Embroi-der-y

A burglar, while burgling a house, takes meat out of the freezer and leaves it to defrost. He is looking for money in the freezer hidden behind the meat. People do sometimes hide money in the fridge. Burglars look for it there. It isn't surprising that a burglar would take the meat out of the freezer and not put it back. Put yourself in the place of the burglar. It's not what you would do.

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An art exhibition on Wednesday. One of the artists has embroidered four steak knives and four defrosting cuts of meat. The blades of the knives glitter sharply and blood oozes out of the meat in tiny beaded blobs, frosted fractals melt into icy pools of water under the meat, executed in tiny even stitches that the artist has learned in classes at Hampton Court.

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A moth has eaten six holes in a pale blue woollen blanket edged with slippery satin. It was looking for something to eat, that is all. Moths do sometimes eat holes in blankets when they are hungry. It isn't surprising. Put yourself in the place of the moth. It's what you would do.

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Tuesday, at the wooden table out the back. On the table, a yellow cloth embroidered with daisies. On the cloth, the pale blue woollen blanket, with six holes in the middle. An artist is darning the holes with fine strands of blue baby wool which she has previously unravelled. She weaves the strands in and out across the holes from left to right and then from top to bottom, one by one. The sun is bright. A fly sits on the blanket, she waves it away. She feels strangely happy.