Kathleen McCall:
Occasional�� Muse�

2002-03-29 - 7:30 p.m.

Sewing Circles

A writer's workshop I've belonged to for a few years is embroiled in a battle over its purposes and methods. There is a faction that advocates a certain amount of restraint and decorum; there is a faction that advocates the no-hold barred drawing of blood, and let the devil take the hindmost.

In the midst of the flaming, a member says, "Go ahead. Turn this place into a sewing circle if you want to."

The comment is not specifically directed at me at all, but it rankles, and it stays with me. I jerk back, offended - a sewing circle? Not me. But then I go away and think, and what I think is this: Yes. A sewing circle is what I want.

What rankled was that that was essentially a misogynist statement. Did you see it right off? I didn't. Sewing circles - a bunch of women with women's inconsequential work to do, gathering in a clucking crowd, gabbling their worthless women's fluff together. Nattering. Gossiping. Eating too many cookies, probably, but at least staying out of the way of the Important Folk off doing their Important Things (like practicing the caber toss, I presume.)

And if I think, "No, I would never want that, something so inane, I am a serious writer," then I accept that view. So I won't say that.

Instead, I will say, "Yes, I want a sewing circle. Do you know what a sewing circle is? It's any group of kindred spirits, with passions or creativity or work in common, who gather together in support of the others' craft. In a sewing circle, you share your art. You share techniques and patterns and scraps; you learn to do things you couldn't do before. You give and accept admiration, yes, but also advice and experience. You share the joy of watching something create itself under your very hands; you harness your power to move something out of your own head and into the world. And in doing that, you share also your own humanity. You share your joys and stories and history and hopes. You band together in sympathy and in rejoicing. You become intimate, and you accept that intimacy and the responsibility it carries with it, to live lightly and keep room for others always. And in doing that together, you create something else as well, something so much greater than the sum of its parts: a community."

I won't say it. Not really. Because the time to say it is past, and because those who believe a sewing circle is a demeaning thing would not care anyway. I say it here for my own ears, really. I have been lucky in my life to be part of various kinds of sewing circles, and to have had a part in creating others. It's good work, and I am proud of it.

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