Superhero With a Sewing Machine (short memoir)

I clearly remember crawling -- and later walking -- on the cream-colored frayed shag carpet of my mom’s sewing room ever-so-carefully as a child because I knew there might be pins and needles that had fallen by accident at some point over the years; a graveyard for broken threads. The TV was often playing reruns of Grey’s Anatomy; when I was young, I couldn’t quite understand what the adults on the show were droning on about, but I loved to watch it with her because I loved to be near her. The sunshine would beam through the windows because she only liked natural light when she was working. Along the wall across from the long table that held her sewing machines was a massive cabinet full of fabric of all different colors, patterns and textures; all different possibilities. I would rummage through the sheets and squares and strips of fabric, imagining the beautiful dresses she would make for me one day when I was all grown up. When I was a kid, I would say the fabric cabinet smelled, “old.” Now, I understand it only smelled of memories. Next to the cabinet, there was a stand with drawers full of varieties of lace and ribbons; I’d run my fingers across the delicate threads of lace and weave the ribbons through my hair like the princesses I saw in movies. Everything in that room was so very beautiful: the whispering rays of sunlight, the colorful fabric and ribbon, and my mother’s warmth. Oh, how I long for the beauty and warmth of her sewing room.

As I became older, I grew to love decorating and re-decorating my bedroom with her. We would go to JoAnn Fabric store together and decide which fabric would become my curtains, bedding, etc. She and I would walk through the aisles, comparing shades of pastels, selecting which colors of lace and ribbon would perfectly tie our idea together. “Pick whatever you want,” she would tell me with a beaming smile on her face. She would work tirelessly, between sewing jobs for customers, to help me create my dream bedroom; whatever that dream was at that time. For many years, the walls wore a lavender color resembling our birth flower, the Violet. The furniture’s handles were in the shapes of lady bugs and butterflies, with splashes of yellow and green scattered around the room and nature-themed art dressing the walls to achieve my four-year-old self’s dream bedroom.

For part of my teenage years, my bedroom became dark; in retrospect, the dark décor only reflected my teenage angst at the time. The trip to the fabric store would have been the same, my mom and me bringing our vision to life, comparing shades of burgundy and maroon and selecting which colors of lace and ribbon would perfectly tie our ideas together. The room became adorned with dark curtains, dark bedding, and wall art to match. The walls were painted an off-white color, not very different from the paint color that covers those walls today. Despite what those dark colors represented for me at the time, I always had such a lovely time decorating with my mom. I loved our time together, I loved to watch her creativity in action, and I loved to embrace my own creativity with her.

When I was sixteen, my parents divorced. Truthfully, I don’t really feel like explaining the whole story of that, and it’s too long of a story for this story anyways; perhaps I’ll save it for the sequel. In a nutshell, my mom was an alcoholic, and alcoholism is an ugly disease regardless of the beauty of its vessel. My parents tried for many years, but things were complicated, and time took its toll; life took its toll. The divorce was a positive thing for everyone in our family because of the stress it caused all of us, although upsetting at the time, and I would understand this more and more as I grew older. It took some time for everyone to adjust to our new normal, but time brought an ease to some of the chaos. My brother and I remained in our childhood home in the bedrooms we always knew. Eventually the family photos disappeared from the walls, and the sewing room became the workout room. To me, it will always be the sewing room where my mom and I shared special moments, especially now as more time passes.

Oh, how I long for the beauty and warmth of her sewing room.

My mom and I found a close relationship in my later teenage and early adult years, I was coming into my womanhood and I valued her motherly touch more than ever; I felt we understood each other, and we were the best friends in the world. We formed a new bond as I matured and learned through life, it was exciting to be finding peace in my sometimes-complicated relationship with her. It was complicated navigating forgiveness and growth with my grown mother. Things were complicated with my dad and brother too, because their boy brains could never seem to comprehend mine; everything was complicated, which is why any hint of peace was welcome.

She continued to battle her alcoholism, with things seeming very hopeful at times and I especially valued the peace I was finding in my relationship with her because as a young woman, I knew my mother carried a particular weathered wisdom about her, the way many mothers do. Despite her own imperfections, she was the kindest person I knew, and she had the motherly wisdom that I knew was the guidance I would need. For, throughout everything, I could always still feel her warm smile shining down at me as I played on the floor of her sewing room; especially then, it seemed she had all the answers.

On February 1st of 2020, I turned twenty-one. My mom gifted me a dress to wear for my big night out, and we planned our birthday lunch -- as we did every year -- because her birthday came a week after mine on the eighth. Twenty-one felt so liberating; old enough to gain some freedom, and young enough to look forward to embracing that newfound freedom. I wore the dress she gave me; I counted the minutes and seconds to midnight when I would suddenly become a full-blown big kid, full of anticipation and excitement. I still have the texts she sent me on my birthday, saying how much she loves me and how proud she is of the woman I’m becoming.

“Never forget how amazing you are,” she always told me. In the background, another silent clock is ticking, only one which is much more easily manipulated, much more difficult to anticipate, and much less exciting. My mom was sick; as of then, we didn’t know how serious it was and would become.

