The parable of the sewing machine

Going to junk shops and secondhand stores is always a serendipitous experience. It is as if, on a particular day and time, there is a connection between you and some nondescript item tucked somewhere in such stores.

After 20 minutes of browsing through one such store, I still had not made the connection. Then Ronald, the store assistant, as if reading my mind, made a suggestion: “I have a neighbor, a woman who is selling her sewing machine. It’s really old, an antique piece, but she has kept it well-maintained.”

That suggestion struck me like lightning. In my childhood, I remember my mother’s most prized possession, a Singer sewing machine. I learned to use it early to make cowboy costumes and toy gun holsters. I was quite adept at it. If there is anything that brings back a flood of memories about my mother, who died at 99 years old three years ago, a similar sewing machine would be it.

Too good to be true, I thought. Ronald saw my hesitation, so he went on to describe the sewing machine. “It is very heavy. And it has the ‘gagamba’ (spiderweb) pattern on its metal stand. The lady uses it every day. But now, she has decided to sell it, only for P3,000.”

It was a short walk through a poor neighborhood. I followed Ronald inside the low house across the street. And immediately, we were in a small sala, and off to the side near the front window was the sewing machine. There was a flash of recognition that swept over me. That image of a Singer sewing machine by the window with “macetas” (potted plants) on the window sill was too powerful, reminding me of how my mother used to sew near the window in our home in Tarlac.

It was the gagamba model, all right. I inspected it, and it was exactly how I imagined my mother’s sewing machine.

The machine was remarkably complete as far as the mechanism went. All the screws were intact. All the emblems were still readable. The gold printed decoration on the body of the machine was no longer visible, except for a small trace. But still visible was the serial number of the machine: AB244998.

I asked for a demonstration that the machine worked. This is where a thin but spritely woman, perhaps in her 60s, who was seated quietly in the room, came forward to demonstrate it.

She took a long piece of scrap denim, folded it lengthwise and expertly sewed the piece, stopping at half-point to demonstrate how the length of the stitch could be adjusted.

I found it amazing that a machine that was produced perhaps 70 or so years ago worked exactly the way it did when it was new. This sewing machine did only one kind of stitch, and none of the fancy patterns that more modern machines are capable of.

Thinking that I might have difficulty finding replaceable parts for the machine, I asked the lady if she had extra “carretes” (spools), which are needed to contain different colors of thread.

It was when the lady gently picked up a box where she kept all her sewing stuff that I realized this sale was ending the life of the lady as a seamstress. The box had neatly arranged in various compartments an assortment of threads of different colors. She also had three carretes, several needles of different sizes, buttons and thimbles, scissors, fasteners and others.

She carefully took two carretes, all the needles she had in a small envelope and a medium-sized black spool of thread, put them in a small plastic bag, and gently handed them to me. No extra charge, she said, so generously.

I became silently frantic for a moment. “Why is she selling this machine? What will she use to live on?” I asked.

“Oh, she’s going back to the province.” Ronald said. “She’s done here in the city.”

I did not quite understand what he meant. Perhaps she needed the money for transportation. Ronald spied the hesitation on my part. “Another buyer will come to get the machine tonight if you won’t.”

Such a trick this cruel world plays on us. I bought the machine, but now it reminds me fondly of my mother, and painfully of the woman who sold it to me.

I remember my brother Bill once remarking, “Sometimes, when the poor ask for help, they are in effect asking you to rob them.” That, I thought to myself, is exactly what is happening in this country on a massive scale.

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