Joanie Brittingham

I leaned my head against the cool painted steel of my front door, holding in a sob. I hadn’t left my apartment in days. I’d showered, finally, determined to go out and enjoy my “fun employment.” I opened the door and stepped across the threshold into the tiled hallway, and slowly took one stair at a time. When I was working in finance, I often ran down the stairs to catch the subway to Manhattan. But I was laid off. My “office bestie” Aurora messaged once a week to remind me to apply for jobs—she was looking elsewhere, especially now that she was the token woman at the company, not counting the administrative assistants. Those were the only jobs they really wanted us to be in. I simmered with rage. They’d called me lazy. If “ethical” and “thorough” count as lazy, then I guess I am. 

I have enough savings to pay my rent for another year. I stayed in the same fifth floor walkup in South Slope I’d lived in as a student, with a longer commute than the guys who got apartments near Wall Street or in the East Village. That meant they needed the bonus at the end of the year for their basic budgets and to keep their heads above water. It kept them hungry for bonuses and promotions. I bought myself time with that apartment, despite what I lost in commuting, and I worked on the train so it wasn’t really lost time anyways, and the stairs meant I always got my steps in. Until now, anyway. I had gone out only to the grocery store, the big chain one that always had a line when I was working, snaking around the bottom level so that I would just do my shopping while in line. Now, I could go in the middle of a weekday when it was less crowded. I was still buying prepared meals, but eventually planned to start cooking. I had my trash and recycling as well as my keys, wallet, phone, and noise canceling headphones. Not that I needed the headphones without the subway. I wasn’t leaving Brooklyn.

Outside, the air was cooler than in my apartment. I need to open the windows because it had gotten stuffy in there. I hadn’t had fresh air, or what passes for fresh air in the city, in days. In my tote bag, I also had my travel coffee cup, the one I never used when I was working. I’d always get takeaway coffee, and often use that to get out of the office and away from all the men shouting “bro!” at each other over my head while I stared at two monitors full of spreadsheets. I wasn’t bad at my job. I just didn’t play the “game” right. And for what? I don’t even like the Hamptons!

I walked past a number of businesses I never explored in my neighborhood on my way to Spinning City, a store and workshop dedicated to everything fiber arts. They sell yarn and thread and knitting needles and crochet hooks and embroidery hoops and whorl drop spinners. I’d scrolled through enough videos of people making things with their hands over the last month after my layoff to want to learn something new. I felt like I’d spun enough straw into gold for billionaires in all my little spreadsheets—why not learn to actually make something tangible?

I entered the store, which was quiet—soft talking and laughter, and no loud music playing. Usually when I go into a store in New York City, they are doing their best to get you to buy and leave as quickly as possible. This was different. The air felt calmer. The walls were lined with colorful yarns and labeled by the fiber content. Along one wall were supplies, and in the center were long tables and benches, like an old-timey tavern, but scattered with patterns and needles and yarn. There were a variety of patrons in the store, including a small group with some children at one table, where an older woman was teaching basic crochet stitches to mothers and their children. She was one of those ladies the finance bros would have ignored on the sidewalk, not stepping out of the way for her and making her move for them. She wore a long, shapeless dress that was brightly colored and patterned. Her gray, frizzy hair was loose and long down her back. She had knobby, swollen hands, the arthritis clear as she gestured with her hands frozen into claws. When she spoke, her pendulous lip blew spittle towards the people she was teaching, who didn’t react to the spray at all. I couldn’t see her feet, but I could guarantee she wore Birkenstocks.

I watched her for a minute. She seemed so…what was that on her face? Happiness? She had a lot of wrinkles and sun damage, and her neck was hunched forward. Her eyes were milky with glaucoma, and she wore reading glasses perched at the end of her nose. I had a three thousand dollar chair at my desk at work…at my old desk, at my old job, to keep me from looking like that, hunched away at my keyboard.

“Can I help you, dearie?” I turned toward the voice. Another older woman, another shapeless dress. This time I could see the Birkenstocks, or, Birkenstock, as her other foot was ensconced in one of those boot things that old people wear after foot surgery. I realized I was staring at her foot, when she said, “Oh, my foot’s alright, really. Flat feet—too much spinning!” She laughed, a cackle really, showing a mouth full of broken teeth. 

“Um, I don’t know what I’m here for. I was hoping to learn,” I flailed my arms around, not pointing at anything in particular, “something.”

She smiled at me, taking me in. It would have felt patronizing if it had come from a man, but from her, it felt like she was sizing me up to see what use I could be.

But I couldn’t stand the silence in her appraisal, so I chattered on, “I’m figuring things out. I lost my job—downsizing—and I have some savings and I need to find a new job but I don’t know what I want to do and I’m so burnt out on the whole rat race and I don’t feel useful and I thought maybe if I spent some time doing something with my hands…” I trailed off. 

“I’m figuring things out” is a loose way of saying sharing memes on Insta and being vague with responses to friends, alternately sobbing and napping, and moving from the bed to the couch and back again. I meant it when I said I don’t feel useful. That’s the hardest part about being unemployed, especially after being let go. 

Unexpectedly, the woman took a step forward and embraced me. I stood with my arms at my side, not sure what to do. Eventually I hugged her back, while she patted my back and said, “It’s going to be alright. You’re going to be alright.”

She led me in and to a table. The rest of the day was a blur. Another older woman, in an equally amorphous dress, gigantic orthopedic sneakers, and thick coke-bottle glasses that made her eyes appear bulbous, brought me a drop spindle and a pile of wool and silently began to demonstrate how to spin with it. Her thumbs were flattened, and like the other women, she was knobby with arthritis. After a few hours, my hands hurt and I’d made more of a mess than I’d made yarn. She clapped me on the back and said, “good job, sweetie, it’s a start.”

