to weave, you need...tension 🕸️

the 1pm-on-Saturday class was at the back of the building in the Design Center. smooth concrete floors reflected the fluorescent light jumping down from high warehouse ceilings. two fold-out tables lined with chairs, an easy-going instructor, plenty of Scrap Exchange supplies to get started and about 6 people ready to take chances and make mistakes. It was Pisces season. The waning moon was entering Scorpio. The year was 2016 and we were learning how to weave.

up, down, up, down….

a small, wooden frame dotted with tiny steel nails 1cm apart across the top and bottom became our loom - our practice space. our instructor shepherded us through the very basics of weaving. she demonstrated how to dress the loom and approach this ancient, majestic tedium that we all signed up for.

slowly

eagerly

our beginner hands and minds learned how to begin the labor of weaving this body we call ‘tapestry’. i relished in our group zest for this newness. i was a fledgling amongst fledglings. everyone was a beginner.

over, under, over, under…

weaving is ancient, weaving is ancestral, weaving is embodied. the basic woven structure - ‘plain weave’ - is a fundamental, sacred geometry that cushions all aspects of life and death from swaddle to shroud. across cultures, weaving is metaphor and material. it regularly appears in our cultural and spiritual mythologies, carrying lessons and riddles for living. it is our collective romance, symbolizing the nature of our interdependence and our visions of a unified, liberated future.

but do you ever wonder

what keeps a weave together? what is the abiding force guiding each pull and grounding each interlay of thread? where does the weave get it’s integrity?

through practice, this is what i’m learning:

there is an invisible magic which every weaver across time has needed to hone and that every vision for our liberated future must accept:

tension is your friend.

in our brutal conflict-avoidant yet, conflict-ridden world, tension is often perceived negatively. likely because it can build up and calcify so much that addressing the mound becomes a sort of nightmare. but, my good people, there is no tapestry, no cloth, no weaving without tension. tension is power in motion. it is the breath of the cloth. it must be spread evenly. it spurs curiosity. it is sensual, informational, and dynamic. it can be subtle and pleasurable, or imposing and harsh. But it is always present. a 3rd body. tension is essential. weavers know this well.

tension is learned through the body.

through practice and patience, our beginner class was sprouting. we were developing a sensory skill for embodied awareness in noticing tension for the sake of weaving. we began to value it’s presence and learn to work alongside it to create shape, balance, beauty, and integrity. the romance of our dreams.

tension is hard to hone

because it requires that you

slow down enough

to feel it,

to attenuate and modulate as needed.

sometimes that means

undoing the weave

or breaking the thread.

the tension leads the way.

fast forward…

the year is 2024. we are in a layer cake of crisis - interpersonal, ecological, cosmic. pinned and squirreling out from under the unyielding pressure of imperialism, war, neo-colonization, and anti-Black capitalism, our social threads are taut and fraying. our homes and lands are coming apart. the road to repair is steep, irresistable, and calling us.

in my 8 years of weaving, tension has become one of my greatest teachers, co-facilitating the classrooms of our healing and the doorways to our inevitable release. our inevitable peace…

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…if you made it this far, thank you! here’s a lil’ scrappy 4-on-the-floor treat for your attension ;)