Red Spool of Thread

The red spool of thread stares at me.

I am on week 3 of quarantine. With a cough, fever and limited testing, I have decided to self-quarantine, protecting the elderly whom I love so much.

My Grandma wasn’t always the kindest. In fact, her last words to me after losing our first baby were; “If you remain so angry you will NEVER have a baby.” Her thin finger pointing me down.

Weeks later, knowing I needed to call her back, my attempted call was received by a busy signal.

An hour later she would crash her car into a cliff and die.

Despite the lack of resolution, I decided to venture out to Montana to clean out her home. Assisting my aunt in taking possession of her ashes and her blood-stained car. Tasks that would ultimately lead us to the life Braden and I love and live.

One of the things I inherited from the entire ordeal was her sewing machine. Not having the time or mental capacity to pull it out from storage, it sat collecting dust for five years.

Today, week 3 of quarantine, I decided to pull it out and venture into the world of becoming a seamstress (shoutout Project Runway?)

One hour into the venture, the sewing machine was still not setup correctly and I was frustrated. I yanked out the spool to find dark red thread.
“What would she have been making with red thread?” I wondered.

Hitting me like a stack of bricks, I remembered her Flower Granny dress.
We had asked our Grandmas to be flower girls. At the time, all Grandmas still alive, we wanted them to be part of our wedding.

She was proud, excited.

“What are your colors? I will sew my own dress!” She exclaimed.
That red spool, the color of her flower granny dress. The hours, the labor of love it took her to sew it.

Her face. Throwing those white roses down the aisle prior to her granddaughter walking towards her groom.

Arriving unannounced at the bridal suite,

“Here is the handkerchief I carried on my wedding day.”

A treasure that will forever sit on my vanity.

Why is it that we allow those seconds, those short moments of darkness to overtake the light?

Week 3 of quarantine and I have resolved to seek those hours of beauty over the seconds of darkness. I will not allow the negative to be amplified but instead allow the positive to overcome.