The Giving Quilt (5 page)

To a murmur of appreciation, the young people set steaming bowls of sweet and savory carrot-ginger soup before the campers and their hosts, and from the first delicious taste Sylvia knew that Anna would have been proud of her apprentice chefs. The Caesar salad that followed was perfectly tasty, if neither as fancy as Anna's creations nor as embellished with obscure ingredients, and the main course—herbed roasted chicken, Parmesan and mushroom risotto, roasted autumn vegetables, and miniature leek, potato, and feta galettes—was simply divine. To her regret, Sylvia was obliged to set down her fork after two bites of Maggie's chocolate trifle—not because it wasn't delicious, but because she honestly couldn't eat another bite.

“I would weigh a thousand pounds if I ate like this every day,” remarked one of her dinner companions, sighing as she licked the last rich chocolate morsel from her spoon.

“I would too, so it's just as well that we
don't
eat like this every day,” said Sylvia, amused. “Not even during the summer, when camp is in session every week.”

As they finished their desserts, the servers circled the room offering refills of coffee and tea. From a nearby table, Sarah caught Sylvia's eye and raised her eyebrows in a question. Sylvia nodded, squeezed Andrew's hand, and stood—and a sudden hush settled upon the banquet hall. The time had come. Evening had fallen; the floor-to-ceiling windows on the western wall framed a violet and rose sky in the distance beyond Elm Creek. Sylvia went to the door, where she paused, turned to smile at her guests, and in a clear voice that carried the length of the banquet hall, invited everyone to follow her for the second of their two first-night traditions.

Everyone, even those who were making their first visit to Elm Creek Manor, promptly rose. It was time for every Elm Creek Quilter's favorite part of quilt camp, regardless of the season, when the week still lay before them promising friendship and fun, and their eventual parting could be forgotten for a while.

Sylvia escorted the campers and faculty across the foyer to the ballroom, a relic of an earlier age when the manor's residents would regularly entertain hundreds of guests with lavish evenings of feasting, music, and dancing. During the summer, movable partitions divided the ballroom into multiple classrooms, but during Quiltsgiving, a single nook was set up in a discreet corner, awaiting Gretchen's Giving Quilt class the following day. A patterned carpet encircled a broad parquet dance floor, still smooth and glossy thanks to generations of careful tending, shining in the light of three chandeliers hanging high above from a ceiling framed with crown molding and decorated with a twining vine motif crafted from plaster. Rectangular windows topped by semicircular curves, narrow in proportion to their height, lined the south, east, and west walls. Along the far wall was an enormous stone fireplace, more than five feet tall and ten feet wide, and at the opposite end of the room was a raised dais, its furnishings concealed by a velvet theater curtain.

Sylvia led the way to a small set of stairs tucked away on one side of the dais and drew back the curtain to allow her companions to pass ahead of her. For a moment she worried about the perky young woman who had arrived on crutches, but the dark-haired quilter from Georgia quickly came forward to assist her up the steps. Sylvia followed the last quilter behind the curtain, which had concealed a dozen tall quilt stands arranged in a circle, an assortment of brightly colored quits hanging from them and facing the center.

Sylvia allowed the campers to walk about and admire the display for a while, but when their voices rose above a murmur, she raised her hands for their attention, slowly lowered her arms to evoke silence, and then, when all were still, she beckoned her guests to seat themselves in the circle of chairs arranged in the middle of the display. Murmuring, questioning, the campers took their places as Sarah stole away to dim the lights, and occasionally a nervous laugh broke the stillness. The quilters' voices fell silent again as Sylvia lit a candle, placed it in a crystal votive holder, and took her place at the center of the circle. As the dancing flame in her hands cast light and shadow on her features, she felt a tremor of excitement and nervousness run through those gathered around her, a sensation both familiar and new.

In the center of the circle, Sylvia turned slowly, gazing into the faces of her guests. “One of our traditions is to conclude the first evening of quilt camp with a ceremony we call Candlelight,” she told them, as she had told hundreds of quilters before. “It began as a way for our guests to introduce themselves to us and to one other. Since we're going to be living and working together closely this week, we should feel as if we are among friends. But our ceremony has a secondary purpose. At its best, it helps you to know yourselves better too. It encourages you to focus on your goals and wishes, and helps prepare you for the challenges of the future and the unexpected paths you might set forth upon.”