Over the next several months, I tried everything: spinning from wool and flax, weaving with a heddle loom, knitting, crocheting, cross stitch, and embroidery. I went with some of the new friends I met there to the fabric district and took sewing classes. I made a dress—one single dress which took me three months—which I wore on dates. My dating life had been dead at my old job, and it was nice to start going out again. It was fun too, to get a compliment on my dress, and say, “oh I made it!” This was more fun when women complimented it than my dates, as the women’s response was, “Oh my God, I want to learn that!” and I could tell them where and that it also had pockets. I also had a handbag made from fabric I’d weaved myself and with crochet edging. It wasn’t perfect—heck, it wasn’t even good, but it was mine and I’d made it, slowly and with the instruction from “the aunties.” 

I met Tom on one of these dates. He also worked in finance, so he knew where I’d come from. There was no sexism about the burnout, either. He had a “Plan B” if he was laid off that involved hiking in Europe, so he understood why I was taking time to make things. We went on more dates. Then we started dating exclusively. I met his family. And one night, he proposed. 

I showed the ring to the aunties the next day and they oohed and ahhed and asked when they’d get their save the date cards. I told them about the engagement party, which of course they were invited to. They all smiled, showing their uneven teeth. Tom’s family was rich—like rich, rich. They’d hate the aunts’ flowing dresses and sandals, their natural greying hair, air died and frizzy. They’d hate their makeup-less faces, wrinkled and Botox free. I burned with shame at my own embarrassment. These women had done so much for me, how could I possibly be embarrassed by them? I loved them, like they were my actual family, who had not yet responded to messages about my engagement at all.

When it was finally time for the engagement party, Tom’s mom showed no emotion as she limply shook hands with my aunties. Of course she couldn’t, her face was frozen with fillers. By then, I no longer called them “the” aunties, but “my” aunties. No one was actively rude, but they were stand-offish. I felt uneasy the whole entire party. I longed for the comfort of Spinning City. The yarn walls absorbed sound, and in this trendy rooftop bar, all the sounds bounced off the hard surfaces. The music, too loud to hear conversations, overwhelmed my senses. I went to the bathroom and stared at my reflection. I didn’t like what I saw: a shiny, polyester dress with one shoulder, my face heavily made up and my hair long and lustrous with a blow out that cost more than materials to make the handmade bag Tom told me was too embarrassing to bring to the party. 

I took a few deep breaths and went back to the party, deeply self-conscious and hyper-aware of every material I saw and touched. I found myself talking at length to one of Tom’s aunts about the history of textile skills and string as a tool of innovation in many technologies. I was only semi-aware that she was blinking quickly and looking away, trying to extricate herself from the conversation. One of the aunts had Tom’s boss in a corner, talking to him about sustainability with natural materials. I knew his investment firm held shares in a number of fast fashion companies. His face turned redder and redder as she spoke, and I steered her away. The party was not a total disaster, but it was far from a success. 

Tom and I went to his apartment after; he’d wanted me to give mine up and move in with him, but I was reluctant to do so. I couldn’t entirely place why, but it began to unravel for me at that moment. 

“Babe, you cannot have your aunts at the wedding. They are…well, they don’t fit in, you know?” He threw his dress shirt, an end-on-end broadcloth, onto the floor. I’d learned that the warp and weft threads were different colors in this fabric, giving it more dimension up close while appearing solid from farther away. 

“They’re the only family I really have,” I stared at the shirt, not at him.

“Just because your parents couldn’t get to the city for a party doesn’t mean they’re not your family. They’re busy, I get it. You shouldn’t hold it against them.”

“That’s not what this is about.”

“Then what is it about? You can’t seriously be planning to spend all your time at Spinning City. I’m not saying you have to go back into finance.” He turned away and kept talking to me from the bathroom while he continued to get ready for bed, as if we were discussing something light and simple, and not the rest of my life.

“You don’t want to ruin your hands and eyes and feet the way those women have. They’re…deformed. You can’t do that to yourself anymore, babe. You’re too beautiful.”

He came back out the bathroom and leaned against the door in nothing but his boxers. He was handsome and muscled, the kind of looks achieved only with money and a high end gym membership. He smiled, his white, even teeth gleaming in the tasteful recessed lights of his modern, luxury apartment. “You don’t have to work, ever again. My mom can get you on the board of some charities. You can spend your days doing whatever you want.”

“Except fiber arts, of course.”

“I don’t want to fight about this. The party was a lot, it’s emotional for everyone to plan a wedding. You’ll come to your senses in the morning.”

He walked into the bedroom, not waiting for me. I could hear him snoring slightly in just a few minutes. Spending my days doing whatever I want…going to nail and hair salons, and cosmetic dermatologists, and shopping, and lunching with other ladies, carrying handbags that cost three months’ rent. Trying to stay young and beautiful and keeping my hands perfect by avoiding any physical labor.

I padded into the living room silently. Even without any lamps, the lights from the city illuminated the room, all angles and flat surfaces, with no art. He said I’d decorate, of course, or we could hire his mom’s decorator. There’d be no woven wall hangings made from leftover fibers of different sizes and lengths here. There’d be no basket of yarn, no loom or spindle tucked in the corner next to an overstuffed chair. The presents from the party were piled high on the dining table. I noticed one that did not match the others—with patterned scraps of paper sewn into a paper quilt as its wrapping, ribbons expertly curled. I pulled the box out, and sat on the uncomfortable leather sofa. Within the box was an organic cotton kaftan and a pair of Birkenstocks. And a note: “To our dearest niece, we want you to choose whatever makes you happy. –Your loving aunts”

I changed into the kaftan and the Birkenstocks. I left the ring at the edge of the marble countertop, glittering in the lights from the window. I slipped out the door and out of that life to my own happily ever after.