I just spent the weekend at the American Needlepoint Guild Seminar with many of my stitching family and friends, many which are from Houston. I went through the ups and downs with them as the phone calls and texts came in and the updates on social media were read. My heart goes out to each and every person that has been hit by Harvey. How could I blog about seminar? and especially after I came across this article on Facebook? I thought “how appropriate” since we spend so much time stitching. So make something worth saving and think about what’s really important…
“There was a flood in Houston, they called the storm Harvey, and the water got close to our house. We got ready to go, packed our bags, but never had to leave. Today we unpacked and put away our things. The piano where on the night we had a last bit of show tune singing at the height of the flood is safe.
We will be able to have another family sing and that is good.
As I packed, I realized how little we had that mattered. We had Father Michael’s papers and those could not be lost. He suffered enough for the faith that his words, sermons, and life should be preserved. Our pictures are mostly in the cloud, but we had a few snaps that are still paper only, but that is about all.
We have stuff we like, eccentric stuff, like a framed print of Charles Stuart on his way to execution, but none of it is really worth anything. Our adult kids might miss Party Fox, the taxidermied red fox, who got his name in ways that are none of anyone’s business. We weren’t going to take up room in our car with a stuffed fox.
Yet one battered blue notebook came with me and it reminded me of a certain truth: My kids do not want my stuff. Furniture styles change over time and both my parents and my generation are selling off our collected things at the same time. In our case, it is worse that usual, nobody wants our oak Presbyterian church pew unless it is for the wood. If the waters had swept it all away, I suspect most of the children would have rejoiced.
They want the blue notebook. Why? These are notes I took in my childhood, the oldest pages are pushing fifty hard, for a novel. The text is nearly unreadable and there was no spell check on eight and a half by eleven lined pages. I liked purple prose even then with even less restraint.
So here is a simple lesson: make things. When I write here, I think of my children long after I am gone reading some of this and thinking of Dad. They will pick up a Disneyland globe and think of the days spent there growing up. They will take their mom’s needlepoint to every new home, because their mom made that piece of art. God help us, let’s make things.
So what can we do? We can create. We can leave clues to our immortal souls and if they miss us, then perhaps in the Christmas ornament that says “Our First Christmas” that Hope and I got when we were married, they will recall us. They will be happy until they no longer have to remember, because we will all be there in an unbroken circle of eternal love.
Make something worth saving.”
Read more at http://www.patheos.com/blogs/eidos/2017/08/what-you-save-in-a-flood/#4uIefXJTO3IqUbU2.99
Beautiful post Vicky. Thank you for sharing it.
Kathy
Thanks Kathy! I miss seeing you!