Clutch the Boxer moved to the starring role on my blog. And the cloth itself grew new parts as I explored Jude's concept of lateral movement, AKA "banding." (The distortion is me being too lazy to take down everything on the design wall so I could photograph it properly.)
I was happy last night after stitching the red squares (who could not be happy stitching in scarlet?) but this morning, I felt a nagging dissatisfaction. Or more like the absence of satisfaction you get when the creation is In Its Right Place.
Now, Jude's current workshop "The What If Diaries" has been focusing for the past month on White. I haven't. But something valuable snuck past the Color Guard anyway. Because I picked up the cloth and said, "What if...." I love the banding...I love Clutch. I don't love them together. So what if the banding stood on its own?
What if it stood on its own
And what if Clutch became a new cloth?
Or he just gets a whole fresh start in life?
Why not just jump into this "what if?" Because it means the finality of this (cue music to Jaws):
We've talked a lot over at Spirit Cloth Plus about letting ideas take their own shape, about cloth morphing from one place to the next. The stitchers over there are fearless and fierce in doing what it takes to make a piece right. But boy, is it ever scary for me. Not scary like snakes, but scary like the first minute you look down from the high diving platform. As in I really really want to do this, but I can't seem to get my toes uncurled from the edge. In the hours since I thought the first "what if, " I grow more excited with the possibility of the new cloth(s) and less attached to the present. And I am REALLY excited about just arriving at this place where I want my work to become what it wants to be.
So, I am probably going to jump but I need to look down a bit more, ok? I think I will post over at the What If Forum and let all my coaches over there give me a pep talk.
well, i'm over here, not there. i know the feeling you're having. i'm having the same feeling with my magic diaries cloth to be cut up for my hassock. i'm going to print it out on paper and do the cutting that way first. if i like it, i'll do it. remember it's just cloth...it's not life changing. i'll post this over at the forum as well.
ReplyDeletewell...typepad has gone crazy again and i can't post anything over at the forum.
ReplyDeleteI found you everywhere! Yes, the paper idea is a good one and perhaps I will try that. Or perhaps I will hear what you say about "its just cloth..."
Deletelove your description of the journey and the Jaws of the scissors!
ReplyDeletethanks, Mo...journey is in hold pattern at the moment, isn't it?
Deletego for it.
ReplyDeletei know, I know...just got to get the message to those tightly curled toes.
Deletei did this recently--cut up something i never thought i'd touch with scissors. your won't believe how amazing it feels. truly liberating!
ReplyDeleteI want that feeling.
Deletethe absolutely GREAT thing is that it can all go Back together. it can come apart, go together this same way, or a new way, for a little while or a long while or or or or
ReplyDeletei keep looking because i don't know what i would do if i were you. i actually love it so much as is..
together.....both together....
not too much at all, really
COULD IT BE that when we make something we love a lot, there is a feeling like we will never
make anything again that we love as much?????? the antidote is to begin a new cloth and
surprise!!!!! we love the NEW one too...
So..i am still thinking, here on my end of the world...i'll come back later today and see if anything has happened yet....
xoxoxoxo
Like most of the things you say, this got me thinking Big Time. We will never love anything as much as the things/people/places we love at that moment...and yet all the moments change and we have to learn how to let go of the moment but keep the love. hmmmm
Deleteoh I agree with what Grace says about thinking that we will not be able to make another piece we love as much and therefore don't do something to the piece we love...
ReplyDeleteand how about two seperate pieces belonging together?
i am starting to believe that they are together because i made them and that will be true no matter where they live. And wouldnt it be cool to then figure out a way to put them back in one piece, like maybe in my magic fruit juicy bedcloth i am making???
Deleteand thank you saskia, for the incredibly beautiful comment on my infertility lettuce (!) posting...i will respond as soon as Himself gets off the computer and I can fling this stupid ipad across the room....
Deletethis is what i meant by holding on too tightly. let go! wheeeee.
ReplyDeleteThat's what my first husband said when he got me on the first and only roller coaster ride of my life. But you are so right, this is about flying, not about gripping. Thank you.
