I know many children’s songs that fit me to a T. One of my favorites is “Look all the world over and what do you see? There’s no one like me!” Either by genetics or environmental shaping, I could feel an affirming glow with the headline: Giving 85% of Yourself Gets a Ringing Endorsement. If you are one of the 15% who has to align silverware as you pass the supper table, that is perfectly acceptable. Just don’t expect me to notice.
So, for a coming on 88 year old with fading eyesight and arthritic hands and a skill marginally kept up to par, I have just finished a project overflowing with mostly love. The recipients don’t care about a few mistakes and their parents are nostalgic about past memories, so all is well.
About 60 years ago, one of the gifts to our first son was a handmade floor blanket with a simple cross stitch decoration and terry cloth toweling as the quilt backing. Using the skill and ingenuity I had in sewing, over the years I created almost 100 of such blankets for great- nieces and nephews and offsprings of co-teachers. Those children on the family tree grew up and I became involved in another phase of my life. The greats produced a great-great generation, and I began to get pictures and notes saying, “Mother saved the blanket you made for me and now my child has it. “
This spring, I girded my loins as the saying goes and flexed my fingers and took myself up to my sewing machine in an apartment over the garage and sewed up love for some great-greats on the list. Not a blanket for each child; however, at least one new for most families. That third boy deserved something that wasn’t hand me down. The patterns and the process were simplified, and I had to wear a magnifying headband to hit 85% of the edges. A few mistakes were ripped out and a few just sewed over. Note: a cognitive science expert from the University of Arizona says, “If you never make any errors you can’t learn from the mistakes.”
By the end of 2024, the Smith enumeration which began with one marriage in 1925, will reach 109. One never loses their number. I will forever be 14. True to 85% being good enough, not all have a sewing machine project. I had to make contact with a book or an ice cream coupon to celebrate the end of a school year. Yet, I am part of the story that says, “This is my family and a lot of people love me.” One good aunt counts even if only 85%. My inspirational article ends: “You have to have enough wisdom to know when to stop.”
A good person leaves an inheritance for their children’s children,
Probers 13:22
Let Me Tell Ya 