A Mother's Heart

It's August in the deep southern United States.  That means we're nearing the end of one season and we are looking forward to the beginning of a much more pleasant one.

Here in the deep south, summer means lots of things, some enjoyable, others not so much.  For example, I've lived in the deep south for the vast majority of my life, but I've never gotten used to the heat.  You'd think that I would at least be used to it a little bit, but, no, I'm not.

I'm a sweathog.






But, fall carries with it the first hint of a cool breeze and the welcome relief it brings.

The air starts to smell like the holidays; we instinctively know that a giant, nostalgic meal is somewhere just over the horizon.  It's like a sailor who, after months at sea, smells the land.  An easier life is now ours again.  We made it through another summer; our reward is almost ready.

Mothers across the land rejoice as the tots go back to school and get out of their hair.  Perhaps this is why ladies go nuts during the fall.  Apparently the celebratory drink of choice is anything with pumpkin in it.  Pumpkin lattes are to a lady in fall what champagne is to a World Series champion.

The feel and the emotions that fall induce are in contrast to what's actually going on in the world.  The world around us is winding down; it's heading for hibernation.  But the feel of fall is fresh and new.

Perhaps it's the rhythm of a new school year each fall.  New books, the smell of fresh paper, long pencils newly sharpened, a new desk, a new room...  It's a season overflowing with newness even as the landscape goes to sleep.

There are other things which fall brings.  Perhaps the most exciting of all is College Football.


No other sport matches the excitement of College Football.  It's a sport in which anything can happen on any given week.  I can feel the beginnings of the charge in the air as the last month of practice begins and the teams prepare for the long slog of the fall.

Being from the deep south, I'm a fan of the Southeastern Conference.  The mighty SEC.  Now, I don't want to get into an argument with those of you who love one of the other four major conferences.  I know you love yours as well.  That's fine.  Just let me love mine, OK?

We can argue about it in another venue.  I'll win.

Now that we've established a conference, we must be aligned with a team.  Seriously, there is only one choice.  We are the Tigers.  We are Purple and Gold.  We are Louisiana State University.

After that ramble, you're probably thinking that this post is all about football or some other testosterone-rich topic.  But, no.  This is a post about a very feminine topic: Mom.

My Mom (She's the one on the Right)

"Never trust a woman who says that her hormones have nothing to do with her behavior."

-Mom

My mom is wonderful.  She's everything that every woman wants to be.  She's sort of like Reba in that way.

Just ask her, she'll tell you.  Believe me, I've heard it all my life.  Perhaps that's why I believe it.

About one topic, though, she might have more in common with a frat boy than with lots of other mothers: she loves college football.

And she especially loves her Tigers.

I feel the need to tell you just a bit about this remarkable woman.  When I was about ten and my brother about eight, my mom found herself suddenly alone in the world with two children to raise.  Might not seem like such a big deal these days, but when it happened to us, there was only one other boy in my class whose parents were divorced.  Can you imagine that today?

"A woman who has a ring on all ten fingers is likely to be crazy." 

-Mom

She dropped out of college when, as a young married woman, she found herself carrying me.  That meant that she had no marketable education, which meant low-paying jobs.


She felt the hopelessness and the heavy responsibility of raising two kids on her own.  She cried a lot, she doubted herself and she questioned everything that she thought she knew about life.

Life, as she knew it, seemed over.

I caught her crying more than a few times.  When I did, she would bury her face into my shoulder and get me all wet.  Then she'd lift her head, wipe her eyes, and say, "Sometimes a girl just needs a good cry."

"Sometimes a girl just needs a good cry."

-Mom

She was right.  Every girl I've ever known just needs to cry sometimes.

A cry is a bit like a summer shower: It's a force of nature that you can't stop.  The best plan is to wait it out, for, when over, a peaceful calm overtakes the landscape and peace reigns once again.

But, life has a way of moving along, so, after a bit, she wiped her tears, garnered her strength and began nursing school.  It was a tough few years for her, though much less so for us because she provided well for my brother and me.

After she graduated, she made her career as a cardiac (heart) critical care nurse.

She is the reason that I so respect and admire the strength of women.  I know firsthand that women have the strength to not only survive, but thrive.

That's not to say that women don't have their quirks.  (Men do too, by the way.)

For those of you who may suspect that I'm a misogynist, consider that the person who has most shaped me is the amazing lady who is my mom.  Women have their strong points and their weak.  They are textured and interesting.  And so is my mother.  I count myself among the luckiest men on earth to have her as a mom and a mentor.

Truth is, I'm not a misogynist, I'm an equal opportunity grouch.  Men are just as goofy, but in different ways.

For instance, I'm goofy as hell.

"Don't trust a person who tells you their entire life story the first time you meet them."

-Mom

In addition to a myriad of other lessons, mom taught me about womanly quirks.  When I was a teen, she once gave this bit of advice, "Never trust a woman who says that her hormones have nothing to do with her behavior."  That's a sound bit of advice if I've ever heard one.

She also had more general advice about people, "Don't trust a person who tells you their entire life story the first time you meet them."  This bit of advice is a bit more subtle, but, after years of testing, I've found it to be solid.

She also told me once that, "A woman who has a ring on all ten fingers is likely to be crazy."  Again, solid.  Mom is a treasure trove of wit and wisdom.

