Jaci Dawn

Dear Mom,

I finished organizing my tiny sewing corner. It’s not much. Yes, that’s polymer clay supplies in the crate above the yarn. What can I say: it fits. I use sewing supplies for making creatures, anyway, not really for sewing. Sewing is for mending. I just did not inherit your gene for enjoying creating with thread. Fabric, yes: it’s the texture.

Oh, I do want to ask you about that coconut head there. I really don’t understand it. It has a soft purple satin lining and that – that funky face. I’m not certain if it is racist or creative, but I can’t bear to part with it. My grandchildren may condemn me for it, so I will put your name inside it and a disclaimer. “Not certain if Mary Lou Wilcox made this or inherited it, and I don’t know its purpose, but I couldn’t bear to part with it because it was hers. It’s funky. You have to love the FUNKY. In any case, it was created circa 1950-1965. I think.”

After I took that photo, I started moving things around in the studio.

Looks like my bedroom when I was a kid, doesn’t it? I swear that was because my sister refused to pick up her things, not because of me. She was the guilty party. Remember: I kicked her out of our shared bedroom when I was fifteen. I piled everything of hers – including her bed – in the hallway. I was tired of being blamed for that mess!

I promise this all has an ultimate purpose. Not kicking Denise out of the bedroom – that was so long ago! – but the current mess in my studio. I’m moving furniture and storage units around so that I can clear a perimeter and have a nice, neat, organized studio again. I have a plan.

This is hardly the end plan, but I did get one wall lined up. I can’t reveal my plan – I don’t have it written down and I only have a blue print in my head, but it involves changing out the contents of the red tool box, the round industrial soap container, the quaint tole house, and the locker.

I have so much crap.

Love,

Your oldest daughter.

PS – I really was the Neat Freak. You never had to ask me to make my bed or clean my bedroom after I kicked Denise out. I’m sorry you had to move your sewing room downstairs to give her a bedroom to sleep in. It really was for the best. And I really did love her.

Except when she dressed like me. I really, really, really hated her when she got up in the morning and put on clothes to match what I was wearing. We weren’t twins, you know.