Deletei came back....the drama all day was with me. WHAT IF
ReplyDeleteshe
DID it?
still. suspense...................................................
I just feel so happy that you would think about this across the continent. Ta da: I am going to cut. And I feel you will understand my explanation: my daughter isn't doing too great right now and, after watching your love and acceptance of Incommunicado Jenny, I've decided to support and love, but not crumble any more with her decisions. So, like the cloth, I made this daughter and thought I could never love anything as much but I have to remind myself how to love this new daughter, now. And I want the cloth to help me, show me to love new life forms that have grown from the old. Make sense?
DeleteAnd I want to have some fun with it too!!!
perfect sense
DeleteJulie.
Deletecloth is Life. yes. i am going to think about what you have said above...
i'll be back later.
and is it possible to tear it?...rip it? by hand ? like just start the separation with the
scissors and then pull????
still thinking. it was not a day to Say things.
ReplyDeletebut i hold you in my heart
ReplyDeleteJulie...thoughts of you have been woven into the last few day. and then i read reference to something
about me/my daughter and the thoughts became Strong.
at first i was thinking to email you because of being unsure how my words might be received. not
necessarily by you, but by anyone else.
FIRST...I DO NOT KNOW. i just try. i just go. I DO NOT KNOW.
so...all day, as i stitched, my mind wandered around in it all.
First, i have NO idea what i had said that you found useful. i thought about maybe going back through blog posts and looking, but no. i really just wanted to sew.
So, i don't know.
but what has remained from so much thought is that at the End, there is Love. there are all kinds
of details before Love. but at the final end, there is Love. and if we are lucky, because of doing our
"homework", that singular love becomes
COMPASSION. period. for "them", for our selves. for anyone or any thing that suffers, however we understand the word suffering to be defined.
but here, in light of what you have written, which i love very much and which FEEDS me, i think
about certain moments. and at first, there is the confusion, the entangled suffering. "they" suffer
and their suffering causes me to suffer. and the thing that i have found in recent years to be the
most amazing is that if i can find a way to see that there is the BIG suffering, but also, singular
suffering. MY suffering often times arises because Her suffering frightens me, makes me feel
helpless. Maybe makes me feel Helpless is the most important part. i cannot make it go away.
and that effects MY day. i want it to stop.
and what i have understood is that it is for ME to stop that. Not her. Her own work is enough for
Her. i need to do my own.
DOES this make any sense??????????????????????
Maybe it wasn't something specific you said, it is the general aura you project about such a difficult thing, about approaching parenting from a "we are both human beings" stance. An aura that says exactly what your words above do...and it makes perfect sense. The only change we can exact is in ourselves, that helplessness often makes me angry at her but lord knows her struggles are worse for her than for me, really. Love, compassion, and detachment. And stitching my own life. Centuries of writing about this, takes a lifetime to integrate. Thank you, Grace.
ReplyDeletei'm glad, Julie that you see what i mean. it's not easy to talk about in short terms. and
Deleteit IS a constant integration of layers of understanding and then experiencing the just going of it. there's no other way.
i think it really all began for me those many years ago when i Took Refuge in Oregon and
studied buddhism there for a while. the woman who taught us the 8 Fold Path
Right Views Complete openness without judgement
Right Attention Complete attention. there is nothing here but a body, a thought, a
phenomenon
Right Effort avoid harmful actions/ideas. Do not Cause. full participation in a light way
Right Intention to see how things really are. No need to intensify/reduce. As Is.
invite reality AS Is
Right Speech truth. simple, direct
Right Morality/Action seeing what needs to be done, doing it. Many times, nothing.
Right Livlihood living simply with minimal exploitation. simple/direct/useful
Right Meditation
and as i wrote those things out above, i am stricken by how they have become my view
of the world. i have not looked at those notes i took (the above) for a really long time. and it makes me REALLY REALLY happy to see that i have, yes, Indeed, traveled that path.
so...A really huge thank you for this moment here this morning.
and Love to all of us. all of the Mothers, all of the Children around and around in a circle