There are many reasons why we choose to sew. It's a great, entertaining hobby, it stimulates the creative side of your brain, you are constantly learning new skills and techniques, the list goes on and on. But I think one of the reasons I love sewing so much is because of the peace and calm it can bring to a hectic couple hours/days/weeks.
During the past two weeks I have found myself becoming progressively more and more stressed and agitated, for various reasons. Firstly, my job always tends be quite crazy as I'm constantly moving from place to place (and I really don't cope with change well! Yeah, I know, good career choice!) and things certainly haven't been helped by unemployment waiting just around the corner. The lack-of-job situation has a knock on effect which manifests itself in the horror that all actors share: auditions. I have had four fairly intense auditions in less than a week, all of which are unresolved as yet as I have no idea what the outcome of any of them will be. This does not help with my feelings of tension! Are you starting to see a pattern here? :)
To top off the situation I'm currently in the process of moving in with my Sweetheart, a wonderful thing that I'm really excited to be doing, but it too is not devoid of it's problems! I had no idea how complicated renting a property would be just because I'm self-employed - my goodness the hoops they make you jump through! Just to rent a flat for one year I've had to provide all kinds of tax returns and other information, I was indirectly accused of fraud and I was told that I had a better change of being accepted to rent a property if I worked on a checkout at ASDA rather than being an actor. You can probably understand why I was a bit put out. Goodness knows what will happen when I want to buy a property one day!
But let's not dwell on the negatives, that's not what this post is about (contrary to what you might think after reading that previous paragraph!)...
After my crazy fortnight of madness and stress I found myself at home alone with nothing to do before going to work that evening, so I decided to take out a bit of sewing that I have been meaning to get around to for a while: Gertie's Bombshell Dress. Without a doubt those few hours of sewing were the exact catharsis that I needed. The almost ritualistic process of laying out the fabric, marking it, cutting out interlining pieces and then hand basting them together with the fashion fabric helped my let go of all the residual stress that I had been accumulating over the past two weeks. For the first time in a while I felt peaceful and calm. It was pretty amazing, I'm not going to lie! I held onto that feeling for the rest of the day and I even took some hand basting work on the train with me which passed the time on my commute beautifully. The effect was undeniable to me: sewing = serenity.
Now of course there are times when your home sewing makes you want to tear your hair out, when something refuses to work or you just can't make head nor tail of a pattern (believe me I've been there!), but for now I'm enjoying the idea of sewing as my own little piece of calm, something that brings me back to myself and helps me remember that however crazy and stressful things get, the smallest thing can bring you back to where you want to be.
And how about you my lovely readers? Do you share my feeling about the soothing powers of sewing, or am I on my own here? :) Have a marvellous Sunday!
