Homing

Here we are again …. or is it still? Home. Stay home … lockdown … grey zone … whatever you call it we’ve been living this merry-go-round life for over a year and we’d all like to get off the ride.

Many of us have used this time to freshen things up. Painting, renovating, cleaning. Me included, as you know. While cleaning out some storage bins in our back room I discovered a quilt that I thought had been lost. It’s not a pristine, fancy quilt. It’s a bit (well, more than a bit) ragged and worn. We chose it from a pile of quilts that belonged to the Bearded Guy’s Great Aunt Mary after she passed away.

As it turned out, a couple of days after I found the quilt the weather turned extremely cold and we needed just one more thin layer on the bed to be cozy. Mary’s quilt was perfect. As it’s a summer quilt it has no batting so was just enough. But it was the next morning when the sun from the window was shining on the quilt that I noticed how lovely it was and how loved.

I only got to know Aunt Mary a little at the end of her life. She was the sister of the Bearded Guy’s paternal grandfather. Mary was a nurse. She was a widow for many years when I met her. And she had a dry sense of humour. She was a small woman, like me, so I felt a kinship with her.

Mary’s style was quite fancy and classic, so I wonder what it was that she saw in this quilt. It is colourful and random. Each block is comprised of multiple scraps of fabrics sewn in the shape they were found. They are framed in white and the whole thing is trimmed in yellow. Not at all like the tidy rooms in Mary’s spacious apartment.

But it was loved, as evidenced by the frayed and vanishing fabrics in the squares.

It got me thinking about some of the other treasures I have hidden in cupboards in my home. Precious things holding memories of happy times. I started really looking at the things in my home. I took inventory of the things on display and wondered why I had chosen to put some of those things out. I got rid of a lot of stuff and replaced many items with pictures. And I started using those treasures instead of hiding them away.

I filled the back of my car with the items I no longer saw as beautiful and donated them. I’m sure the Bearded Guy hoped that my love of random old things had gone with them. It wasn’t gone, just changed. I still like to shop at thrift stores. I’m pickier now, though. An item has to mean something or remind me of someone. And when I look at those things that are now displayed in my home I smile. They make it easier to stay home.

The quilt is still on our bed. And we’ll love it until it’s nothing but threads.

One day we’ll be able to fling open our doors and roam the city as we used to. Until then, I’ve decided to enjoy my home … putter in my garden … waive to my neighbours … and be grateful for the sweetness of all those memories.