I created two children with my own body. There is nothing I am more proud of than this glorious work.
An intention preceded the work itself. I embroidered the children’s dreams one by one with my husband. The man who came into my life in my early twenties and had been filling me with belonging ever since. Together we built our bubble. First huge rectangles: love, passion, thrills, attention… and then smaller rectangles: familiarity, intimacy, understanding, patience, listening. And finally, small grains: completion, loyalty, responsiveness, devotion, contemplation…
When the building was already stable, we started to embroider a dream about ordinary children who would come and complete the family we had created.
I did not get pregnant by mistake. Not by chance and not by surprise. I conceived with pure intention. In the act of love, the dreams and hopes, and expectations for the child were integrated.
For years I did my best not to get pregnant. I took pills, defended myself, counted days, and hoped for the best. And suddenly, in one moment, I removed all the barriers and set my heart on a new goal. I celebrated my fertility, enjoyed the fantastic natural periodicity in which the possibility of creating life arose in me, and relished it.
The birth of the eldest was an exciting event. I was watching my son pulsate me and upset my blood. At his birth, I did not shout or make a sound. Quietly and intently watching, I waited for him to come and join me. And when he was born and laid on my chest, I knew I was not wrong. My masterpiece was perfect.
Junior’s upbringing was accompanied by difficulties arising from his illness, but all of which did not detract at all from my parenting enjoyment and admiration for the experience as a whole. However, something was still damaged.
Something that has no name stood between my man and me. I will sin deeply into the feeling if I call it a disappointment. There was something inconceivable, in the understanding, that all those intentions and dreams of ours were trampled under the weight of the harsh reality that was forced upon us. The boy who started with pleasure and great fantasy also brought with him pain, fear, and sorrow. The silence between us began to grow and expand and occupied most of the space of the house.
Productivity was no longer so desirable. Its meaning has lost some of its former grace. Suddenly, there was an overt threat—danger lurking for us upon its realization.
The fear kept us apart. Our joint work hit us in the soft underbelly that put us on either side of the barricade. The building blocks began to be damaged and broken. Large holes opened in the walls of the building and through them flowed cold winds. Each of us found a corner protected from the wind and took care of it. He keeps himself from being touched by the cold.
And at the same time, we longed for heat. We wanted the holes to close, and a great heat would come and envelop us, we longed for the past, for a building that was ours, and now it is crumbling on us.
Attempts at repair did not go well. The foundations of the building were already too dilapidated.
Only after very long years did we realize that there is no more hope for our building, and these have no choice but to erect a new building that will accommodate the existing reality. And so it was. We turned to the slow and tolerant construction of our new facility. This time the building materials were carefully selected. The elements are cast from new materials: completion, acceptance, inclusion, understanding. And the whites were: unconditional love, listening, devotion, sacrifice, honesty, loyalty, adaptation, giving up…
Slowly, slowly we rebuilt ourselves. And out of the building, we created love, passion, and mutual commitment again.
Sometimes I find myself missing the first building. The one with all the right ingredients in it, unfortunately, did not match reality. Now and then, I raise my head and look at the new building and think to myself that I would happily give it up, but how lucky I am that I get to live in it day in and day out.
