Frozen in Time

I'm immediately drawn to certain objects. Especially ones which lead me to ask a lot of questions about how it came to be - or not, such as the unfinished hook rug pictured. Still on its frame, still pinned and eternally poised to be completed, I saw it in a local thrift and was compelled to give it purpose - if just a moment's notice by a contemporary passerby.

After all, many years ago (I'm guessing 1940s-50s) someone sat before this stretch of burlap, carefully sketching all the pretty, pink peonies and bright, green leaves, and when the oval pattern was complete, she painstakingly pulled her short, looped yarn through the loosely woven fabric time and time and time again. Slowly and skillfully raising the hook flowers from their burlap garden bed.

I took a class in hook rug making years ago with my cousin, Mary, at Old World Wisconsin, an outdoor living history museum in Eagle, near where we used to live. So when I came upon this relic from some relative's attic, I well knew it was begun by someone quite accomplished with a latch hook.

So why did she stop? 

Heartache? 

Illness? 

Death?

I guess it doesn't really matter.

To me, it's still something to admire - stains and all - because all those years ago, someone sat down in front of this canvas and started to make something beautiful.