the art of grief - the making of a shrine

after my husband died, i had a lot to deal with.  suffering through his death has been just that, suffering.  i love him.  deeply.  still.  always.  there are people who care and advise on what to do.  one of the things i was told was moving the day of his funeral was the worst thing i could have done.  didn't have a choice.  the other thing i was told to do was the get rid of all his clothes.  "get them out of the house.  you'll feel better not looking at them."

i was stunned.  how could i do that?  why?  they smell like him.  his sock, his underwear?  all of it?  now?  they were his and i want them.  his jeans.  he was a jeans man and all of them are so beautifully worn out.  how could i get rid of his jeans when almost every picture i have of him, he's in his jeans?  we're out somewhere hiking, bouldering, walking the beach.  i'd know his jeans anywhere, in any pile, no matter how large.

i know that everyone is different.  i know widows (ers) who have their spouses clothes years later.  i know of some who have to give it all away as soon as possible to start their own healing process.  i'm a shrine person.  i build shrines.  if you've ever seen a rock cairn on a beach, i'm one of those people who spend the time to create one.  i pay homage to places i've been with something that will most assuredly fall.  but it was once there.

i build shrines.  i had so many small things of his that i was trying to lay out and getting so upset.  clutter.  that's what it looked like but they were his and ours and i wanted to see them.  there were patches from the Marine Corps, pins, those little poppies you can buy on Memorial Day, trim from our wedding (i made our clothes).  i had just finished sewing a crazy quilt to get rid of scrap fabric when my daughter suggested i make a quilt from my husband's jeans.

and so i am.  it's a mess but it's soothing to work on.  it isn't planned in any way.  there is layout.  it is a stream of consciousness.  i'm having a hard time cutting up his clothes.  i cry.  but each time i cut, i create.  i'm using back pockets and front pockets.  i'm saving the zippers and the button fly.  they aren't squares but i'm piecing them together with parts of the legs of his jeans to square it off.  the legs also are filler squares, will be part of the binding and the backing.  i am going to use his underwear, too.  {his socks i'm making into sock animals but that's another story.}

i'm working from sentiment, sewing on all the loose things onto the denim.  i'm adding quotes as well, what he said to me at our wedding and on a black satin square i've embroidered a quote from Romeo and Juliet:  "when he shall die, take him and cut him out into little stars and he will make the face of Heaven so fine that all the world will worship night and pay no worship to the garish sun."

this quilt is saving me right now.   it's a labor of love.  it's also given me much needed work from outside sources.  a woman in the widow's group i attend has hired me to make three quilts for her out of her husband's clothes.  one for each of her children and one for her mother-in-law who is suffering intense grief.  it has been a journey for her as i talk about what i see in her eyes, what i see in her husband's clothes, and what i plan.  she tells me she is healing in a way she hadn't yet and it has been over two years for her.  for me, i find i can be of use.  i have a purpose for someone.  i'm hoping for others who may want me to do this for them.  her quilt is more straightforward, much more planned for her comfort zone.

mine?  as you can see from the photos, mine is my own vision.  it reflects the life my husband and i shared.  the warrior and bold adventurer that was him.  the reclusive artist who lived life through her dreams.  i reached out and joined hands with a dragon of a man and found what i had never had.

when finished it will not be a museum piece, but an heirloom with things that belong to him, to me, and to us.  our story.  it is a quilt of scattered thoughts that represents a broken heart hanging on to every tangible piece of him that i can.  i can't make sense of why he had to die so i am taking what he left behind to create something as beautiful as he was.

it is a quilt of my heart.  it is how i want it to look, not as anyone says it should.  it is how i need it to look, how i need it to feel.  and isn't that the purpose of a quilt?  to feel good?  to wrap around you for comfort when, if not the weather, but deep inside you, you feel cold, and alone, and deep in sorrow.