My love for Sharon Astyk seems to know no bounds at the moment. I loved, loved, loved her recent commentary on Handwork. My handwork doesn't make me feel particularly virtuous but I felt a terrific sense of validation after reading this;-)A brief excerpt:
"My grandmother told me that when I was a grown woman, I would live my life in a sea of labor that was done each morning, and undone before I went to bed. I would wash the dishes and cook meals, only to see them eaten and the dishes dirtied again. I would wash clothes, dry them, and see them back in the hamper. She observed to me that it was necessary that I learn to do something that “stayed done at the end of the day.” She was telling me how important this was to her, and she wanted very much to pass on the knowledge.
I was 10 or so, and I truly did not understand what she was saying to me. The life she portrayed seemed alien, distant and unimaginable. Of course I would end each day with some great accomplishment. Of course my work would stay done. I wasn’t going to be concerning myself with dishes and laundry (I think I thought magic fairies might do these for me), but with great events and great deeds - dishes didn’t figure into it. So why on earth did I need to know how to knit or crochet? How could such small things ever matter? I would never, I thought, be the sort of woman who needs, at the end of the day, to rest quietly and work on that one thing that will not be undone. I assumed that my grandmother was simply being fusty."
My latest piece of Handwork, finished last night while sitting companionably next to The Hubby, is a tea cozy for I7. She doesn't own a teapot yet so Mama gets to use it;-)
