“Well, why don’t you ask him?”
“Oh sure, and risk embarrassment when he can’t tell me?” She remembers Jack’s comment about cocoons. She’s not sure if Kathy would appreciate the poetry of what Jack said, but she blurts it anyway.
“He said it seems like I was raised in a cocoon, but that was okay because, get this, from cocoons come butterflies.” She sighs. “Wasn’t that lovely?”
Kathy rolls her eyes and says, “Oh brother! So why didn’t he just say he thinks you have potential?”
“Potential! That sounds clinical. Jack obviously knows the right thing to say to an English lit major.”
During the next days, Saffee fills every available minute coaxing the blue yarn into the shape of a wearable garment. As she knits, she gives serious thought to Jack’s advice that she honor her mother by not becoming her. As they had parted at the door that night, seconds before curfew, he added, “God knows the ways you should be like her and the ways to avoid. Let Him help you.”
Yes, God, help me, she breathes as her needles click.
She had often tried to please her mother by copying ways she did things. Little things, like folding laundry with precision, ordering her world, as much as possible, with neatness and cleanliness. Wouldn’t it be dishonoring not to be like her in these ways? But to Joann, simple tasks often became obsessions. Saffee thinks about other, more vital qualities that might put her on the right path.
She must make an effort to shed her mother-like aloofness. It’s good to have friends—why scare them away? And she must temper her critical nature. What was that her dad used to say? Something about her mother never being happy unless she was complaining. She gives the yarn a tug, unwinding the ball, and adds becoming generous and courageous to the list. It will take a lifetime of amends. Yes, she will need God’s help to make His promise of a “different” life a reality. She dares to hope that Jack is not only a heaven-sent reminder of God’s promise but also part of its fulfillment.
Saffee and Kathy continue to knit, sometimes laughing with nearly every stitch. Knitting is giving. Giving to Jack. He has given her priceless gifts of friendship, approval, encouragement, and happiness. These have planted a desire to give in return: appreciation, admiration, affection—knit together into a tangible gift, right here in her hands.
Saffee finishes the sweater by Christmas. When Jack tries it on, the sleeves dangle almost to his knees.
“I was trying to adjust for your long arms,” she moans.
“‘I don’t know where all this wool could have come from,’ Tom said sheepishly.”
“Jack! How can you make jokes when I’ve ruined your Christmas present?”
“It’s not ruined, it feels nice and warm,” he says, grinning, trying to roll the sleeves into thick cuffs. “Maybe I’ll grow into it.”
Gratefulness warms Saffee to the core.
The day finally comes (Saffee had hoped it wouldn’t) that Jack’s friend Kenny invites them to go up in his homemade balloon.
“I’m sure it’s safe,” Jack assures Saffee when she questions him. “My pesky vertigo wouldn’t like riding in that flimsy lawn chair of his, but in the basket I think we’ll feel contained.”
“Wait a minute. If you have vertigo, why do you want to go way up in the air, hanging under a balloon?”
Jack grins. “Life’s too short not to enjoy it.”
Saffee is quick to jump on that one. “Yes,” she says with a smile, “life is short; why make it shorter?”
“Without a few risks, it would be downright boring.”
Boring? Saffee hates the word that has typified her life. And she wishes she had more courage.
Not a single sparrow can fall to the ground without your Father knowing . . . Don’t be afraid; you are more valuable to God than a whole flock of sparrows . . .
How many times has she been grateful that she read the Psalms and New Testament during her freshman and sophomore years? Although at the time her motivation was to receive approval from her roommate, nevertheless, the wisdom of the Scriptures made a lasting impression.
“All right. I’ll go,” she says. With the sparrows.
The white parachutes Kenny has sewn together mushroom like a silken cloud, then rise plump and firm sixty feet above them. To control altitude, the enterprising pilot regulates propane from a tank in the center of the basket. Standing arm in arm, Saffee and Jack cautiously look down over the side. The trees and snow-covered fields are a startling distance away and rapidly getting farther.
“Kenny, where’s the rope? You know, the whatcha call it, the tether.” Saffee tries not to sound alarmed.