Remembering

It is coming up on one year since the accident. It has been on my mind and I have been having bad dreams. I kept getting the call to go to the hospital. I kept seeing Delores laying so neatly and peacefully on the stretcher with the mess beneath her. I kept waking up thinking that I had to go back to the hospital. I thought it was weird because I did everything I could about the accident and then I let it go. I helped Bonnie as much as I could. I arranged, bossed, threatened chased off, and generally railroaded as best I could. So why did I have unfinished business? I did the work. Why did it still bother me?

Then it occurred to me that in the dream it was always Delores I saw. I had stood over her and in the dreams I was right there again. I wondered why. I wondered how come after everything I ended up next to that stretcher night after night, looking down at Delores. In the actual accident, I had spent moments with Delores before being and staying completely overwhelmed with Bonnie's injuries and needs. Delores didn't need me. But Bonnie was in big trouble and my attention, energy and focus (rightly) were all on her. So night after night, I was looking at the thing I hadn't yet done. I went to Delores' funeral. But I just stayed a little while. I had to get back to the hospital. Bonnie need a lot of supervision then.

So I had two chances to say thank and goodbye to Delores, once in the hospital and once at the funeral but I just hadn't. Everything that I had was focused in one direction.

What people did not know as that the first time I was in the Rexburg ward, Delores had been very very kind to me in a difficult time. She was the RS pres then. I had appreciated and looked up to her.

I wanted the dreams to stop. But I want to understand why I was having them. One day it came to me. For years, Delores had tried to teach me to knit. I have always wanted to learn and I would take after it in fits and starts. I would mess up and head back to Delores and she would laugh and fix it. I was a terrible knitter. I could do it when she was right there. But I would go home and lose it all. I couldn't remember. I seemed at once to have too many and not enough hands.

So I sat down to learn. I typed "learn to knit video" into google. I wandered through several sites. But none of them struck a chord. I thought maybe I was destined to never knit. Then I clicked one more and I saw a woman casting on just the way Delores had tried to teach me. I sat and cried and watched videos for hours. I watched until I got brave enough to try. I cast on. I knit. I kept running the video again and again as my huge fat fingers got in my way. I struggled, tongue out face twisted to pull the thread here and there. I ripped it out and started again. I cast on. Loops fell off and I started again. And suddenly, my fingers found their own way. I found a rythmn. I was knitting. In not too many hours, I had produced the worlds saddest dishcloth. It is 3 inches wider on one end then the other. It is full of holes. I loved it and I promptly cast on again.

I haven't had any more dreams. I have made more dishcloths. Each one has fewer holes. They are lovely and soothing and useful and sensible and homey and dreamy. Like the woman I learned them from.