{"id":188,"date":"2006-06-14T18:28:54","date_gmt":"2006-06-14T22:28:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/riverwriter.ca\/wordcurrents\/2006\/06\/14\/linen\/"},"modified":"2007-03-07T09:55:39","modified_gmt":"2007-03-07T14:55:39","slug":"linen","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/riverwriter.ca\/wordcurrents\/2006\/06\/14\/linen\/","title":{"rendered":"linen"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>[significant revision July 2, 2006]<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Satisfaction<br \/>\nironing the napkins gave her satisfaction<\/p>\n<p>they exuded a doughy patina of warmth<br \/>\nher mother&#8217;s stories<br \/>\nguests on Saturday evenings<br \/>\nfriends relatives for dinner<br \/>\ncandle light glistening sterling<br \/>\nsilver candlabras creamers flatware<br \/>\ncream soup steaming potatoes<br \/>\nroast beef onions in cream sauce sweet carrots<br \/>\ndark aromatic coffee in porcelain cups rich cream<br \/>\ncigarrettes and fine wine home made mince meat pies<br \/>\na tot of port with a cigar over the old stories<\/p>\n<p>the often washed linen was quiet, soft<br \/>\nalthough a young nephew had once squealed<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>wow we&#8217;re having the hard napkins<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>welcomed with that phrase<br \/>\nthe hard napkins were quite soft<br \/>\nmuch as linen gave to restaurants<br \/>\nhotels and railway dining cars<br \/>\nan aura of gentility and class<br \/>\nso it gave her dining room table<br \/>\nan elegance appropriate to<br \/>\nflowers candles silverware<br \/>\nsteaming food coffee rich conversation<br \/>\nlaughter photography jokes stories<\/p>\n<p>legends were born here<br \/>\nepics that would reconvene years hence<br \/>\ntales told in another voice but still hers<br \/>\nto loyal friends family cousins second cousins<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Remember the time<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>she would begin<br \/>\nthe linen wiping her lips<br \/>\nand over her face would come<br \/>\nthe soft mask of memory<br \/>\ngentle humour compassion love<br \/>\none napkin she would spread<br \/>\nacross the chest of her husband<br \/>\nwho otherwise ruined his shirt early in the meal<br \/>\nanother under the plate of a two year old<br \/>\nmost on laps or sliding softly to the carpet<\/p>\n<p>The washed and ironed napkins<br \/>\nwere arranged in two folded rows<br \/>\ntwelve of them alone on the linen table cloth<br \/>\noverlapping neatly diagonally geometrically<br \/>\nsoftly lustrous in the dim sunlight that slanted<br \/>\nthrough the glass drapes in the west window.<\/p>\n<p>She was organizing a space in the middle drawer<br \/>\nof the splendid dark maple hutch<br \/>\nthe drawers fitted into its curved gleaming front<br \/>\nglided open silently easily<br \/>\nat the back she discovered several<br \/>\neight neatly folded unused napkins<br \/>\ngifts from the old aunt<br \/>\nher mother&#8217;s sister<br \/>\nwho had stored them<br \/>\nremoved from her own<br \/>\nmother&#8217;s linen chest<br \/>\nafter the cancer had taken her<br \/>\nstored them forty years<br \/>\nin a cedar chest in her bedroom<br \/>\npassed them on sacredly<br \/>\nto this niece she had liked<br \/>\nless than two of the others<\/p>\n<p>\u2014 she always played favourites<br \/>\nsour as curdled milk<br \/>\ndependent upon her sister for a social life<br \/>\nreproving judgemental religious<br \/>\neasily disliking the imperfect fourth niece \u2014<\/p>\n<p>these napkins had no heat<br \/>\nor if they did it had long faded<br \/>\nto reside on some bitter moon<br \/>\nsilent ice encrusted dark alone<br \/>\nfar from the dim sun<\/p>\n<p>she lifted the eight napkins as one<br \/>\ntruly hard fixed unyielding<br \/>\nshe thought of hot water soaking<br \/>\nloosening the flax binders then<br \/>\nironing smelling the pungent steam<\/p>\n<p>she tossed them down the laundry chute<br \/>\nthen went to the window and<br \/>\nlooked out at the warm sunwashed street<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>[significant revision July 2, 2006] Satisfaction ironing the napkins gave her satisfaction they exuded a doughy patina of warmth her mother&#8217;s stories guests on Saturday evenings friends relatives for dinner candle light glistening sterling silver candlabras creamers flatware cream soup &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/riverwriter.ca\/wordcurrents\/2006\/06\/14\/linen\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[45,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-188","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-aging","category-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/riverwriter.ca\/wordcurrents\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/188","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/riverwriter.ca\/wordcurrents\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/riverwriter.ca\/wordcurrents\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/riverwriter.ca\/wordcurrents\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/riverwriter.ca\/wordcurrents\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=188"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/riverwriter.ca\/wordcurrents\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/188\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/riverwriter.ca\/wordcurrents\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=188"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/riverwriter.ca\/wordcurrents\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=188"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/riverwriter.ca\/wordcurrents\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=188"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}