the process of crocheting an afghan is about just that the process
you make an afghan looking forward to the nights you will curl up under it and relishing the way it fits over your legs when it's halfway finished
or thinking and hoping how much someone you love will love and appreciate your gift of time and callouses
weaving a container for whatever emotions you need contained
i realized this that first winter deep in february when i began my long nights of scrap yarn desperately trying to piece something together out of the not knowing why i told myself that this was it the sum total of my works the item they would fold up and place on the table next to the jar of my ashes come september and it was done by march
a slow and roundabout way of pushing myself through the suicidal smog smeared through my mind
my friends had blankets wrapped around them that bright morning of the anniversary we all cried together my tears falling on my afghan
i made them each an afghan plus a few more always pushing myself to look forward
lost count of how much yarn i used how many stitches passed through my hands
but by the time the next march came around i had made or charted out five more
to fill the void clawing at my insides
spent a year making myself another in tight ripples of time and television
and now my fingers slow and stop
seven afghans in two years is an accomplishment that might send the head of even the highest caliber of grandma spinning
i have no more afghans left in me to make
so instead i crawl down into bed two i made two from friends and one from my mother
and lie head pounding eyes puffy void of energy in the space between my afghans