The Pillow

It was over three years ago, on Christmas 2010, that Mark received the present he had demanded. A brand new sewing machine. Mark had never sewn before, had never owned a sewing machine, but because of those stupid shows on cable television, those shows pitting designer wannabes against each other for money, Mark needed a sewing machine. The first year it sat on the bar in the sun room collecting dust. By the second year it had been moved to the floor where it helped anchor a little rug that tended to move around. Year three saw it pushed behind cases of soda and piles of unread magazines. So I was greatly surprised when Mark came to me and told me to "Put the sewing machine in the car please." I assumed he was giving it away to the Salvation Army, the Pet Shelter thrift shop, or some other deserving person who would actually use it. "Good," I told him, "I'm glad to see that somebody will get some use out of it." As far as I knew, Mark had never even turned the thing on. "I'm not giving it away. My friend Cisco is going to teach me to sew." So I picked up the sewing machine and carried it out to the car. Finally, something was going to come of the Christmas gift of 2010. Hours later Mark returned. He opened the front door, walked over to the sofa, and tossed two pillows on it. "Sewing is hard." Mark whined, "Cisco made me thread that machine. It took me longer to do that than it did to sew those pillow covers."  I looked at the pillows, "You sewed those? They're really nice, you did a nice job Mark." There was a bit of silence, and then Mark admitted "Well, Cisco kind of did most of the actual sewing. But I threaded the machine, and it was hard to see that little hole in the needle."