Sylvia allowed the expectant silence to swell before she explained the ceremony. The campers would pass the candle around the circle, and as each woman took her turn to hold the flickering light—

“I know,” one eager camper broke in nervously. “You want us to explain why we came to Elm Creek Quilt Camp and what we hope to gain this week.”

A few other campers stared at her, some startled, some annoyed by the interruption. Sylvia smiled indulgently. “I see you've visited us before.” A ripple of laughter went up from the circle when the woman nodded vigorously. “You're right; that
is
the question we ask during our summer sessions, but for Quiltsgiving, we're more united in purpose than we are at any other time of the year, and so that question isn't particularly illuminating, is it?” She looked around the circle and found most of the quilters nodding and watching her expectantly. “It sheds less light on the workings of our hearts and imaginations than—well, than this candle.” Sylvia studied the flickering light for a moment, allowing the curiosity to build. “We've gathered here to make quilts for Project Linus, to make quilts for children in need, to offer them a sense of love and comfort. We have come here to give. The question I would like each of you to answer—and to consider carefully before you answer—is why. Why do you give?”

This time the silence was absolute. Some campers held Sylvia's gaze as she looked around the circle at each of them in turn. Others quickly looked away, at the floor, at their hands clasped in their laps. Others turned uncertainly to the left or the right as if hoping to find an answer in a friend's eyes. Sylvia gave them time for contemplation before asking for a volunteer to speak first.

For a long moment, the only sounds were their own soft breaths, some shifting in chairs, the muffled clearing of a throat, the furnace kicking in as the night grew colder, the ever-present but usually unnoticed creaks and groans of the historic manor settling. Then, hesitantly, the dark-haired woman from Georgia raised her hand. With an encouraging smile, Sylvia passed her the candleholder and nodded for her to begin.

“My name's Pauline,” the woman began, her accent soft and charming. “I'm from Sunset Ridge, Georgia, and I'm a 911 call center operator. I have a son and a daughter, both in middle school.” Her listeners murmured a mixture of congratulations and sympathy, and Pauline nodded, seeming grateful for the pause in which to find the words for her response. “This is a difficult question, and I'm not sure if my answer is really what you're looking for . . .”

When her voice trailed off, Sylvia prompted, “The only answer I'm looking for is the truth of your own heart. It's really very simple.”

“Easy for you to say,” someone murmured anxiously, and the laughter she evoked seemed to dissolve the nervous tension somewhat.

Pauline took a deep breath. “I give because I'm needed,” she said, her gaze fixed on the candle. “It breaks my heart to think of children sad or lonely or in pain, and if a quilt will offer them comfort—and maybe give their parents a little hope and encouragement too—then you'd better believe I want to make them a quilt.” She offered Sylvia a quick, tentative smile and passed the candle on to the woman on her right.

“Oh, dear,” she said, accepting the candle with a start. “I thought we were going clockwise. Okay. Let me think.” She paused, biting the inside of her lower lip. “I'm Kathy. I'm from Harrisburg and I'm recently retired and enjoying every minute of it.” Another long pause, and then she sighed and shook her head. “Oh, it'll take me too long to think up an impressive lie, so I'm going to be perfectly honest with you. It makes me feel good to help. My children are all grown up and on their own now, and sure, they still need me and probably always will—”

“You can count on it,” murmured one of the oldest women in the group.

Kathy smiled. “Even so, they don't need my help in quite the same way as they did when they were younger. But these children do, and it makes me feel warm and happy in my heart to know that I'm able to do some good for them, to put a little love out into the world. Heaven knows the world could use it. I guess I'm just horribly selfish, giving to feel good about myself.” She spoke with such comical despair that everyone laughed as she passed the candle on to the next camper.

