Choosing the Path

For the last little quilt in my mini series on Winter back in 2019, I started stitching a piece of hand-dyed silk:

I wanted to do a scene from memory. This was a moment even further back in January 2013 when I took my favorite person to see snow for the first time in the Smoky Mountains; a trip that also changed me forever.

I wasn't trying to recreate the scene exactly, just the feeling from that moment that has stayed with me all these years. A feeling of finally facing the ugliness in my life, and the blessings, and choosing my path accordingly. Literally, choosing hatred, or roses.

I never truly understood Robert Frost's poem, The Road Not Taken, until this moment in the mountains. Today I can tell you that I made the right choice -- one that made all the difference in my life. On that day, I chose roses, which is what I named this little quilt.

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Better than Fried

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Make It Yourself

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This is a page from my 2010 poetry journal. My handwriting isn't the best, so I'll transcribe it: If my heart survives to tell all the secrets kept inside it will be an abalone shell in which the beauty did reside. But I think I will always be lost to the tides that rage in me . . . humbling and polishing . . . I don't write many self-portrait poems, but this one isn't too embarrassing. A bit overly dramatic, but the girl I was eleven years ago went through some tough times. I'm in a much more peaceful place today.

Rayen

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