Old acquaintance - TM
Jan. 1st, 2008 11:51 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
fredlessor 'An Ode to a Sweater'
Everytime she went to wash it, Fred always wondered at the wisdom of it. All the initial fears from when she first got a lab of her own always came creeping back. What if she did it wrong, by doing it, well -- right? Was there some sort of combination of laundry detergent and softner mixed well with the spin cycle and then rinsed that would somehow take all the magic right out of it? Was it possible for everything that made a thing the thing that it was to get lost? Fred knew that the answer to that was yes.
But then, the sweater's owner wasn't exactly one for following the rules. Could textiles be taught his philosophy?
Because it was always ok.
It always emerged from the wash just fine, and as Fred sorted and folded and hung, she always saved it for last. It wasn't the color or the cut that was important. It wasn't who made it, or what magazine it'd been seen in. Tags and brands were never the point.
It was the way it felt, beaten into softness from the inside out. The thing that happens when body meets clothes and then get about living together. It was layers of contact, world to sweater and sweater to wearer all leaving marks on each other. All sorts, and all kinds. It was fraying and aging but never breaking. Sweaters didn't break.
Sweaters never broke.
There was something to that.
Everytime she went to wash it, Fred always wondered at the wisdom of it. All the initial fears from when she first got a lab of her own always came creeping back. What if she did it wrong, by doing it, well -- right? Was there some sort of combination of laundry detergent and softner mixed well with the spin cycle and then rinsed that would somehow take all the magic right out of it? Was it possible for everything that made a thing the thing that it was to get lost? Fred knew that the answer to that was yes.
But then, the sweater's owner wasn't exactly one for following the rules. Could textiles be taught his philosophy?
Because it was always ok.
It always emerged from the wash just fine, and as Fred sorted and folded and hung, she always saved it for last. It wasn't the color or the cut that was important. It wasn't who made it, or what magazine it'd been seen in. Tags and brands were never the point.
It was the way it felt, beaten into softness from the inside out. The thing that happens when body meets clothes and then get about living together. It was layers of contact, world to sweater and sweater to wearer all leaving marks on each other. All sorts, and all kinds. It was fraying and aging but never breaking. Sweaters didn't break.
Sweaters never broke.
There was something to that.
