Of Rugs & Weavers
Straddling the line between two quiet towns on the coast of Maine, our shop is home to a bustling rug washing and repair business. Its green and tan tin siding plays decoy to the beauty and treasures found within. One of my favorite such treasures is an old loom that was donated to us by the mentor to our owner, whose hand played a big part in what Rite Way Cleaning has become today. With its raw wood and thin body, the loom is nestled between the doors of two offices. In between the frame, is the beginning of a rug in process but now paused. I’ve often wondered if this was intentional as if done to be a teaching tool or rather, its original weaver abandoned the project to boredom, retirement or death. These thoughts still captivate me 3 years later, but somehow I don’t want an answer for fear a mundane answer would eat away at a far cooler and bizarre possibility.
I have leaned heavily on this tool of our trade as a way to teach new employees about the construction process of rugs. I love how exposed the loom is with its half creation hung up by the heddle. The nakedness of this loom has served as a great teacher, bearing all its secrets for those willing to spare a minute and soak up the lessons it desperately wants to share. The rug on the loom will most likely never get to enjoy the prospect of adorning a wooden floor in a nice home near a stone fireplace. Instead, it will stand between two offices with dirty rugs being laid at its feet. This less than halfway woven rug is the first to greet and last to wish Godspeed to its sister creations as they frequent our shop.
Every morning, I’m greeted by this old friend as I enter the building on the way to my office. In 45 years of living, I’ve never felt more akin to an object than I do to the rug that is on that loom. It's taken 42 years to land at a place where I truly feel like myself. In each line of knots, I see years of change and growth tamped down between the wefts of joy and heartbreak. I also feel the hope that exists in the space above the last weft woven on this rug. The bare warps provide a space for new additions in what I hope finishes a beautiful piece of art called the life I’ve been given.
Beyond my own inner reflection, this rug also shows me the current place I have found myself in. That place is knotted alongside fellow fibers with equally interesting pasts that have led all of us together. Our shop consists of a menagerie of misfits with a penchant for creativity and excellence. We boast an owner whose path to rug cleaning started as a family man who founded a business as a way to provide for his family and pay for his way through Bible college; a wife who followed her husband and learned the craft of rug repair; a young man with a passion for all things old and the bartering skills of a modern day pioneer; a stay-at-home mom turned shop mom and her son who keep our quality in check; and lastly, our admin and marketer with a creative streak that matches some of the best designed rugs. As for me, I’m the son of a janitor with a weird path that brought me into the presence of this merry band of nerds.
It’s in this group that I see the greatest lesson the unfinished rug is teaching me: we are both the rug and the weaver. We collect and create. We weave and pack and then weave again. In us is the vision and the ability to bring to life. And what we bring to life is a tapestry of a life lived. From each one of us comes a custom rug. We are creations creating. In us are both the weaver and the thing woven. Our DNA cries out to create because we have a Creator. It is stitched into every fiber of us.
And like the half dressed rug on the loom, we too are still missing part of our raiment. We do not profess ourselves to be finished or perfect. Instead, we shuttle back and forth patiently adding a row at a time to our knowledge and our experience. Each knot added meaning more than the finish of the product and its release from the loom. I am learning from my friend on the loom that though parts of my life are still bare, the warps leave room for new fiber to be tied. It is our hope that others like us will find this place to be like the loom in our shop: a place for the unfinished to get a little more complete.
