As We Grow Older- Relive Your Life

In memories.  In friendships.  In returning to those activities that made us happiest.

The last time I visited the library (where I worked quite happily for nearly 10 years), a friend and co-worker asked if I did much quilting any more.  I said no.  I admitted to losing interest when the last Twelve by Twelve  project ended.  My friend said it was much the same for her, only it ended when I left the library I think.

She said she has looked at the lovely appliquéd quilt she made (with my help and instructions) and can hardly imagine that she made it.  She looks at it now, and can't remember how it was done.

I think it's this way with much in our lives.  We are deeply into something at the time and then move on to other things--or have life changes that take us far away from that time and place. I talk to her and remember spending so much time with her and her family as I helped her through this newfound love of quilting.

I remember when she called, in the midst of machine quilting a large bed quilt, asking me to "come" help her with the mess she had made.  Her son answered the door.  Still a child (he's in college now)  he confided to me "she's had quite a bit of chocolate".  That still makes me smile.

Just that chance comment at the library opened me to remembering those days and those emotions.  I know that sorting through things here at the house has triggered memories.  Good ones, mostly. But going into my workroom to sort the fabric, threads etc--not so much.  It makes me sad.  To have lost all that.  To not be doing that work any longer.  Why did I let it all go?  What else was so much more interesting, important???

Today, on the Sunday editorial page there was a letter from a reader.  Asking us to remember our past, our old friends, our old loves.  To relive our lives.  To make time to visit a old friend, a sick friend and recall the sweet moments of our friendship.  Before it's too late.

I did this once, when my father was dying, and I wish I had had the opportunity to do it for every friend I have lost.  I sat next to his bed and recalled only the best moments of our lives together.  The day he taught me to draw an elephant when I was 10.  The failed root beer experiment as the glass bottles exploded in the attic.  How proud I was whenever I saw him in his crisp police officer's uniform. The hilarious fish on the line story when he left my brother and I alone for only a few minutes on the shores of Lake Erie. I hope I sent him off into the unknown of death with sweet memories.

I hope someone does the same for each of us....someday.