Non-Stitcher Musings

I had visits today from non-stitchers (not that that's a bad thing...), but do they really understand us? I wonder what they're thinking when they want to see what we've been up to when we aren't out with them and we've been keeping ourselves "shut in the house so much."
They look at the WIPs and finished pieces, compliment and praise, but then look curiously at me like, "why is this so important to her?".

How can we explain our love of our artform to non-stitchers? How can you explain the joy and peace it brings to have personal choices, quiet time, solitude, beautiful things to see and touch, and creative masterpieces that come from our own minds and hands?

What's more fun than running your fingers threw a huge new batch of silk threads, more joyful than the piece you just started, more gleeful than looking over your stash of beads and crystals and charms, more exciting than seeing that new package of charts in your mailbox, more absorbing than your newest stitching magazine issue, more anxiety provoking than waiting for the Christmas Ornament issue of Just Cross Stitch, more dazzling and mesmerizing than a new Chatelaine Design or Mirabilia or....you know, or more heartwarming and satisfying than a finished piece. What's more memorable than a roadtrip or stitchaway or workshop with friends, an exchange, a SAL or our guilds and chats? How can a non-stitcher really understand?

How can a non-stitcher understand that it doesn't really matter "how long it takes to stitch that." That snuggling down into the cushions of your favorite stitching place, adjusting your stitching tools, making sure the light is just right, looking over your threads and chart and holding your piece while you pick with your tiny needle and thread as the design blooms to life in you hands -- and at your touch brings about a magical place and time that isn't found anywhere else on earth.

I wonder if they realize how much our chosen pieces really say about us? That each lovingly chosen and stitched piece tells who we are, what we love, what we find beautiful and important simply by the choice we've made. There's more to stitching than meets the eye. Maybe that's why the ancients say, "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder," and "We are shaped and fashioned by what we love." As for me, I'm so pleased to be a stitcher and I wouldn't have any other way.