Darn it

Congratulate me, guys.  I just got finished darning a sock.  It was cashmere and I loved it and I couldn’t bear to throw it out.  I felt just like Meg from Little Women.  (No, I didn’t have a darning egg but I used a Limoges oval-shaped snuff box instead.  It worked great.)

This is truly blog-worthy, because, trust me.  The odds on this happening were slim to none.

I am the most UN-domesticated creature on the face of this planet.  (I am including all you men readers in this statement, too.)  I loathe and abominate ANY form of domestic arts and I stink at all of them- in spades.

(Except cooking.  I do love to do that.  Yes, I know my way around a kitchen- but that’s where it begins and ends for me.)

I have never had any interest in cleaning or OMG ironing- 0r folding for that matter- or dusting or mopping or sweeping or vacuuming.  Boredom- combined with terminal klutziness- sets in, my eyes glaze over, my attention wanders and I immediately halt any household task that I even thought about doing.

Luckily for me there’s always been someone around who actually likes this kind of mind-numbing drudgery.  A great housekeeper or a multi-talented husband whose mother raised him right.

But most of all I hate sewing.  This phobia goes all the way back to my Girl Scout days.

I was a member of Wilmette, Illinois Troop 110.  I was there, btw, under the deepest of protests.  When Avoca School started this scout thing in my third grade year, I wanted to join the Cub Scouts.  That’s where all my real friends were.

But no.  Title Nine hadn’t even been dreamt of and so the sexist powers-that-were press-ganged me into the Brownies.  I hated the dung-brown dopey uniform, I hated the name and I hated the dumb things we were supposed to do after school.

This enmity didn’t die when I “flew up” to the Girl Scouts, either.  My troop leader was Mrs. Redlich, Cathy’s mother.  (Help me out, Ellen Kander. Who was her assistant?  Mrs. Rasmussen?  Your mother?)  She was very sweet and I liked her.  ***

*** Instant Update:  Ellen Kander just emailed me and said our assistant troop leader was Mrs. Cooper, Marilyn’s mother.  Bless you, neighbor!  It was driving me nuts.

But all my close gal pals were in Troop 111.  (I think we had been divided geographically or something.)  And I had gotten gerrymandered right into cookie-pushing Hell.

Round the Old Campfire Recipe Sidebar: We learned how to cook s’mores.  (Yuck.  Just the sickeningly-sweet memory sets my teeth on edge.  But I did love a nice char on my marshmallow and the graham cracker.  You could keep that Hershey chocolate glop in the middle.

And we also mastered a camp-fire cuisine called “Hobo Stew.”  You would dump some Campbell’s vegetable soup, ground burger and some catsup and mustard into an aluminum packet, toss the thing into the camp fire and sing jolly Girl Scout songs as the slumgullion of a mess cooked merrily away.  Roll back the tinfoil and serve.)

But I hated to sew even then and the very first badge the troop went for was…

The Sewing Badge.

To earn this, every scout in Troop 110 had to make a dress for a Barbie doll.  Surprisingly enough, I did have a Barbie Doll.  The very first that came out.  She had a striped bathing suit, I bought her one outfit that had a hoodie and then I lost interest in her.  I’m much more a “Steiff” kind of gal.

I had no aptitude or desire in sewing this thing but every girl had to make this doll dress or the whole troop wouldn’t be awarded its badge.  The pressure was on.

I gave it some thought.  I gave it a lot of thought.  And then I knew what I had to do.

I took some fabric and cut two holes in a square.  Then I cut off a small strip of the same cloth.  This was the tie for the blouse I had just designed for Barbie.

Then I cut out a circle of the same fabric and another thin strip.  Voilà!  Now she had a skirt.

It didn’t look half bad, and proudly I presented my doll to our fearless leader.

Mrs. Redlich blanched.  She didn’t quite know what to do.  After all, I hadn’t sewn one single, solitary thing on that dress.  She just couldn’t decide if it met any specifications outlined in the GSA handbook.

Our two scout leaders conferred and cool heads prevailed.  My Norma Kamali-like achievement was taken downtown to the Juliette Low Board for the local GSA mavens to assess it and decide if our troop was indeed badge-worthy.

And the whole troop held its collective breath while we waited and waited for the Board to decide my/its fate.

And then the decision came down from Low.

In their infinite wisdom they decided that if I sewed a snap or a button hook and eye anywhere on this shanda, I would have fulfilled the minimum requirement and thus the troop could get the sewing badge.

All eyes were on me as the troop urged me on.

“You can do it, Ellen!” they cheered.  “Just sew a snap for pete’s sake.”

It took forever but I did it.

And Troop 110 got its badge.

I vowed never to do anything that terrifying again.

And I haven’t.  Until today.

And that reminds me…

“Make new friends but keep the old

One is silver and the other gold.”

To all my silver and gold friends I wish you a very happy holiday season.

And remember.

Be a good scout.

Now where did I put that embroidery hoop…