Ten Saturdays

Re(finding) My Creative Way With Clothes

Since I moved from the city, retired from “influencing”, engaged with the natural and spiritual world, I’ve not cared much about what I put on my body. A body that since turning 70 rebels against the chiseled contours I set for it during my 60s (that’s a whole other post). I dress to do the work of tending family, home and land, not to be seen. Function and comfort uppermost. I deliberately dress in a way that will not call attention to myself. Yet I remove the ever-present sunglasses, preferring to deliver a direct and transparent gaze.

For most of my life, clothing was a creative material and an inexpensive, sustainable activity for me that had nothing to do with “fashion” or the fashion system. Because of my class growing up, I did not have access to high-end fashion or Vogue magazine. Perhaps this is why these objects became so seductive later during a short period of my later life. Putting everyday pieces of clothing, or tablecloths, or curtains or willow branches together in various arrangements allowed me to exercise my imagination, to create a character, to play with an identity. If I had to describe what I have mostly done with clothes and other material objects throughout my life, I am more like a costume designer or maybe a sculptor than a stylist or fashionista.

Living life in accordance with nature now means September is not a month to be excited for a big fat, full of advertisements, issue of Vogue but for dividing and replanting spring bulbs, pulling out spent summer crops, dead-heading, collecting seeds and generally tidying up. Updating a garden journal to remember lessons learned for next year. The hot, humid weather creates an epidemic of pathogens infecting many of my plants. While my social work/clinical studies taught me how to be a healer of people, this summer I study and learn to be a healer of plants.

September is a transition month, shifting from one season to the next. I want us all to enter this new season healthy. I wear both my healer hats, of people and plants. Leaves turning, light shifting, change happens slowly. Like a mirage, the glimpse of autumn coolness in the early morning evaporates by 10:00AM. Flannel shirts come off in the heat of the afternoon, we are not there yet.

During these recent years, I learn to live in the moment and to live slowly. I study, nurture and protect the small ecosystem under my stewardship. I re-direct my anger at what is happening in the world into a positive energy that focuses on a vision of a just, caring and sustainable future world for my grandchildren. I process and untangle the past, leaving an open, fertile space for my imagination, if it wishes, to plant something new. During this time, I experiment with what that something new might be. A project to keep me intellectually and creatively stimulated outside of my home and garden. Something that makes me feel part of a community. I try writing classes, study groups and volunteering, but the nature of my life (and my family’s life), like nature itself these days, is unpredictable. I discover that keeping a weekly commitment is not a good fit as I am often pulled away during the week.

I always think I've found the missing piece, but it turns out not to be quite right. I get excited by ideas but short-circuit at the execution. I’ve shared many of my schemes here and there that never came to fruition. I continue to learn lessons from my garden about failure, false starts and patience. The last sparks of the striving sputter out. I stop grasping towards and just bide my time the way I patiently wait from planting seeds in late spring until August for the wildflowers and zinnias to bloom.

A couple of months ago, on one of our “one tank of gas” road trips, I came across a scarf. Made of the softest natural fabric, block printed, very long, an orange that sings and flows, I impulsively buy it. While I have continued to seek out and read books, like The Pocket: A Hidden History of Women’s Lives, 1660-1900, to feed my academic interest in clothes, this scarf evokes the first brief twinge of an interest in something I can hang on my body. Something physical. Something I can arrange with my hands. Something that can be fashioned with my overalls and denim. The orange against the deep blue of my denim shirt is beautiful. I feel a sharp intake of breath. I search for another scarf like it in vain. The pattern is not quite right, or it is way too expensive. I fill with a desire to make the vision I have in my head. My hands want to feel the touch a textile and reach for a needle and thread.

My Instagram feed has slowly filled with posts by gardeners, naturalists, herbalists, embroiderers, natural dyers, textile artists, those who make handmade clothes and those who write about all these things. There are old houses, old objects artfully arranged, hand-sewn garments, cozy retreats and lots of flowers. Shortly after I feel the desire to make a scarf, the algorithm for a change gifts me with something I might actually want. Up pops an announcement for an in-person course called the Art of Clothing, close to where I live. Once a month, all-day Saturday workshops run from September to June. This commitment is something I can make, with time in between for reflection, slowness, practice, writing and availability when needed. There is conversation, sharing and study. It seems the natural evolution of my engagement with nature, spiritual practice, my past, my writing and desire for community. The course design envelopes my desire, takes my restless hands and places them in a process that is grounded in nature and respect for the earth. Within this experience, I hope to re (find) the creative way I have always had with clothes.

Course Description:

“In this course, we design and sew three garments using natural fibers of cotton, linen, and wool, and make a shawl or scarf using silk to create a complete outfit. Drafting simple patterns and sewing by hand gives us the opportunity to center ourselves and practice a meditative way of working. Over the course of the year, we experience different sewing techniques, plant dyeing, embroidery, and other artistic techniques as we create our own unique fabric and garments.”

Somehow this feels like more of the unfolding that has already occured during these last years. The mending, repairing, embellishing, writing and spiritual practice I have already taken up, the growing and nurturing of plants and family, the slow, reflective life I have created here with Calvin. It intuitively and organically feels right. It’s what happens when I pause and wait to see what will come into my open, patiently waiting arms. I always chose who I wished to be, and then I told that story with clothes. This time, the making of the clothes themselves will direct the process and maybe even determine who I will yet become.

First class is September 20.