Memento Mori by Muriel Spark

In Spark's classic novel, a mysterious voice calls several elderly people to tell them "Remember, you must die."  The source of the calls -- mundane or supernatural -- is never explained, but that's not the point.  Instead, the novel is a meditation on aging, death, and the way the various characters come to terms with their lives.

The results aren't exactly admirable, but they are funny, satirical, pathetic, and moving.  Human frailty is on display here as the characters mull over their lives, make excuses for themselves, and criticize their peers while coping with the physical and mental costs of aging. Above all, the concern is to have a "good death," whatever that means to the individual -- in the comfort of one's home, in a hospital with round-the-clock care, with a lot of money, surrounded by loved ones, mourned by the public at large. 

But the concerns often become petty. One character is constantly revising her will to reward or punish people; another schemes and blackmails to get inheritances.  One character catalogs the infirmities of everyone around him for the sake of "research" that's really busywork; another does it to reassure himself that he is "winning" at aging.  Towards the end of the book one woman, astuter than the others, makes the observation that "[a] good death ... doesn't reside in the dignity of bearing but in the disposition of the soul."  This is a point that is often ignored when we discuss end-of-life issues because we are so focused on getting rid of suffering and in "dying with dignity." But some suffering cannot be avoided no matter how hard we try.  And dignity doesn't lie in how able-bodied or sound-of-mind we are, but in our character.

For the most part, the characters in Spark's novel don't quite grasp that. That doesn't make them contemptible, though, just human.  Just like the rest of us.

1 Year of Stitches: Week 38

It's that Time of Year

... when I get the urge to stitch, bead, and sew all things pumpkin and foliage.  First up is a scrappy pumpkin pillow, which allowed me to use a Halloween-themed charm pack from my stash:

Instead of 2.75 squares, I made mine 3.5 finished to better accommodate the 20 inch pillow form I had.  I also quilted it with perle cotton and big stitches:

To finish it I used the envelope technique, which I learned all the way back in 6th grade in my first quilting class:

No zippers!

I'm in the process of recovering the old, ugly cushions on the rocking chair. Doesn't this look better?

Speedy Beadboy3 lunges for the pillow

1 Year of Stitches: Week 37

Book Round-Up

Darned if You Do by Monica Ferris: the latest but one of the Crewel World series, this novel had some sloppy editing, but it was made up by a genuinely interesting mystery.  Ferris's character development continues to shine.

Rose Cottage by Mary Stewart: A quiet, gentle story set in post-war England, this novel is part mystery, part family drama, and part romance, but is mostly a pleasant diversion.

The Strawberry Hearts Diner by Carolyn Brown: This was ... kind of awful.  I'm all for cozy novels set in cute small towns, but this was too unrealistic.  The small-town superiority was too ridiculous, the characters' relationships developed far too quickly, the alleged conflicts were too minor (or just petered out instead of being resolved). I ended up skimming through to the anti-climactic ending, and it wasn't worth it.

The Mystery of the Yellow Room by Gaston Leroux: Published in 1907, it's one of the first locked room mysteries, and well constructed; I was able to accurately guess the perpetrator of the crime and his motive, but the way he did it confounded me. It's also a product of its time; the success of the crime hinged in part on two people deliberately impeding the investigation to protect someone's honor -- not an internal sense of honor that comes from integrity, but an external one based on reputation.  I have little patience for that sort of thing, and it kept me from appreciating the novel as much as I should have.

1 Year of Stitches: Week 36

Even More Blockheads

I got inspired over the Labor Day weekend.

Floral heart:

The Wicked Witch of the West:

I am vengeance! I am the night (flight)! I am ... BATMAN!

1 Year of Stitches: Week 35

Two new motifs: a gridiron for St. Lawrence and St. Jerome's cross; both are the patron saints of librarians.

Another Blockhead

This week's block is called Cat's Cradle, and like a couple of other members I used some cat fabric:

Ignore that erroneous-sewn seam at the bottom.