Potholders and Memories by Liz Flaherty

My friend Karen had a pretty potholder at church that someone had made for her from Christmas fabric, and I thought, What a great idea! I could do that between other projects. When I was a kid, Mom had one of those looms where you used circles of fabric--usually cut from the tops of worn-out socks--to make potholders that were both ugly and indestructible. Once you gave one to your grandmother, she couldn't ever throw it away. 

While I have never been above mediocre as a cook--and sometimes mediocre is a bit of a stretch; ask my kids about cube steak at our house--the kitchen is still my favorite part of the house. It's a place of color, cherry cabinets and dark blue walls. It has shelves and windowsills full of memories, junk drawers I need to clean out someday, and windows that frame my life. Including one over the sink.  Kitchen appliances are third only to computers and sewing machines in my power tool inventory. 

The kitchen aisle is my favorite one in any store, and at the top of my list for gifts both given and received is a package containing dish towels--nice, absorbent, colorful ones--and dishrags. They don't even have to match. And it occurred to me just a few years ago that I don't have to wear the old ones completely out before I get new ones. What a concept!

Memories from Grandma's Kitchen

Oh, but I was talking about potholders, wasn't I? Sorry. I use them all the time, another reason I thought they'd be a good project. I still have a few of my grandmother's. They're not pretty, but they've been in use since the middle of the last century, and when I use one, I think of Grandma Neterer. She wasn't much of a cook, either, but I sure did love being in her kitchen. 

So, one afternoon early this week, I made a hot pad from scraps of Christmas fabric. I knew just how I wanted it to look. 

Well, not like that! It is such a mess that even Duane laughed when I held it up to show him. Really, he laughed, and what does he know about potholders? He's probably never left one close enough to a stove burner to start it on fire, dropped it into the dishwater accidentally when he needed to use it as a trivet, or left it somewhere when he used it to carry a hot dish into a pitch-in.

Since I obviously couldn't use it as a gift, I kept it for myself. It works really well. I used a layer of insulated batting, so I haven't had to mumble swear words when the heat came through it at a time I couldn't set the pan down. I like its colors, and I don't much mind that it's a mess. Grandma's are kind of a mess, too.

Most of our memories are that way, aren't they? I suppose it's okay that we clean them up and remember ourselves as more heroic and smarter than we actually were. To recall that our kids were always truthful and obedient as well as gifted. To insist our own childhood behavior was exemplary because our parents would have settled for nothing less. It gives a certain amount of pleasure to lend perfection to things that probably weren't. 

But the memories we laugh longest and hardest at, that we hold the closest even decades later, are the less-than-perfect ones, aren't they? They're the ones that soften the scars on our hearts just as the messy and old potholders keep us from being burned. 

Have a great week. Make memories. Be nice to somebody.