Chapter 4

Chapter 4

 One Week After Mandatory Evacuation

 Thursday, 9/18/08  0800 CST

 I’ve awaken to another cool morning after a peaceful rest determined to try to do something normal today or at least productive. Last night after placing all my “chapters” on the flash drive with the hopes of getting to connect to the internet today I called my best friend Pam in Tennessee to visit while I started straightening my studio. Pam is not only my longtime friend of over 20 years, but she’s also a fellow longarm quilter – for the record, I got her into this (smile). Typically, prior to our mandatory evacuation last week, she and I would spend hours on the phone together. We have this rule; we only talk if it doesn’t interrupt our work. She has a headset for her phone and I have a blue tooth for my cell or a head set for my landline (which is a cable modem connection and is down right now). We’d talk about issues with our machines, problem quilts, quilts that we had lined up in the future, design ideas and just life in general. It wouldn’t be unusual for moments of silence while one or the other of us would be concentrating on something we were working on, hearing only the hum of our machines. Then moments later the chatter would began again.. Many a pleasant hour has been spend on the phone with my friend Pam – and again, for the record, I work better when I’m talking to her as I tend to stay focused on the quilt and not distracted with other things in the house such as the computer and my need to connect with my online friends (smile). Can I help it I’m such a social creature (double grin)

 

During our conversation last night I caught her up on the latest concerning our journey through Ike. I also shared the good news that one of my local quilt shops in Texas City contacted me yesterday to see how we faired and informing me that she had power at the shop as of that day and would be reopening. That’s good news as I have a class scheduled to teach on Saturday – which she inquired about, did I want to teach? You betcha! Any of the students that were able to come I’d be more than willing to offer them an opportunity for distraction from the storm recovery and to any students unable to come I’d be more than willing to reschedule and teach the class again in the future. I have to admit, as much as I love teaching new quilt piecing techniques, especially Square in a Square, I am truly looking forward to this selfishly as it will be a nice distraction for me too, a touch of normality so to speak.

 

I told my husband that this saga of preparing and recovering from Ike was getting to be an old story. Oh I realize it’s not over yet and won’t be for a long time, but the play by play drama needs to fade as we try to rejoin the real world. Even though we have power I haven’t seen or heard the local or world news, when I have been around music I have chosen to listen to my iPod full of praise and worship music. But that’s typical for me, I tend to just surround myself with upbeat positive music and remain sheltered in my own little happy world of quilting and my church family. Speaking of which, I really hated to miss services Sunday – I know they met but don’t know any details whether it was in the parking lot or inside. We also knew they were having services last night but again, were unable to go. Our church is 12-15 miles north in Friendswood, not only are we trying to conserve our fuel, but we are still under a curfew in our community whereas that area is not. So Wednesday night services weren’t an option for us. But oh how I eagerly look forward to Sunday! What a day of rejoicing that will be!

 

So my plans for today is to work at the community center as needed and then fill the other hours working in my studio. There is a lot of stuff here to put back before I can ever touch either my sewing machine or my longarm quilting machine….something to look forward to! Then perhaps when I’m able to connect again later in the week I’ll add to this saga quilt related stories. Won’t that be wonderful good!