Needle Threader
A skilled seamstress, my Nanny often spent hours stitching sequins, tiny glass beads and pearls to the bodices and skirts of wedding gowns she had been hired to create. It was a task she took great pride in. “This dress is the last garment the bride will wear as a single woman and the first she will wear as a wife. When she walks down the aisle, all eyes will be on her in this dress,” she explained. The eye of her beading needle was so small she held it beneath a magnifying glass in order to thread it. She would often make multiple attempts at threading before picking up her finishing scissors and nipping the end of the thread. She would nip and attempt to thread over and over until the thread finally slid successfully through the eye of the needle. A sigh of relief always fluttered my way as she pulled a tight knot in the end of her thread. Never expressing frustration or anger she would offer “If you sew, you can’t let that little needle eye get the best of you.”
I understood the need for multiple attempts and the benefit of using the lighted magnifying glass that stood on an adjustable pedestal, but I did not understand why she kept nipping the end of the thread. So, I asked… “Each time I attempt to push the thread through the eye of the needle, my thread frays. Finally, the thread is so divided, any attempt at threading the eye brings me farther away from success,” she explained. “So, I nip.”
We loved shopping at the TG&Y store. They offered a wide range of products at reasonable prices. Often we visited the store without a specific need and left having purchased newfangled gadgets. “Well, look at this,” she chirped almost in song. I looked, but didn’t have a clue what she was so excited about. Inside a plastic package was a small flat piece of tin cut in the shape of a teardrop. The rounded portion of the teardrop was about the size of a nickel. Where it stretched to a point, a fine loop of wire was attached. The package label read, “Guaranteed to thread your needles on the first attempt!” A tight grip on the package, Nanny looked around like it was some sort of trick then headed for the checkout. She slapped a quarter on the counter in payment, and we headed home on the back roads so she could drive faster without fear of a speeding ticket.
Home, we made a bee line for the sewing room leaving a trail of torn packaging in our wake. I read the instructions while she readied to thread. “Push the wire loop through the needle eye, thread the string through the wire loop, and pull the threaded loop back through the needle while tugging the flat handle gently.” It was easy! She sat back and cried…
Just like thread, our relationships are prone to fray. We push and push until any attempt to live a joint life is impossible. Separate paths pull at the fibers of a relationship until the division undermines the strength of the original bond. Before we realize, we have nipped at the relationship to the point that there isn’t enough remaining to hold on to. There is no newfangled gadget for stitching lives together, but there is a book filled with helpful instruction. The Bible is filled with God’s instructions.
“A time to tear apart and a time to sew together; a time to be silent and a time to speak.”
Ecclesiastes 3:7
