"Nothing feeds the center (of being) so much as creative work. The curtain of mechanization has come down between the mind and the hand." ~ Anne Morrow Lindbergh
According to USA Today (10/7/04), crocheting has become "the craft du jour, practiced on subways and modeled on runways."
And, that's just fine with me... What took you so long? I've been crocheting most of my life, since my Grandma Dorothy taught me the fine art of stitching single and double crocheting when I was 12.
"Hands," said Pope John Paul II, "are the heart's landscape."
Grandma's lessons were based on desperation--she couldn't see well enough to join her granny squares with black yarn. So I learned how to do it for her. Many, many hours we sat together, crocheting and talking, trading yarn and stories.
"Stories are medicine," said writer Clarissa Pinkola Estes. "They have such power; they do not require that we do, be, act anything —we need only listen."
There is something remarkably comforting and balancing in the act of crocheting. I get lost in the stitching--in the progress, colors, and turns. On long trips, I love to crochet to pass the time. Each stitch is a stitch of goodness. As minister John M. Mason said, "As every thread of gold is valuable, so is every moment of time."
The time spent on each crochet project is time well spent. I give away most everything I make. I think of the person I am crocheting the gift for as I create my stitches. Each stitch, like a heartbeat, is a stitch of love, a celebration of heritage and heirlooms. A tribute, a promise, and a warm wish for all good things for the people you love.
As Chief Seattle once said, "Humankind has not woven the web of life. We are but one thread within it. Whatever we do to the web, we do to ourselves. All things are bound together. All things connect."