I could write a long, long time about the wonder and the quirks of my mother, but I must move on with this post before the internet runs out of space.

"Rise above it."

-Mom

I had the idea of building her a quilt since I began quilting, but I wanted it to be special.  It took time for me to work out just the right thing for her.  Special people require special consideration.

Designing her quilt was a very long process.

As I thought about my mom, I had a lot of thoughts.  I was trying hard to think about what she liked, what would represent her to others, what she would identify with, etc.  Designing a quilt for someone can be tough.  Another aspect of this quilt was that I didn't include her in the planning; I wanted it to be a surprise.

At about this time, as I mentioned in my post about Caleb's Falling Mountain quilt, I was becoming interested in Bargello designs.  I began to think about how I might use the Bargello idea to make an EKG tracing (heart tracing) since my mom was a cardiac nurse.

I also wanted to incorporate college football into the design since she loves her Tigers.

One of my early conceptual ideas was this:

If you're judging the colors, please don't.  I only chose those colors because of the pencils available in my kit.  I was drawing it to see what the design might look like.

I didn't like it much, so I thought about it for a long, long time.  This quilt occupied my mind for months on end.  I drew a lot of ideas, but could never get get anything that I liked.

One day, I got a very large of sheet of Bargello design paper and began to draw.  I erased a lot.  After a few weeks, I came up with this:

Not much to look at, I know, but it's a very accurate representation of an EKG.  That was my goal.  Then I numbered each block and recorded the measurements in my notebook.  This chart would then serve as my cutting guide.

I searched for team fabrics to use as the Bargello strips.  The fabrics in this quilt represent each of the teams in the SEC.  I have to say that I was very nervous about how this would turn out because usually Bargello designs focus on one or two colors and gradations within those one or two color families.  To use so many different colors, as I was planning, might be a mess instead of a masterpiece.

I could see it in the eyes of the ladies at my LQS.  They were nervous for me.

Once I pieced all the strips together into a top, it looked like this...

Again, I put a stripe in the border, and, again, I mitered the corners so that the stripe would make a square.

I chose to quilt the Bargello portion of the design in the ditch; I free-motioned quilted (FMQ) the white background.  It was the first time I've done such a large design with FMQ and I can definitely tell that there are mistakes in it.

It'll be a while before I'm able to FMQ with an acceptable level of precision, but that's part of the fun of it.  There's always room to improve and refine.  It's sort of like playing golf.  No one can ever completely perfect their golf game.  There's always something to strive for, something to tweak.  It's the same with quilting.  Always something to improve upon.  Always something to perfect.

This precision thing is a bit tricky.  I think that I'd like to say a word about it.

As usual in human pursuits, there is a spectrum.  Most of us live most easily at one end of the spectrum or the other.  More easily, but not necessarily more comfortably.  We are creatures of the extremes.

So let's apply this concept to the subject of precision in the quilt world.

Extreme #1: I must do this perfectly.  If not, it speaks to my worth.

Extreme #2: It doesn't matter how this turns out, I'm going to be satisfied with any result whatsoever.

It seems to me that there is a tendency amongst some quilters to attach the perfection of their work to their worth as a human.  This is just pathological.  Our worth as humans has nothing to do with what we produce.  Hint: God gives us our worth.

Honestly, I can live comfortably in neither extreme.  I strive to live in the middle of these extremes.  Not in balance, but in tension.  It's in tension because, if I choose to live in the middle, I'm always being pulled towards one extreme or the other.  I have to have some discipline to remain in the middle.  While, at times, it may be more work to live in the middle, it is also more comforting to know myself and to know where I am on the spectrum at any given moment.

So, how does this play out in my real life?

This quilt is a good example.  The quilting on this quilt is below the expectations that I have for myself.  I expect perfection.  I desire perfection.  It is my goal.  As far as goals go, it's not a bad one.  Trouble is, if we think that perfection equals happiness, then we will always be unhappy.

On the other end of the spectrum, if I'm always pretending to be "happy" no matter how things go, I'm never going to be challenged to improve my skills.

I handle it like this: I know that my worth as a human is not tied to my skill at building a quilt, therefore, I don't think that I'm less because there are mistakes.  At the same time, I can honestly look at the mistakes and think that there's room for improvement.  I think about the moves I made while I was quilting and about how I can do them better.

So, while I agree that a self-berating brand of perfection is something to be avoided, I do not agree that the solution is to move to the opposite extreme and just be "happy" about everything without any critique of what we just produced.

Live in the middle.  I may not be as easy, but it's more rewarding and ultimately more fulfilling.

Now, I know that this advice isn't for everybody.  Not everyone has the same goals that I do.  My goal is to produce something as perfect as possible.  That may not be your goal, and that's perfectly fine.  Perhaps your goal is to sew because you find it soothing.  No worries.  But, identify your goal.  If you don't, then perhaps you'll sew for comfort and then be upset that you didn't produce something perfect.  You may then think that you are somehow inferior.  That's a bit crazy, don't you think?

Ultimately, this is all about creative, expressive fun.

I'm having a ball, can't you tell?

Do yourself a favor and enter your email at the top or bottom of this page so that you can have a ball with me.

If you disagree with anything I've said, blame my mom.

She's a character.

TheCurmudgeon

p.s.