Our Sympathy

She watches you as you walk down the hallway; depending on what you have accomplished throughout the day, her expression may be one of disapproval or satisfaction. The dignified image you pass by is strong, displaying accurate strokes of brown and white charcoal. My mother-in-law recently passed away and her sketched portrait hangs in the hallway of the house. It favors her so well that I often find myself speaking to it.

The loss of her life was one that shook the ground we all walked on. At the time, getting back to a life filled with normalcy seemed a goal far out of our reach. Some people choose to abandon the memory of a lost loved one because of the pain it causes those to think of someone who is no longer with us, but for others, embracing the past and incorporating it within everyday life is a healthy way to cope with the dearly departed.

The Christmas season that followed my mother-in-law’s passing allowed me to give an extremely moving and memorable gift to my husband and stepson. This was to be the first Christmas they would have without the warmth and comfort of their mother and grandmother. I wanted to give them something that would speak to only them and emphasize the bond they both shared.

At the time, I was experimenting with making T-shirts by scanning items onto the computer and printed them to iron-on transfers. I purchased a few white T-shirts and decided on the perfect subject for their shirts. As they left the house to run errands, I grabbed the ladder and lifted the rather heavy portrait from the wall. Positioning myself above the portrait, I took several photos of it with a digital camera. After returning the portrait, I went to the computer and resized the photos, then printed the finished product onto the iron-on transfers.

In the middle of the night, while everyone was asleep, I snuck into the kitchen to iron the transfers onto the T-shirts. This would be my first attempt at creating a T-shirt and I was meticulous in the way I lined up the transfers, hoping I was positioning them in the correct places for menswear. Examining the end results, I noticed something quite odd. In the portrait, my mother-in-law was wearing earrings. This was not the odd part. When I took the digital photo, a reflection from the flash hitting the glass made it look as if her earrings were sparkling. This was the only place that this detail showed up in the photo and it was completely unintentional. When they opened their gifts, it was quite emotional to see the look on their faces. When I saw the tears, as well as smiles, I knew I had done well.

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