The Christmas Quilt

"On the first Saturday in October, Jo Benjamin awoke, pulled her blanket closer, and thought about color." Jo Benjamin, emotionally guarded wife and mother, is a woman who loves to quilt. She has struggled in accepting love and friendship, but finds in quilting a capacity for gratitude and for embracing the gifts her life presents. "Maybe she could have recovered without quilting - for example, books had always been a refuge for Jo - but there was something about the quilting midwifery that went beyond hobby or pastime; she was crafting herself out of scraps and tatters. Each project called her to something important and allowed her to bear witness to hope. Her quilts were affirmations of the better parts of ordinary people." Opened by her craft to possibilities that she had never recognized, Jo contends with the cost of living fully. Each quilt tells a story, and each story propels Jo toward understanding that she must complete a Christmas quilt. The challenge is a daunting one, but working with fabric transforms Jo. "It struck Jo that the swirl of contending thoughts in her mind was quieted when she worked with fabric. Her delight in texture and color, and the satisfaction she took in solving problems of construction, made the time she spent in quilting seem a different sort of time. Hours sped by, of course, and she had a lovely artifact when she finished, but the gift for Jo was in the process of finding out what the fabric had to say to her imagination." Quilts seem to present themselves unbidden, exactly as Jo has need of them. From the broken places in Jo, the neccesary next right story emerges. A quilt begins with scraps. Each piece is entirely itself and entirely necessary to the quilt as a whole. What, then, is the quilt in the end? The intricate design? Or the pieces that form the pattern? A quilt is a story and a story about stories. The Christmas quilt is, finally, the story Jo was meant to tell. She knew, too, that the act of imagining allowed her to recognize and feel kindness and generosity of spirit as it worked in the world. Somehow, as her hands moved, her capacity for gratitude was moved as well.

Peter Arango lives in Carpinteria, California, just south of Santa Barbara. Surrounded by craftspeople since childhood, he has a profound appreciation of the work done by those who bring beautiful things into being. The photographs, quilts, pottery, furniture, and paintings that enrich his life are gifts given to him by people who have loved the work they have done. The Christmas Quilt is his way of thanking all those who continue to bring beauty and inspiration into his life.