Eulogy for my mother, Mary Lou York

Mary Lou York

1940-2024

I loved my mother so much and I am completely overwhelmed now that she is gone. She was my number one supporter in my life and my work. She bought me my first sewing machine and got me started in quilting. She never tired of showing my work to anyone and everyone. And no matter how busy she was, she always had time for me and her grandchildren.

My mom loved dominoes and dancing, cooking and gardening, making money and spending money. She played the piano and was an excellent seamstress. She was always fashionably dressed and perfectly coiffed. She loved to wear beautiful clothes and eat delicious food. She loved to laugh. She loved her friends and her family. She was a real ‘people person’. She adored her grandchildren and she loved her cats. She had a great wit and loved to travel. She was smart and loved to read. She also loved discussing books in her bookclub, even if she didn’t read them, or so I have been told. She worked full time (until the return of the cancer last fall) as a real estate manager and had a savvy business sense that served both herself and her agents well. She was a mentor to so many. She had a generous spirit and loved giving to others, which included people she never met. She volunteered her time and energy to many fundraisers and worked on weekends at the Assistance League of Austin. She loved to cook and host parties in her home. She was resilient and strong. She had a fierce can-do attitude and the agency to follow through.

In the end they said it was the metastatic breast cancer and the fall that killed her. However, without the cancer, she would not have been on the meds that made her bones so fragile, her body so weak, and her balance so bad. Or maybe the cancer did all that? Cancer is a hostile monster of a disease.

Where the Walls Have Eyes, Part 12

Where the Walls Have Eyes, Part 12

I almost did not make this in a 3D form.  I was looking through my second prototype, and I realized that beyond one block in, I could not see most of the work I had done. I could not see the batik, I could not see the satin stitching, I could not see the colors of the blocks, I could not see the colorful threads I would use to sew the blocks together.  All I could see was the hole, and some of the stitching around the hole. (ps. if you are wondering where the eyes are, remember, this view is on the prototype, not the actual project)

I also realized that the parts that I could see were only visible because of the placement of a light above the holes. This would not be the case for the rest of the cube. It would be dark inside.  I bought some fairy lights to light the holes.  I was planning to sew them into the seams, and leave the control boxes on the bottom of the giant cube. Sadly, they did not help much at all. It was disappointing. It felt like all that work was wasted on an idea that didn't work. Utter failure.

And yet, I had all these finished quilted blocks that were so colorful and pretty. I regrouped and tried them on my design wall.

Since I had over 1200 blocks, it completely filled my 8' x 8' floor to ceiling design wall, and I still had over 200 that weren't used.  I opted for a log cabin layout for several reasons. One is that I LOVE the log cabin block, it was the first quilt I ever made. Two the log cabin block references the home.....which is where the loss of privacy is happening on home computers. Of course, this version of log cabin is more reminiscent of courthouse steps in construction, or even square within a square, but those work too. Every white circle you see is a hole. Imagine this sewn together, and hanging some place where you can see people on both sides of the quilt! That would make the physical quilt an illusion of a solid surface, but holes everywhere that prevent privacy. I loved the symbolism of it!!

Also, this layout accommodated the colors of the pieces that were all ready finished.  My original idea of a cube, inside a cube, inside a cube (each being a different color), gave me the right number of pieces to be able to make a flat version of this idea. (Note: I hadn't started cutting out the eyes yet, so there aren't any on these photos, and if I made it flat, I would have decided where to put the eyes, which was also fun to contemplate.)

This lead me to want to be on both sides of the holes, which I could not do with them pinned to the solid design wall. So I took some of the remaining pieces and taped them together with painters tape.  Then I attached it with more tape to my sliding glass door in my studio. I wanted to be on the other side and look through the holes.

Now I could generally see what was on the other side, and as I got closer to the hole, I could see more.

Sorry the lens made the picture on the other side blurry.  It is a car with brake lights on (which means it is one of the few cars that actually stop at the stop sign on this corner!).

Then I went outside and looked in to my studio.

Mostly you see the painter's tape that I used to hold the blocks together. And, the view through the hole is pretty much what you would expect if you stand close to it.  I angled myself to see the iron on my ironing board. 

I was pleased with the results. But it was hard to give up my original idea. I got stuck here for a long time, not willing to proceed with the flat version. And not ready to commit to making the 3D version either.  I decided to be patient with myself. I knew that when the answer came to me, I would be ready to move forward.

And so I waited. Then I looked through the prototype again, without the lights on, and saw once again how dark it was.  That was when I realized that conceptually, I like the idea of loss of privacy on the internet so much better with the darkness, as in the dark web, and the dark scary thoughts of someone constantly trying to hack my into my personal space. It would be okay to leave parts of my project in the dark, and essentially make them private.  With the right technology, and motivation, you could spy into the holes of the cube, but without them, those hidden recesses would be private. YES! 

Time to commit to hand sewing all those very difficult and awkward seams.  Stay tuned, those are coming up on the next post!