Morning and Evening Star

I lie in bed watching the morning star shine in the dawn darkness...

A gift from Michael’s grandmother, the quilt has hung on a wall in every home of ours. It is over one hundred years old, faded and with some holes made by hungry mice, a reminder of lives and loves long ago. The pattern is two four pointed star shapes, one long star and one short star, with stripes and a bow tie in the center of the shorter star. The long stars are a dark fabric that dominates the overall pattern with the short stars pieced in strips of varying fabrics and hues. Girl friends gathered, pieced and quilted this coverlet, signed their names to it and gave it to Michael’s grandfather as a friendship quilt when he married his grandmother. Her name is among the names at the bottom edge of the quilt. I read those names and wonder about the lives of those women. Were they friends forever? Were their lives full of love and good work and family? What were their sorrows and joys?
I wanted to paint a quilt for our newly restored high barn and chose this friendship pattern for the project. Michael and I stayed up late one Sunday night drawing the pattern to scale. That week I handed out copies to some of the farm family and invited them to help with the color selection. I was amazed by the responses. Jim, our gifted carpenter friend who is helping save the barn, saw circles around crosses in the pattern. Candace saw blue, green and white or lavender, yellow and blue arranged in different patterns. Leisa used dove gray, blue and orange. Michael saw dark blue for the larger stars. The variation in visions reminded me that all of us see the world through our own eyes and none of us see the same things the same way all the time. My challenge now is to incorporate the different ways of seeing into this quilt so that it, like the inspiration friendship quilt, reflects the friends who were a part of its creation.
Those women long ago had it right. They used bits and pieces for the small stars sewn together in small strips, reflections of the bits and pieces of our days. Most of our days pass by with the work of daily living, tasks that seem useful perhaps but not inspired. The holy days, the days that make a difference, loom large in our memories like the dark stars in the pattern and give our lives structure and meaning. One cannot exist without the other. A quilt made of only dark stars, holy days, would have no meaning without the pattern of the small stars of our daily life.
The morning star shining brightly in the dawn darkness disappears, blotted out by a dark cloud. I watch and wait. The star shine appears again as the cloud passes. I rest in the sure and certain knowledge that morning and evening starlight are Advent benedictions for darkness that gives way to light again and again. Even when I cannot see the Light, it is there waiting for me and I will rejoice in its coming. Thanks be to God for friendship quilt lives and for the Light that lights my path always. Amen.