handstories

After & During

It’s hard to do things on the phone, so I’m not sure how this will go… My computer is in the basement with a fan blowing on it for four days, then I will lay hands on it, turn it on, and hope.

Today was a new day. The air is a little worse again, a little more yellow. In sympathy with that, I cut this square from the stack of beautiful cloths that Tina had sent. That was one of the very nice things that happened this weekend. Thank you for sending rainbows 🌈 Tina!

I noticed the small bit of blue in it, reminding me of hope, that the blue skies are still there, somewhere behind the smoke and drear that is 2020. About last night...

While watching the SWAT guys strap their guns on in front of our home, I recognized a teen and mom standing across the street. He had been a student at my last school job, I had given him rides to school when he was in kindergarten, seven years ago. I hadn’t seen them in a couple of years. They live on the block below us. There was a sinking feeling...

Passing one of the groups of police, I went over to talk with them. It was their house. Their relative. He was going crazy, destroying their home.

“I’m so sorry. Can I get you anything?”  

She asked for wine.

“White or red?”

Red. 

I brought it in a travel coffee mug with a lid, passing the police group again. 

Social distancing was ignored for a moment as I quickly wrapped my arm around the teen (I was masked). “I’m so sorry, sweetie.”

They said he’s been snowballing, that He just couldn’t take it anymore. 

The last hour was very quiet, we listened, hoping to hear nothing, but knowing that he probably had a gun.

When the SWAT guy was taking down the barrier tape, I went outside and asked him what had happened. He said that they had to go in, but everything was peaceful. 

A Black man didn’t die. 

I said that I hoped G would get the help that he needed, and thank you.

So today I worked on putting blue into the sky. 

Again, I don’t know how this will go on my phone. It’s hard on my eyes and my fingers are clumsy.

Take care out there. 💙 

Please

    I think things are ok.  Thank you all for your thoughts and care. 

    I feel worn out, but grateful that... The guys are home.  Mom's area has been lowered to Level One ("Be Ready").  Our area is still smoky and the air quality is unhealthy, but at a lower number than yesterday, and it's not quite as yellow out there.  The neighborhood is quiet.

    I don't know what happened to the man.  His family, including his elderly mother, were outside in the smoky air for over four hours, as three different negotiators tried to talk to him.

    I sat here at my window listening, meaning to work, not taking a single stitch, made another painting.  Held him, his family, and the police in my thoughts- hoping he would come out, hoping they wouldn't go in. 

    Then thinking, "If this goes bad, I don't want the memory of gunshots here." 

    While gathering things to move to another room, they began playing a message from his mom.  "Hi G, this is Mom. Please talk to the officers.  We just want to be sure that you're ok and get you the help that you need.  We love you. Please."

    They played it over and over.  It was heartbreaking.

    An officer on the sidewalk was saying that they might leave and see if that would help.

    I decided to go to a friend's, and just as I was leaving, so did all of the police, negotiators, ambulance... 

    The guys were here all evening, and heard nothing.

    A little bit ago, a police car parked on our street and walked down.  They weren't gone long. 

    Hopefully, G is ok.

    Again, thank you for your emails, comments and thoughts.  They and a couple of other nice things lifted my spirits in the middle of all of this... more next time, I hope you all are safe and well, oxo.

Nothing gold can stay

    I've been alone for two days.  The guys had planned to go to K's family cabin in Oregon with a stop at his sister's near Portland.  That's as far as they got. 

    Instead they stayed with her, offering support, and helping to gather essentials and valuables for possible evacuation.  My mom is in the town next door, closer to the fires.  She has had a "Be Ready To Go" evacuation order for a couple of days. Rain is supposed to come tomorrow and as of today it seems things will be ok.

    I wanted to add a piece of my childhood soft sheet to the new piece.  It's thin enough that it can be torn with fingers, so it was stitched to a layer of muslin for support.  This bit had been put into indigo.

    More smoke came yesterday, heavier and leaving a layer of ash on everything.  I called my mom a few times.  I wished for the guys to come home.  I crammed cloth into the gaps of the old windows.

    Looking toward downtown this morning.  It's even smokier and there is a yellow haze over the world.

