Our Common Thread

 

                                The author's daughter in a jacket embroidered forty years ago.

I embroidered this denim jacket when I was twenty-nine years old and pregnant with my daughter. During that year, I was often house-bound (or in this case apartment-bound). This is because I suffered from extreme morning sickness. Morning sickness that lasted all day long, everyday, for the entire length of the pregnancy.

Embroidery gave me something pleasant to focus on as my belly grew big and my body seemed to betray me. During those long months, I breathed and dreamed and pushed the thread through the tough denim fabric, and then with some effort, pulled the thread out the other side. Over and over again, developing a nice rhythm. It took me nine months, the time it took to grow my baby in my belly.

I finished the jacket just before I was rushed to New York Hospital. It took twenty-two hours of intense labor, after which I had a baby girl as well as a beautiful jacket. I gave the embroidered denim jacket to my then-husband. It was my gift to him—a new father—and so I never really expected to see it again--especially after our divorce.

Today, that baby girl is now forty-two years old. And the jacket that I thought had disappeared into the winds of time--has been returned to her. In fact, recently when my daughter met me in Baltimore, she showed up wearing the jacket with the girl embroidered on the back. When I saw the girl I had embroidered, it felt as if had time-traveled into my past and I was meeting up with an old friend with whom I had spent hours musing over needle and thread.

Embroidery is an intimate act. You’re up close to the fabric and working the needle can be very physical. It involves the fingers, hands, arms, shoulders and even the chest and stomach. So yes, I knew the girl on the jacket very well. She’s an old friend. And she’s also someone I birthed.

Creative Friends--when you birth something into the world--trust the process and know that no work is ever lost once it is made. And this is true even if your hard drive swallows up your novel or that special chord is forgotten or your ex-husband steals away with a treasured jacket. No matter what, your creation will always live within you and your beautiful mind. And sometimes it will show up on your daughter’s back.

Love,

Jamie