Many years ago I found a prize at the free store—a pair of GAP fleece-lined jeans. They became my almost constant winter comfort, soft, loose and cozy. They were worn but still sturdy then; now the long story of life with me shows as tears in elemental areas.

A few years ago, my sister gifted me with llbean flannel-lined jeans for Christmas, as I requested. I was happy that I could be warm as I folded away my GAPs. I wore then the stiff strong new ones—which maddeningly tortured me at the waist.

In the unkind cold of this winter I unearthed my now disreputable old GAPs and began to wear them again. But I vowed to leave them behind. Days before we left, I tried on the llbeans and finding no miracle enlargement of their waist or reduction of mine, decided that I would venture South without them too.

Crazed with the decisions of last minute packing, I plucked up the thankfully clean GAPs and frantically tore into my stacked storage bins looking for some fabric to bring along for patching. Something calm and blue, with no shadow of the funky alterations of my younger days. I grabbed a scrap of old familiar fabric—there were clear blue spaces between the large yellow and beige elegant-leaved flowers—then pushed jeans and cloth into a bag that disappeared into the motor home.

I awoke freezing after our first night out, and as Andre slept, I retrieved the jeans, found the cloth, got the sewing kit we carried in the bottom drawer by the bed, and sitting in bed under the heavy covers, began my work.

The "kit," assembled by Andre's mother, was bountiful and elegant. The hand carved blue-lined box from India held an ample selection of colored cotton thread, fine short and long needles, round-headed straight pins, 2 kinds of quality scissors, a thimble and ripping tool. As I leaned over my work, hurrying to complete at least one patch before he woke and it was time to go again, I was filled with gratitude for this one gift from a woman I never met. I thought about what she had left behind. The lovely paintings, letters, scrapbooks, two sons and grandchildren. The stories they told of her. The intensity of not always positive feelings associated with her.

But she had entered my solitary world of craft as a benefactor. My intention was to have these jeans, that morning, and I worked quickly, using her scissors, thread and pins, striving to make my small blanket stitches consistent and the needle pierce only the top layer of denim, leaving the lining untouched. I made my way around four sides of the first patch, then moved to the second one, all the while marveling at the flexibility of time. All the while taking small even steps around the boundaries of my task.

Pressing my luck, I began the back pocket. Unable to stay understated, I let the yellow flowers flow up from the bottom and bloom. Amazingly, I finished the long-sewn journey, arose soon after Andre, put on the jeans and faced the day with a sense of elation—of the task completed, the restoration of a loved garment touching me. And of the benign presence of Ingrid.

We drove into the gray day. I looked at the road. I looked at the patch above my knee. I thought of my labor. How the results were good, but not perfect. How it had taken time, yet not too long. How my hands felt some pain, but it was all worth it.

Suddenly, Margaret came to mind. I had seen her the day we left, weak, but healing from her intestinal surgery. In good spirits and alive, better than expected. I was still marveling about it all. That laproscopic surgery had saved her body from excessive trauma and allowed her a speedier recovery and return home. As she lay in bed we talked for awhile, and then as I was about to leave she pulled up her shirt so that I could see one of her incisions.

I knew they were closed with staples; that staples have become the accepted method of closure where possible. Speedier than stitching, I'm sure. More secure? I haven't a clue. But quick. Easy. Yet I was unprepared for what I saw. No "angry" wound. Just giant pieces of metal in her soft belly. The belly that is part of the body that for over twenty years I have known, tried to protect, helped to clean, move, comfort. Part of the person who I love, and who has been a comfort to me. And while I was so grateful for the amazing skills and technology that enable her well-being, I was resentful of that metal in her belly.

So we drove, my own encounter with precision and stitching still fresh in my mind and body. And I thought of Margaret, and the long centuries of wounds and the necessary stitching of humans and other animals. Stitches that dissolve, stitches that must be removed. Careful small stitches. In eyes, in skin. Awe of numbers of stitches. Many and few. The talents of doctors who sew. Who mend. The kindness of stitches.