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Yellow
Brick Road
by Kim Stratford
Ravelling
by Linda Maxwell
I wrote “Ravelling” at a time when catastrophic and seemingly unrelated incidences had my life
splintering around me. It was a time when only words were left to give my life shape.
At the same time the fact that I could write these words told me that I knew I’d make it.
– Linda Maxwell, June 2005
I’ve been pondering (colds are actually
good for something after all) the process by which our lives can unravel. A
thread in our fabric, our vivid, precious, carefully woven tapestry, can pull
and the unravelling happens before our eyes. It can happen quickly – so
quickly, we can only watch in open mouthed horror as the thread
unravels...unravels...unravels and we’re left wondering how we can stop it.
Sometimes we can slow it down. Sometimes we can stop it altogether. Sometimes
we are left holding the thread – that long, long disconnected thread, in our
hands and wonder how it all started. But even as we stand there, attempting
to make sense of the painfulness and destruction of unravelling...even before
we can work out how to mend the gaping hole in the tapestry, another thread
begins to unravel. A long way from the other one and apart from the link that
they are from the same tapestry, they are seemingly unconnected. And it’s
another long, long thread, one that coloured the whole tapestry. Stunned, we realise
any skills we may have developed from the last rescue seem useless in our
damage control this time.
Yet somehow the process of unravelling has stopped
again for a while. Later, it’s hard to remember what halted it and sometimes
it doesn’t seem very important to know how it stopped, just as it’s not
always important to know why it began in the first place. My beautiful
tapestry is in ruins – there is seemingly little that is left intact and
recognisable. But I knew that before. I knew it would be smeared and patchy,
damaged and unlovely. My fingers carefully trace over what’s left and feel
the patterns and pictures that have changed shape, coloured by the massive
unravelling. Pictures I thought I knew so well, I would’ve bet anything on
knowing the stories those pictures told. But I had never really looked and
felt those pictures on my tapestry and now they aren’t the same to me. They
were all altered in the unravelling. I move away from the tapestry and my
frightened eyes see through those large gaps to the shadows of what lies
beneath. Is it just emptiness, that darkness there? We have a choice – we
don’t have to look. But to not look is worse and I know that if I don’t, I’ll
always be frightened of that darkness.
It takes a long time...peering into that darkness.
To be honest, I’m still not sure what I saw, but I do know the darkness
wasn’t emptiness. It was something else...something deep and substantial, yet
it still had “give” in it. Most importantly, it was nothing to be frightened of,
or ashamed of. With relief, I realise that what lies beneath is more than
strong enough to lay my tapestry on. My old tapestry sometimes felt as if it
was simply covering the darkness, but now it will be a part of what lies
beneath. My tapestry will be given substance and lustre because of what lies
beneath.
So I start from the beginning – a very good place to
start! I have what lies beneath and I have my damaged tapestry, and all the
old threads. I carefully sort through them and I discard some – they are ugly
and damaged beyond repair and I don’t choose to ravel them into my new/old
tapestry. Here are some interesting old threads; a little sad and worn, but
still richly coloured and surprisingly durable. With my eyes closed, I feel
the old patterns and stories – they are there and will always be there. I
don’t want to change them, and some will be left untouched. Others need
threads added to them and I pick out those old threads and they are again
part of the picture. But I know those threads now...held them between my
fingers and seen them for what they really are.
The process of ravelling will take the rest of my
life. New pictures will be added to old ones and threads I thought were
short, will prove to be long ones. As my fingers and mind have played out
this story about ravelling, I’ve made two discoveries. The first, that the
pictures on my tapestry aren’t single dimensional paintings – my tapestry
isn’t Still Life. I know this because I see that the pictures never stop
moving…it’s not simply that the pictures are added to, as a continuing story,
but that they have Life with all its senses.
What else? I’ve almost forgotten. Ah yes – the other
discovery is the knowledge that with my precious, surprisingly beautiful
tapestry firmly attached to deep substance, it won’t be so easy for it to
unravel again. I have no doubt threads will unravel...they have a habit of
doing that, do they not? But the difference is that I’ll never again be
frightened of what lies beneath.
This smacks of a pithy ending. It’s not.
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