I started sewing even before I entered kinder. The memory of siting down on a cool gray tile floor next to a black trash bag filled with retazos from leftover material of dresses my mom had sewn is my dearest memory. She always refused to teach me how to sew arguing that I needed to learn by seeing her at work.
I often thought she was harsh but I am glad she did. When I moved to the United States and did not know how to speak English, I had to learn by only seeing. It was hard but I knew how.
Every time we crossed the border, we bought fabric. It was a must even though we did not need it for anything. I got so used to touching fabric to feel the quality and texture which gave me a sense of what to create with it.
La tienda Dos Rios was a paradise for me. You see, the border is not all sadness and death. The noise of the scissors cutting the fabric along a hard edge table and the infinite roles of fabric along the old catalogs made me create at high speed, in my mind, designs of dresses I wished to wear.
Today I mentioned to a young crowd: As you grow older, you will associate things with color and you will carry that association with you for your entire life. A light blue will remind you of the first car you drove or your first dress.
Fabric for me reminds me of my grandmother, my mother and the border. All three come to my mind when I see a strong floral cotton fabric that can be turned into anything. A fabric of that quality is and will always be hard to find. I have had this floral printed fabric for more than ten years and it suddenly made sense to me, this past December, to cut a piece of it and create art with it.
