Foraging my brain for
memories of eighth grade brought back the sewing story from home ec
and then the stories of my Mom sewing and my Grandmother sewing and
that brought front and center the saga of the sock monkey.
My Grandmother made many
items to be sold at her church - St. Judes, an Episcopal Church
within walking distance of 51 Dash Street for oh so many years; then
the church, whose name I cannot remember, still within walking
distance of 277 Hastings but a lot further away; and finally an
Episcopal Church in the subdivision Granny lived in after she moved
to Florida in 1986.
Different women from this
last church would stop by Granny's to deliver the materials needed
for her to make the items she had committed to for their bazaars –
and Granny began to realize that perhaps that was the only reason
they had befriended her – they would not have come by otherwise. If
she had not been making stuff for them, would they have even talked
to her? She was being used.
And then she wondered if
that was how it had always been? In the early years, especially at
St. Judes, I'd like to think there had been some true friendships
formed. But in the later churches, as Granny got older, maybe the
women thought they were making her happy just by giving her something
they thought was fun for her to do – and little effort was made on
either side to nurture any more to their relationship?
But I stray from the sock
monkey. Granny made sock monkeys – the traditional kind. It is not
like she made tons of them that piled up in her house. But I saw them
as they were made – Granny worked when she watched television in
the afternoons and evenings. The monkeys were cute but I kind of just
took them for granted.
On one visit to see
Granny when we were both still living in Buffalo, she gave me a sock
monkey that she had just finished. I was delighted! The once
ubiquitous sock monkey had then become a most treasured item as it
remains to this day.
It was a few years after
my Grandmother passed away that Mom was chatting with me, and
suddenly she started talking about her mother and the sock monkeys.
“She made sock monkeys for everyone else she ever knew and complete
strangers, but did she ever give one to me, her own daughter? No!”
Mom was kidding, but her voice had that edge of bitterness to it that
revealed so much more.
I couldn't help myself –
I said, “she even gave me one!”
That next Christmas there
was a package under the tree for Mom from Mike. It was a storebought
sock monkey – not the same as Granny's, but we decided Mom had to
have one. She named it Henry and took it home.
Charley, Mom's
cat at the time, claimed Henry for himself – Charley and Henry sat
together on the chair by the patio door and glared at Mom as if she
were the unwelcome third wheel in their relationship! And once again
Mom felt left out of the love that sock monkeys provided the rest of
the world – the love her own mother had spread but neglected to
share with her!
One day, I remember it
was Super Bowl Sunday, I was visiting Mom and she mentioned that
Henry had been banished to the garage because his stuffing was
leaking and leaving funny rice-like particles on the chair. Mom said
she had cleaned off the rice after moving Henry, but mysteriously
some rice had returned. I think the truth dawned on both of us at
that moment, and I took a sample of the rice with me. Mike and I went
to a friend's house for the Super Bowl that evening, and this friend
just happened to have a microscope at the house, and yeah, the rice
was not from Henry the stuffed sock monkey, but rather worms from
Charley! Ew!!!
Charley got some medicine
and Henry returned to the chair near the patio door, and the
worms/rice disappeared.
After Mom passed away,
Amanda and Tony adopted Charley who now rules the roost over their
cat, Zumi, and dog, Pizza.
Henry is there too,
because it would have been wrong to separate him and Charley, and because
everyone should have a sock monkey.
148 20150528 Sock Monkey
Love
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