The next camper, gray-haired and sitting tall in her seat with her ankles crossed, knew her answer well and spoke without hesitation. “I'm Miriam, and I'm a wife, mother, and grandmother, and I was a stay-at-home mother long before the term was invented.” She allowed a small smile as she peered around the circle over the rims of her glasses. “I give because it's an important tenet of my Christian faith. We're called to give, not from our surplus but to give all that we can. We're called to give to anyone who needs us, to comfort the least among us, because we are all brothers and sisters in the eyes of our Lord.” Several other campers nodded their affirmation. “I've been given a talent and an interest in sewing, and I'm very happy and honored to use these gifts to help others, to keep them warm or to brighten their days. It's a privilege, and I'm thankful that the Elm Creek Quilters have provided us such a wonderful opportunity to give.”

She passed on the candle to a woman with a long, dark French braid that reminded Sylvia, wistfully, of Anna's. “I can't believe I have to follow that,” she exclaimed with mock shame in a heavy Brooklyn accent. “Okay. I'm gonna lay it on the line. I always make quilts for charity, and I just figured I might as well get a free week of quilt camp out of it!”

Everyone burst into laughter—except Miriam, who looked mildly scandalized. Gretchen spoke up. “I think everyone feels that way to some extent. The gifts of our hands are no less heartfelt or sincere or necessary if we enjoy ourselves while making them.”

“For those of you who disagree and are convinced that giving has to hurt,” Diane added, “we can find a hard pallet in the most cobwebby corner of the attic for you.”

As the campers laughed, the candle moved along the circle to Michaela. “I'm Michaela, and I'm here for two reasons. I'm a student at St. Andrew's College but I'm really from Pheasant Branch—” She pointed, vaguely, over her shoulder as if to indicate a hamlet somewhere to the south, although Sylvia knew Pheasant Branch lay to the northwest. “I have to fulfill a community service requirement for graduation, and I thought this would be kinda cool. Also, most other community service jobs need you to be able to walk around a lot, and obviously that's not an option for me right now. But that's why I came here this week, not why I give. I guess I give because no matter how bad you think you have it”—she indicated her cast-bound leg with a gesture of humorous resignation—“there's always someone else who's worse off, you know? And at Quiltsgiving we get to help kids, sick in hospitals or burned out of their apartments or whatever. Who wouldn't want to help a kid? If they need a quilt”—she shrugged, and her blond curls bounced—“then I should make them a quilt. I mean, in my case, it's not like it would take time away from my marathon training.”

“But, dear,” asked a thin, silver-haired woman four decades her senior. “You're so young. Do you even know how to quilt?”

Almost imperceptibly, Michaela bristled. “Of course. My mom taught me. She's like the most awesome quilter ever. She came to summer quilt camp here two years ago, and she heard about Quiltsgiving, and she told me.”

The older woman didn't seem reassured in the least. “You seem too young to be a quilter,” she murmured as Michaela passed the candle along.

Karen Wise gave Michaela a sympathetic smile as she accepted the candle. “I give because I always have,” she said simply. “I can't imagine not giving. My parents taught me to give and I want to set a good example of giving for my sons. I want them to know that giving is a joy, not a burden.”

She passed the candle on to Jocelyn, who studied the candle for a long moment in silence before introducing herself, adding that she was a middle school history teacher from the outskirts of Detroit and the mother of two daughters. “I give because the need is so great,” she said. “And while it's true that I could give on my own, closer to home, I think it's often important to gather together so that our acts of giving may have an even greater impact. ‘Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.'”

“Margaret Mead,” said Pauline from Sunset Ridge, Georgia, promptly.

“Yes, that's right,” said Jocelyn, offering Pauline a small, thoughtful smile before passing on the candle.

Around the circle went the flickering light, and each woman who held it shared her reasons for giving. Some were variations on what had been spoken before; others were wholly new or newly insightful. The sisters who had reunited in the foyer during registration were the last to speak, and when the younger of the pair took the candle, she confessed that she gave because people asked her to, and that she always felt like she ought to do more, or at least not need so much prompting to do it. “Mona's too hard on herself,” said her elder sister, Linnea, when it was her turn to hold the candle. “She's just as busy as the rest of us with work and family, and she fills every other available moment with volunteer activities. I can't imagine how she could possibly do more unless she abandoned sleeping altogether.” Linnea fell silent for a moment, thinking. “I suppose I give to balance the scales in life. I've been richly blessed throughout my life, with a wonderful family”—she gave her sister a little nudge and a smile—“work I enjoy—”