    This keeps growing.  Maybe it will be a blanket.

    These have not been the relaxing days alone that I wished for. 

    They'll be home tonight.

        (All of the post above was written this morning.)

    Now:

    Police have barricaded the street on the other side of our block, at that first intersection in the photo above.  A negotiator has been talking on a speaker, asking a man to come out of his house.  This has been going on for two hours.  He is asking him to come out with nothing in his hands, and promising that he will do the same.  Validating the man's fear of the police, promising that he just wants to talk, to find out why he has barricaded himself in the house, but being clear that if he doesn't come out they will go in.  More and more police are arriving. 

    I sit here listening and worrying and holding my breath about what will happen next.

Imagine having to prove you're a Person

    This week was hot for here (which makes me grumpy), I decided to rearrange/clean out the studio (it got so much worse in the process), and I sliced my pointer finger (right where the needle sits while stitching).  It's cooled off a bit, the room is almost better, and I can hold a needle again...so some progress.  

    A new block by a young artist created with @sjsacademy arrived.  Her message honors Chief Standing Bear, a Ponca chief and Native American civil rights leader. In 1879, he was the first to successfully argue in the U.S. District Court that Native Americans are "persons within the meaning of the law."

    The blocks arrive with the pieces tacked down with craft glue.  My job is to secure the fabrics, embellish and add context to the piece.  The base cloth felt too white and thin to work on, so I added a layer of muslin around the center design.  It was cloth that had gone into a fading indigo vat so it has just a touch of blue here and there.  It makes me think of the sky.

    The artist wished for Sitting Bull's quote, "I myself would rather die an Indian than live a white man."  I'm wishing for Liz's skill with stitching words.

in Remembrance and Hope

In remembrance of Michael Brown (1996-2014)

Social Justice Sewing Academy Remembrance Project 

    Next it will travel to those who will quilt and stitch it and other blocks into "activist art banners for local and national activist organizations who have requested creative statements to be publicly displayed that represent solidarity as well as remembrance. This partnership will create a visual statement to memorialize those who have been unjustly murdered by police, racial vigilantism, or as a result of their gender, sexual orientation and other forms of identity politics. These artivism blocks will honor the lives of individuals through symbolism and portrait. Their names and identities will be displayed during community activism events reminding the world that their lives mattered."

    (Please visit the link above to learn more about the project and other empowering work of this wonderful organization.  This line in their description strikes my heart... "When you take a step back and look at the sheer size of the exhibit you realize the tragic fact that you will run out of volunteers long before you run out of names.")

    That little silver starred blue patch in the middle right is a scrap of mama love.  A bit of the cloth that was used in both Blue's and Moon's baby quilts.  A gift from K. when I was pregnant with Blue, and finally feeling safe enough to hope he would really come.  Now, ages 22 and almost 18, my boys are here, filled with ideas and hopes, with their whole lives ahead of them.

    Michael should be a 24 year old young man now, he should be making the music he loved, working at a job that his college education would have led to, hanging out with friends, living and filling his life with ideas and hopes.  

    This time of stitching this block and thinking on what I've been able to learn about Michael have been a journey.  Reading the stories about Michael's killing, the two sides of it- He had problems/he had promise, he jaywalked and shoplifted/he was joking around, he charged the officer/he had his hands up and called "Don't shoot!"....  It's easy to get lost in the "He said/He saids" of it all.  But they don't matter.

     What is true is that he was an unarmed human being who is now dead.

     There is so much to muddle through in anti-racist work, inside and out.  As a mama, a white woman and a human being, I worried about getting this square Right.   Not for me, but in honor of Michael and those who loved him.  I know that it isn't possible, there is no "Right" in any of this. I'm learning that it's important to being willing to be uncomfortable, unsure, wrong, and to keep trying, to do better for Michael, for those who loved and lost him, and for so many others... for all of us.

Wings for Michael

    Thank you, everyone for all of the kind supportive comments on yesterday's post.  I love how we hold hands in this circle.

    Last night cloud and wing shapes were basted on.

    This morning I woke up early and wanted to get right to stitching- to see if the ideas might work, and with a little anxiety about getting this done by the July 8th deadline.

