Little things that comfort...

Blaise Pascal argues that we are made happy by little things because we are irritated by little things. Take me this morning. I was feeling a little chilled so I reached for my sweater that was draped across the couch in my room. Now this is no ordinary sweater. It is the last sweater that my mother ever knit for me. It is a burgundy coloured homespun wool cable stitch pullover with a crewneck. I have had it for about 12 or fourteen years but it looks new.

That is because I knew it was the last one she might knit for me because of the arthritis that was attacking her hands and making knitting jut too painful. Putting it on not only made me feel warm; it made me feel the love that went into it. There are likely still many sweaters that my mother knit for family and friends floating around the world. She was a very gifted person who could knit, and crochet, embroider, hook colourful mats from scraps of cloth and tat lace. These were the ordinary skills that so many women of my mother's generation acquired as young girls but she raised her work to an art form.

So when I put it on I could see her there, knitting and laughing chatting away without even looking at her needles. I am sure that when she fell asleep in the middle of some project she did not drop a stitch. When I put it on I could feel her arms around me with all of the love a mother can offer her child. When I put it on my loneliness evaporated and I felt loved and watched over.