Recently my husband has been preparing the coffee machine at night and leaving a note on it that all I need to do is push the button in the morning. Rinsing the coffee pot, pouring water into the reservoir, dumping the old grounds, rinsing the coffee basket, grinding coffee, putting the grounds in the basket, and then at last pushing the button can seem a huge task in the morning, but really, it's such a small thing. My husband going through the process at night is still a small thing, yet it's huge. It says "I love you," and what can be huger than that?
Since retirement, I've taken up quilting in earnest. At first, I wasn't overly concerned with perfect cutting and stitching of pieces. So what if one piece was a little small and I had to stretch it to fit other piece or, heaven forbid, I allowed a tuck in the fabric? There is debate as to whether making a "humility block," a deliberate mistake in a quilt so as not so seem too prideful, was in fact a common quilting practice in the past, but making a mistake in a quilt certainly is not uncommon, nor is deciding to leave the mistake if it does not ruin the overall effect. My quilts have been replete with humility blocks, but I easily dismissed them. After all, quilting is a hobby, and everyone who receives one of my quilts marvels at and loves it. I've made two discoveries in recent months, however, that rocked my quilting world: the seams I thought were one-quarter inch, as most quilt stitching is, were actually slightly more than one-quarter inch, which explained why my quilts were smaller than expected or didn't go together as neatly as anticipated. All those slightly-more-than-one-quarter-inch seams add up. I was amazed and thrilled at how much better my quilts went together when I began to make true one-quarter inch seams. I also began to be even more careful when cutting pieces, in order to promote one-quarter-inch-seam perfection.
The second discovery was the benefit of pinning the heck out of every seam in a quilt, from the first two pieces sewn together to the last strip of binding. Especially when putting the three pieces of a quilt together—the top, the batting, the backing—I used to think a couple of pins would do to sew a simple straight seam. Thus, I encountered the tucks in the top, the backing that turned out to be too small even though I'd measured it three times before cutting, the rumpled batting, the crooked lines. Since I've been using a gazillion pins on every seam, not only is the sewing easier, but the quilts look more uniform, more expert, and give me a great deal of satisfaction—it's as good as scrubbing the brass clean on the bottom of a Revere ware pot. I take much more pleasure in the process and the result.
There's a lot of small stuff that for sure isn't worth stressing over, but there's also a lot of small stuff that is the stuff of life. When my sons and daughters-in-law leave a phone message, of course I'd much rather I'd been there to talk to them, but the small message makes me feel wonderful for the rest of the day. I take enormous pleasure in watching the birds at our backyard feeders and birdbaths, although some might say we are turning them into welfare birds. What's small to me may be big to someone else, and vice versa. When I clean the tile floor not because it bothers me but because I know how much my husband likes it to be always clean, his pleasure is worth my effort.
Of course knowing when to let go of something small—and sometimes even something big—is important. Of course not letting minutiae dictate one's day is important. But some very small things produce satisfying results: the ready-to-go coffee, the rare goldfinch at the birdfeeder, the text message from a child, the chore done to make someone else happy, the quilt blocks that snuggle together like the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle.
from Nammy:
ReplyDeletegazillion - that says it all for me