My youngest is on the make again. She’s building another costume for the upcoming comicon and Sakura-con at the Washington State Convention Center in Seattle. As her mother, I’m always concerned for her safety during construction.
It’s not that I think she’ll injure herself on the sewing machine or even the blades she carves costume pieces with, rather it’s the state of her bedroom that worries me. It gets so destroyed that she won’t even let the cat in her room at night. There’s not a lot I can say these days, she’s 20 years old, and seemingly old enough to determine whether she’s in a precarious situation. I have my doubts.
Several years ago, when she was still a minor and couldn’t have possibly known better, she created a costume for a friend that required a metal tomato cage. She slept in a loft bed with the desk area underneath. I went in to say good night to her one night and noticed the tomato cage sitting right next to the area of her person. I immediately moved it into the desk area, because I, being an anxious, imaginative sort of mother, pictured an earthquake pitching her out of bed and impaling her on the tomato cage.
I know, I know, it’s an extreme idea that would probably never happen. I can’t help myself. I was really happy when I later moved her work into the bonus room with my office. I kept scooting over to give her more and more space to create. I was glad to do it because it kept her safe while sleeping. In her senior year of high school, a friend of hers moved in and they took over the whole bonus room and I moved the office to the other end of the house. They could mess up the entirety area to their hearts content.
When her friend moved out after graduation, my daughter had the option of taking over the whole bonus area, keeping her costume building space, and living like a free agent. She chose to move back to her small, cozy bedroom and let her older sister have the space. Though she has a corner of the room to store some of her supplies, she again makes costumes in her bedroom.
I went in during the second week of creation and noticed she’d moved a full-sized ironing board next to her bed instead of running back and forth to the half board hanging on the door of my bathroom. Hmmm? Ironing board next to the bed, iron and sewing machine sitting on the ironing board, floor piled with scraps of fabric and other debris. There must be something of concern I can hyperventilate over.
She’s long been out of the bunk bed and is at least level with the floor, so the risk of impalement is low, plus she moved the sewing machine to the ground. But still, my imagination runs deep, and I am her mother. Irons flying around the room as the house flips over during the mud flow caused by Mount Rainier blowing up, because of the earthquake come to mind. I haphazardly mentioned the danger. She scoffed at me. Thereafter, every time I open her door to say good night I eyed the precarious situation and held my tongue. I really have no realistic scenario to suggest, nor do I wish to be mocked any longer.
She’ll be sorry when she is ejected from her bed by the world’s largest mole as it digs its way through the crawl space and pops up under her bed, making her childhood nightmare of a monster under her bed a reality. Scoff at that, child.
Gretchen Leigh is a stay-at-home mom who lives in Covington. You can read more of her writing on her website livingwithgleigh.com, on Facebook at “Living with Gleigh by Gretchen Leigh,” or twitter @livewithgleigh. Her column is available every week at maplevalleyreporter.com under the Life section.
