{"id":304,"date":"2021-04-12T02:26:06","date_gmt":"2021-04-12T02:26:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/elizabeth.lainschell.com\/?p=304"},"modified":"2021-04-12T02:26:06","modified_gmt":"2021-04-12T02:26:06","slug":"stay-home-and-mend","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/elizabeth.lainschell.com\/index.php\/2021\/04\/12\/stay-home-and-mend\/","title":{"rendered":"Stay Home and Mend!"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<h4><em>Hello! We&#8217;re Still in a Pandemic here!<br>Stay Home and Mend!<\/em><\/h4>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe title=\"Stay Home and Mend E9\" width=\"640\" height=\"360\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/mmuvZPe2cbY?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Mending<\/strong> is what we do to cover a hole or break in the fabric that inevitably happens because of everyday wear and tear.\u00a0 Long ago people took scraps of cloth used in making clothes to patch over these breaks. People have continued to do that for generations. When people stopped having rags or scrap piles in their homes, companies thought up presewn funky patches you could buy to sew or iron on to cover the holes in the cloth that covered your knees or elbows.\u00a0Or that you could just add for flair.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Of course then it became more fashionable to have pre-made rips in the fabric of all things. But not just naturally torn from long wear. Fashion so often&#8211;and so creepily&#8211;mirrors culture.&nbsp; ..A culture that charges ridiculous amounts of money for pants to look worn and \u201crugged\u201d for people who never wear anything long enough for it to get worn or do anything that would amount to being \u201crugged.\u201d&nbsp; &#8230;A culture that charges you to have \u201cdistressed fabric\u201d while distressing the workers who sweat over the machines and chemicals that create that fabric.. Such a culture can seem pretty twisted and perverse.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But mending really used to be a thing. And many of us still do it.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>These are darning eggs. An old tool but still in use by those who still darn their socks. You slip the darning egg into the sock so that you can flatten out the place where the hole is and make sure that when you mend you don\u2019t sew one side of the sock to the other &#8211; it\u2019s good to make sure we don\u2019t make things worse when we do the mending.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Most people today just buy a new pair when they get a hole in their socks. Probably some of the few people who darn their socks are those who knit them in the first place. Because they know the work that went into them. So they take the time to mend.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>There are so many things and people in our lives far beyond knitting that we<em> say<\/em> we cherish and yet we don\u2019t take the time to do the mending necessary to reduce harm. We\u2019ve developed a predatory capitalistic culture which spreads the misinformation that everything and everyone is disposable. And people do literally throw away all kinds of very usable things. And people and systems chew up and dispose of people and cultures, too.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But no matter what our death culture teaches, you can not replace everything and everyone with a swipe of your card or an online purchase. It\u2019s no wonder folx grow up in our culture emotionally bankrupt and bereft of a real understanding of relationship and community and resilience. Because the only way many of us know how to \u201cfix\u201d anything is to throw money at it. To throw it away and buy something to replace it. And when that inevitably doesn\u2019t work, it\u2019s no wonder we have such a high incidence of violence, addiction, and depression.&nbsp; Because we have so many broken places and so few among us who know how to mend.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We must find our way back to the lost art of MENDING.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>You can mend just about any broken place, but a good, lasting mend can\u2019t be bought or rushed.&nbsp; A good mend requires close attention to detail. It\u2019s less about fancy skills, but slow, deliberate, intentional care.&nbsp; It\u2019s important to find all the breaks so that further damage isn\u2019t done. Mends can sometimes be invisible, but rarely.&nbsp; Like a scar, the more serious the damage, the more visible the mend..&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But a good mend makes the cloth stronger and more beautiful.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Sometimes we don\u2019t have to look outward to see what needs mending. Because often there\u2019s a space inside us that needs tending; that needs to know we are worthy of being loved and capable of being loving. So let\u2019s work on our mending skills: for ourselves, our relationships, and our whole community. Because no one is disposable. Not ever.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" width=\"1024\" height=\"533\" src=\"http:\/\/elizabeth.lainschell.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/Mend-illustration-1024x533.jpg\" alt=\"Silhouette of spool of thread with words forming thread winding around and reaching out in an arc towards a silhouetted needle wih words &quot;Good mend makes the cloth stronger.&quot;\" class=\"wp-image-305\" srcset=\"https:\/\/elizabeth.lainschell.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/Mend-illustration-1024x533.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/elizabeth.lainschell.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/Mend-illustration-300x156.jpg 300w, https:\/\/elizabeth.lainschell.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/Mend-illustration-768x400.jpg 768w, https:\/\/elizabeth.lainschell.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/Mend-illustration-1536x799.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/elizabeth.lainschell.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/Mend-illustration-2048x1066.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><figcaption>Illustration by Rik Lain Schell<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<h3>Possible Questions\/Further Thoughts to Explore<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p><em>What broken or damaged things in your life to you feel comfortable fixing? (clothes, furniture, appliances, etc.) Do you wish you had more skills for fixing things? If so, how might you gain them? Who could you learn from?<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Do you think the ability to mend or fix things is valued in our culture? Why or why not? Do you think that&#8217;s changed over time, generationally, etc.? <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Many have turned back (or for the first time) to crafting, making, diying, etc. during the pandemic. Do you think this will stick? Will people move forward with these new found skills, hobbies, interests, etc.? Or will they be passing fads? <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>What might it mean to &#8220;mend&#8221; a relationship? What about the description of different kinds of mends &#8211; invisible versus visible &#8211; resonated for you in how a person, a community, a place&#8230; recovers from a trauma? How do we take the time to mend in community? How can we be intentional and tender in the work? <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Explore the problem with wanting to &#8220;fix&#8221;a thing and how that can lead to saviorism. But also how we can often focus on an end result and not the process, the relationship itself. The craft\/art of mending speaks very much to this delicacy of intention.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In the 9th episode of the Crafting a Better World series, Elizabeth explores the lost art of mending and what it means for our clothes, our relationships, and more.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[6],"tags":[19,29,9,8,32,31],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/elizabeth.lainschell.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/304"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/elizabeth.lainschell.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/elizabeth.lainschell.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elizabeth.lainschell.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elizabeth.lainschell.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=304"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/elizabeth.lainschell.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/304\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":307,"href":"https:\/\/elizabeth.lainschell.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/304\/revisions\/307"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/elizabeth.lainschell.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=304"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elizabeth.lainschell.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=304"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elizabeth.lainschell.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=304"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}