The Quilts We Carry

I visited my mom tonight. She is a hospice patient so we’re allowed to visit her at her assisted living residence, even during the pandemic.Just as we do on most Saturday nights these days, we watched the Lawrence Welk show on public television. We comment on the era they’ve chosen for the program aired that evening — tonight’s featured the 1980 25th Anniversary show (my preference is the late 60s), and note which costumes we especially like. Tonight’s show included a first: a marimba-playing tap-dancer. I’m nostalgically amused at the fashions — not to mention the hair styles — of the day. It’s a trip down memory lane, and it has become kind of a sweet journey with her. Sometimes a song sparks a memory for her that she’ll tell me about.

Whenever I visit her, I note the patchwork quilt that covers her bed.

She began working on the quilt when I was in high school. It was around the time of the American bicentennial, when a crafting fervor swept the nation. My mom and her friends were caught up in the wave, and formed a quilting circle. I remember coming home after school to find them laughing and working on quilt pieces in our living room from time to time. The end result spent its early years draped over a quilt rack at our cabin, and is now spread over my mom’s bed.

We recently sold the cabin that was in our family for more than 50 years. One of the items I took from the cabin was a patchwork quilt with pinwheels of faded colors — pieced, I imagine, from hand-me-down school clothes and old house dresses. I don’t really know its history; my sister thinks it may have covered our parents’ bed at one time, which makes me think it may have been a bridal gift from church ladies. My mom doesn’t seem to remember it.

I took two other quilts from the cabin as well, not because they are attractive, but no one else seemed to want them. One is a crazy quilt which is not too bad on its own, but it is not helped at all by the unfortunate fabric that was chosen for the border and backing. The other is a pieced quilt with orange, pink and tan as its colors, which strikes me as a peculiar color scheme. I have two other quilts that came from my mother-in-law’s parents’ home when it needed to be cleaned out. She didn’t remember them or how they had been used or displayed. Again, no one else seemed to have any interest in them when it came time to empty the house, so I took them. 

No one seems to remember the origins of these quilts. Representing careful thought, time and skill, they most likely began their lives proudly displayed in family bedrooms. Over time they were relegated to the high shelves of linen closets.

Even with their uncertain provenance, they all speak to me of family. And history. Of the way our lives are pieced together — sometimes with arrangement & pattern that can be appreciated, but not always with fabrics or colors we would have chosen. Sometimes we just make do. In accepting that perfect doesn’t exist, with quilts and with life, we still find life-giving warmth to sustain us.

I’m reminded of the observation I made in my journal a few years ago, as I experienced my children heading out into the world as adults, one by one.  As mothers, we piece together a quilt of memories for our children throughout their childhood, which they carry with them for the rest of their lives.  I wanted each quilt to be lovely, warm & comforting, and to maybe reflect their unique personalities with intention & design. It’s been a process for me to embrace that while the reality didn’t match my expectations for myself, they carry with them what I had to offer, and each quilt was sewn with love. I may wish they were more generous, and there may be pieces I’d like to replace. I may be aware of all the imperfections, but each quilt will serve the purpose of warming them throughout the rest of their lives. 

Quilts remind me of our innate desire for order paired with beauty, and they reflect their maker’s choices and individual creative spirit. There is a coming together of “this is the pattern” and “this is how I want it to be” and “this is what I have to work with” that speaks to me. I recently read Stitches by Ann Lamotte and she made reference to quilts in her metaphor about life being about patching things together to make the best of things. She said she prefers “funky, rustic” quilts to “elegant and maybe lovelier” ones because they “defy expectations of order & comfort” and embody “exuberance.”

I’m coming to appreciate her point. While I am innately drawn to the well-designed quilts with pleasing, pinterest-worthy patterns and colors that all work together and make sense, I realize that actual life often plays out more like the crazy quilt with the ugly border. And I find that the more time goes by, I’m liking it more and more.

While this Mother’s Day will be unlike any other, it still provides us with the opportunity to think about our moms and to thank them for the quilts we carry. Thank you, Mom, for piecing together a pretty lovely patchwork of memories for me throughout my childhood on Hampshire Drive. It has warmed me for nearly 58 years. I love you, Mom.

As mothers, we piece together a quilt of memories for our children throughout their childhood that they carry with them for the rest of their lives.

Thank you, Mom, for piecing together a pretty lovely patchwork of memories for me throughout my childhood.