Why Mending Matters

It hung in my closet for years, that dress Mom and I found on the clearance rack at JCrew for a song when I was 17. I wore it all the time that summer - to church and out with friends, picnics and parties. It was breezy, pretty and everything you want in a sun dress.

Years passed and pregnancies came and went and I wore it a few more times in between. One day I noticed a small pull between the main fabric and the lining along the zipper. I wore it again and it got worse. So I stuck it in my closet and left it alone. Sometimes I'd grab it before remembering - that's right, it needs to be fixed. Never mind then. Summer after summer it waited, untouched.

Last weekend, I pulled it out and sat cross legged on the bed with a needle and thread. 5 minutes later it was fixed. Wearable. Useful again.

In my pursuit of clutter-free, simple living, I often forget about mending. That or it just doesn't seem to be worth my time. In our American life, we have so much. Often I get rid of clothes for the kids that might need a little fixing because the time/benefit equation doesn't balance out. I tend to err more on the side of getting rid of things that are no longer useful as opposed to fixing them.

But this disposable mentality can sneak it's way into other areas of my life as well. A relationship becomes difficult, more work than I want to put in? It's tempting to step away as opposed to working out the problems. When issues crop up in my parenting, my knee jerk reaction is to throw out whatever discipline I had previously espoused instead of examining what works and what really doesn't.

I relate a lot to the idea of creativity being a spiritual discipline, something we were all made for in various ways, a reflection of the Image we were all made in - but what about mending? Repair? Salvation itself is about repair. Repairing relationship. Restoring us to where we were meant to be, all along.

We are made to create, but we are also made to mend. To fix broken things, to constantly move toward repair. There's hope in that, after all. Hope that, even when everything in life seems to be unraveling, or a collection of sharp and painful shards - the possibility for wholeness remains.

{Bear with me this week? My CF card reader met a sad end and I'm waiting on a replacement. Instagram photos are all I have to offer!}

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