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| My attic sewing space. |
When we were growing up Mom did all her sewing at the kitchen table. The sewing machine was kept in the space between the washer and the refrigerator. It was an old metal Singer that Mom used for years and years, finally donating it to me after King and I were first married. When the belt on it finally broke and could not be replaced -- unless I wanted to hunt one down in an antique store -- I got a new sewing machine. Hindsight is always 20/20 and I would imagine today -- with the advent of the internet -- it might be easier to find a belt for it. Unfortunately that old Singer disappeared about 12 moves ago.
Mom had a dedicated sewing room after they moved to Grand Haven and I've fashioned my sewing room after hers. Mine will never be as neat and tidy as hers, but I have never been as fastidious about cleaning as she was. My hope is someday the dog hair will miraculously roll across the room and out the door on it's own.
By the time Mom and Dad sold their home in Grand Haven and moved into an apartment, I don't believe Mom did much sewing. I don't think she could have remembered how to thread the machine. Routine things had simply started slipping away. I recall how after they bought a new car Dad thought she should know how to drive it. By that time he was doing the majority of the driving, but he thought she should at least know how to drive the car -- just in case.
It was a dismal failure. Mom, who had been driving for years, could not remember which was the brake and which was the gas. Dad was incredibly irritated -- and probably just a little frightened. How horrifying that must have been for both of them.
Dad would say, "She just isn't trying." Unfortunately we now know she was trying. She was trying to hide the fact she couldn't remember things. She was trying to hide the fact that simple tasks were no longer simple. She was trying to continue to take care of Dad the way she always had. Her mind simply was not working.
So in a few minutes I will leave for the store, driving a car that I take for granted I know how to operate. I will purchase a fan and put it upstairs in my sewing room. I will thread my sewing machine and work on another project. But I will no longer take for granted that I can do those things. And I will hope and pray that the time will never come when I can't.
A few years before my Mom died, I still saw one of the books I'd written on the stand by her bed in the home. It didn't have a bookmark in it so I asked her if she'd read it. She said, "Oh, I read it every day. I just pick it up and open it anywhere and read a little". That's when I realized she was no longer able to hold what she read in her mind long enough to get through a book. Sobering. When Kel and I consider the too large number of books we own and our overloaded Kindles, we joke about the time that's inevitably coming we'll only need one, maybe one we can even share.
ReplyDeleteA few years before my Mom died, I still saw one of the books I'd written on the stand by her bed in the home. It didn't have a bookmark in it so I asked her if she'd read it. She said, "Oh, I read it every day. I just pick it up and open it anywhere and read a little". That's when I realized she was no longer able to hold what she read in her mind long enough to get through a book. Sobering. When Kel and I consider the too large number of books we own and our overloaded Kindles, we joke about the time that's inevitably coming we'll only need one, maybe one we can even share.
ReplyDelete