or failure.  Our creativity is sacred whether it manifests in our children or in our creative work, and we are called to give it everything we have.

As we sat next to Patty’s sister waiting for the wedding to begin, she shared with me that Mike told her, “Mom has always been there for me for 28 years.”  Mike truly understood and appreciated the selfless, unstinting love his mother had given him, still hearing the echoes of her “I do,” even 28 years later.

So I wonder…Can I promise to love, honor, and cherish my creative work in frustration and disappointment?  Can I be as selfless in my creativity as Patty was in preparing that wedding for her son?  Can I say, “I do,” to my creativity?

After the ceremony, as the bride and groom made their way down the aisle greeting their guests, Mike hugged his mom fiercely to him, tears of relief and love and joy on both their faces.

And I would guess that, for Patty, that was reward enough!