Thursday, July 14, 2011

Of pearls and yarn and subtle glow

My mom has been gone for a long time, a frighteningly long time when I count back upon the years, but she lives still within me. She taught me to knit and sew and her voice still arises when I'm about to do something not quite right. She was a masterful keeper of the household whereas I am not; she was a perfectionist to the finest detail whereas I am not and the differences go on and on but the similiarities are far more powerful.

I walked into my kitchen the other day only to realize I have a yellow kitchen just as my mother had. I'd have those avacado-colored appliances if they still made them just as my mother did. She loved color and so do I. Stainless steel minimalism?  Forget it. Give me color. So, I took a photo of my mother's pearls, by far one of her most prized posessions, gleaming quietly by a shell sitting beside a glimmering hank of Art Yarns beaded silk and mohair which, in turn, rests amid a field of Chinese silk I bought en route to Malaysia eons ago. All soft glow like candlelight and moonshine; all capturing the glow of memory burnished by time.

Love is like that. Long after the fire dies, the glow remains.