At twenty-one, I was old enough to gain freedom and young enough to look forward to embracing it, and I would soon be taught another lesson about time. I suppose I always imagined I would turn twenty-one and spend the subsequent months learning to properly hydrate and spending my nights with friends, galivanting through city streets with a drink in my hand and a skip in my step. Of course, I knew that these new freedoms were not to be treated recklessly or irresponsibly, but I imagined I would bask in this new life which age would afford me, with my eyes set steadily on the wonders of my future. Now as I look back, I don’t remember much of the months following my birthday, except for watching the clock tick and eventually run out. Ironically, twenty-one would be the age when would I stop drinking.

I watched this clock tick as if it was a lie, as if the hands deceived me, or perhaps I was just having a recurring nightmare about timepieces for some unknown reason; anything to explain my newfound fear of time. Each day was spent inside of a broken hourglass in which the sand can only pour in one direction; each singular falling grain threatening to suffocate me entirely.

My mom had been sober for the past several months, but in March we learned she was dying anyways; the damage within her body had taken course, her liver and kidneys were failing rapidly. There’s an immense sense of denial which will emerge when someone tells you that your parent is sick and dying, it almost seems impossible. For, they couldn’t possibly mean my mom, the superhero with a sewing machine. Suddenly, I was only a child in her sewing room again. I imagined my fingers tracing the lace and ribbon once again, with her laughter and the sun warming the room; our sewing room. I dreamed of the sheets and squares and strips of fabric; the simple beautiful things that never die. Only that time, I felt the pins and needles in the carpet with each step I took.

On April 24th, 2020, my mother’s sickness won, and she took her last breath with my big brother and me by her side; the clock ran out. Time of death: 2:54 PM. We held her hand and told her, “We love you mom, it’s OK for you to go now and find rest.” The nurses said she couldn’t hear us, due to her lack of consciousness, but those itty-bitty spikes on the monitor in her last moments told us otherwise. “That’s it,” my brother Ben said with a broken voice when her last breath came. I nodded in agreement. The nurses told us, “we’re so sorry for your loss.” I felt I might collapse to my knees and let out a piercing scream at any moment; instead, I only whispered, “No, come back.”

In a way, I wished to hear that dreadful imaginary clock ticking again; anything to save me from the silence of a still heart. I wished for the irritating beeping of the monitors to fill the room again, I wished for the nurse to say, “just kidding,” and I wished to be in her sewing room; it was much warmer there than the hospital room in the ICU, and her fabric was much more beautiful than that of the blue and white hospital gown which she wore the day she died.

I left the hospital with Ben, no skip in my step, it felt I was only tiptoeing over pins and needles; my broken heart comparing shades of blue, in an attempt to tie it all together. I became lost in an ocean of sorrow; I tasted the saltwater of my own tears until I thought I might drown. I asked myself, “Will I live through this? Will I ever smile again without her here?”

Oh, how I longed for the beauty and warmth of her sewing room.

Two-and-a-half years after her death as I type these words, my hands remember the feeling of her heart slowing down, slower and slower, until it stopped. Yet, despite the heaviness this feeling brings me, I do not find it to be burdensome because it reminds me of the beauty of each of those heartbeats. I do not find it to be burdensome because my mom, my superhero with a sewing machine, had a kind heart and it deserved to find the warm embrace of love as it found rest. As I have typed this story, I have found myself greeted with both fond smiles and tears of heartache; I do not find either to be burdensome because my heart is not broken anymore, it is only feeling. In the way I held her heart as it found rest, I hold my own as I find strength and beauty. Despite the great treacherous nature of loss and grief, I have found that the delicate beauty of lace and ribbon does not diminish or disappear just because you must walk across pins and needles to reach them. For, though my feet may bleed, I dream of the sheets and squares and strips of fabric; the simple beautiful things that never die.

So, what have I learned? I find this to be a rather complex question; you may disagree, but I say it isn’t quite so simple because we don’t learn from grief itself, we learn from surviving through grief. I’ve learned to survive; I’ve learned that some days will be like a silent tear, fallen on an old dusty photograph. Other days, however, feel like more of an endless night; harrowing screams into a dark sky, never to be answered. I have learned to survive; I have learned to remember the beauty of the simple things, and I have learned that grief will not be my teacher, but it may show me the lesson I must learn next. I find that surviving grief has made me fierce of mind but soft of heart; it is beautiful to survive and to have a heart that beats. I hold my beating heart with warmth and tenderness as it finds peace and fortitude; I listen for the whispering of the sun’s rays, and the pins and needles will never stop me from embracing the fabric, the ribbon and lace; the simple beautiful things that never die. If I hold on tight to these beautiful pieces and memories, if I visit her sewing room often in my mind, I am always reminded of her warmth. I find life to be quite beautiful, it is formidable and gentle simultaneously; therefore, I welcome the times when love and pain greet me with the same harmony.

For my mom.