Finishing

I hate leaving a project undone. Big or small, major or mundane, I just don't like dragging around the weight of too many things on my to-do list. So it was with reluctance that I packed a half-done, brown brocade ballgown into a plastic storage container in my basement in the fall of 2008.

I had started making the dress with great anticipation that summer, envisioning how pretty I would feel as I accompanied my husband to dances at some of his Civil War reenactment events. Midway through the project, I was working on the tight-fitting bodice when I discovered the lump that turned out to be a fast-growing cancer in my abdomen.

Now, on the other side of chemotherapy, surgery and a return to good health, I pulled the container out, unpacked my sewing machine and returned to my project. As I pinned, stitched and pressed the fabric to completion, I offered up prayers of thanksgiving and marveled at the journey this dress will always symbolize for me.

I did, indeed, feel beautiful as my husband and I joined the Grand March into the Statehouse Atrium last Saturday night for the annual Civil War-era winter ball. It was not just that the dress turned out as pretty as I had envisioned. My euphoria came from being able to finish what I started when my battle with Cancer 2.0 began.