A sweet memory arose on the way to the pharmacy: Grandma's shopping for supplies to make, for me, either a now crispy crunchy royal blue hat & scarf or the softer and scratchier afghan. I can't remember the name of this former five & dime on N. New Hampshire in Covington, but I remember Grandma taking me along for what was an almost unbearably exciting expedition for a girl growing up in a tiny town. I watched her sift through the yarn bins for just the right colors of what fiber snobs would call "cheap acrylic" yarn, to crochet gifts for her family. The building wasn't this upscale back in the 1960s-1970s, of course. Gentrification has made old Covington far more attractive but also far more exclusive and inaccessible to many of its former residents. It can't steal all my memories, though.

It must have been the afghan for which she was choosing yarn, because Grandma was looking for just the right shade of white to match the lavender and soft blue yarns. She, as so many poor people have to do, settled for what the dime store offered instead of what would be "perfect.". It was the 1970s in a still very rural parish of mostly villages and small towns. Either the labeling was incorrect or she couldn't see well enough to read it, but she got more than she bargained for!

The afghan was beautiful. I loved it! Grandma was so proud of her gift. She must have worked  dozens of tedious hours to produce something big enough to cover most of me.

And then, we washed and dried it. Or Mama washed it. I can't remember. Who did the washing and drying doesn't matter - what mattered was what it did to my 70+ year old grandmother.

Grandma wept when she saw it. After the damage was done. Angrily berated herself for not realizing the "white" yarn she'd chosen was 100% sheep's wool. The blue and lavender were acrylic. Reminiscent of the biblical warning against sewing a piece of new skin onto an old wineskin. Of course when the work of her crippled, arthritic hands went into the hot dryer, the wool shrank. A lot. Suddenly the perfectly straight edges had unsightly ripples and the perfectly flat fabric she'd created had huge buckling puckers. Everywhere. It was every crocheter's or knitter's nightmare. What had been a lovely zig-zag that draped well was now an odd-looking zig-zag with tight, dense, scratchy bands of felted cream wool pulling on the still soft and supple rows of the other two colors, distorting the entire piece.

Grandma was crushed. I don't know if she ever picked up a crochet hook again after that. But that wonderful rectangle of love continued to keep me warm on cold nights and lay folded at the end of my bed, on top of the blue & lavender iris bedspread, on warm nights. For the rest of my life it's moved with me to each new dwelling place. With each washing and drying (yes still in a dryer) the acrylic yarn softens again and the wool tightens up a wee bit - but somehow they have made peace with each other, and it looks so much better than it did four decades ago.

How I wish Grandma knew that over forty years later her gift of love still warms and comforts me, often when I need her the most.