    Feathers were basted all day long, with thoughts of Michael.  Thinking of the cloud angel he saw.  Imagining him in wings, rising to a better world where he might be free.

    Moon looked at Michael's photos, listened to his story, and is taking an interest in this piece.  That does my heart good.  He'll turn eighteen next month, the same age Michael was when he was killed.  This project breaks and fills my heart.

Michael Orlandus Darrion Brown (1996-2014)

    A few weeks ago, I volunteered do more stitching for the Social Justice Sewing Academy, this time for their remembrance projects for victims of violence and their families.  When I signed up, the projects were just being formed, I really thought I was signing up to work on a lap quilt of a victim's clothing for their family.  Something cozy and comforting, but said I was willing to do whatever I could within my skill set.

    On Saturday a request to make a square in honor of Michael Brown came.  Michael was shot to death by a police officer in Ferguson, MO, he was just eighteen.  Upon reading the email, I was overcome, overwhelmed, and sure that I couldn't do it.  Also, on instagram, I had seen the first finished square for this project.  It was beautiful and expertly created- a photograph in cloth.  I really couldn't do that.  I replied that while I felt humble and grateful for the opportunity to participate, I was not sure I had the skills required to do Michael or the project justice.

    While waiting for the reply (which was lovely and encouraging), I began reading everything I could find about Michael.  At first, I was done in by stories of the shooting, but then found this NYT article and a few others that shared more about Michael's story. 

    What I kept coming back to is that he was just a kid.  Born two years before Blue.  Like Blue, Michael was born in May, was 6' 4", loved video games, music and hanging out with friends.  He had just graduated from high school, with plans to start college in a few weeks. 

    Earlier that summer he had called his dad and stepmom in the middle of the night to describe the after-storm clouds that he was looking at.  He said that he saw an angel in them, being chased by Satan and running into the face of God.  "Now I believe." he told them.

    So, with a mama's heart, I've started a square for Michael, and will try to hold all of this.

    Michael Brown was just a kid, who had hopes and an openness to wonders in this world.

 

balancing things

    Yesterday brought news for us, not unexpected, but still, it has tilted things.

    At the same moment a beautiful email came, from a soul who does such good in the world, creating space for healing.  It was a reminder that in the big view of things we are ok.

    The rest of the day was spent stitching, finishing up pieces, thinking about the many possibilities for how things might go. 

    There was a new start, too, and a recognition of that moment at the very beginning of a cloth, when I don't know what will happen, and of how much I love the wide openness of that.

      Gratefulness for Jude's moons, star and scraps, Deb's cloths and threads, Tina's cloth, and so much for the centering circle of this community, oxo.

small somethings

"A Sky of Love"

"Heaven's Heart"

    These two pieces were stitched through the storms of this week- society's and personal.  I have almost no memory of making them, which probably speaks to stress levels.  Posts were made here and on Instagram.  Posts were deleted.  I'm second guessing every move and thought.  In the big picture, things are ok here.  In the big picture, things are not ok for so many.

    I keep thinking of the students at the last school I worked at.  Thinking about how many of those young children were living with injustice in many forms.  How justifiably angry and/or hopeless many of them were.  I wonder where and how they are now?

    These two sky stories will go into the shop tomorrow.  100% of the sales of these cloths will be donated to the Social Justice Sewing Academy ( @sjsacademy ).  There are many ways to support this organization- volunteer to stitch a remembrance quilt for families who have lost a loved one to violence, embroider a young person's square, donate, etc.  Please take a look at all of the good important work they are doing in "connecting young people with the opportunity to engage with issues of social justice through sewing."

heaven's heart

    Yesterday morning I awoke to the rain.  Everyone was still sleeping.  Flinging open the studio window, I stood there listening, smelling and hearing the low rumble on its way.  (The photo is a screen shot from the video I took when the thunder and lightning were coming one after another.) 

    I love a good storm, but all I could think of was that the Sky/God/Universe was grieving, that there is so much sorrow and angst right now that the heart of the heavens is breaking.

    It rained all day... and then an alarm went off on all three of our phones...

    We turned the news on...

    And this is just Seattle.  

    

    It's almost midnight.  It's still raining.