The Collapse LXXIII: Needle And Thread

07 March 20XX +1

My Dear Lucilius:

One of the things I initially took for granted living away from an urban area in general or with no commerce at all is the nature of clothes and clothing repair.

Of note is that my clothing requirements have not been extensive or expansive in many years. Following the Great “Work From Home Exodus” and the resulting change in location of where I worked (and to a lesser extent, when I was around other people) at all), my wardrobe changed dramatically. Gone were the days of needing button down collared shirts and slacks or even “business casual” dress of shirts and chinos on a daily basis (an abominable term, by the way; casual anything other than conversation is usually an excuse to be lazy); most days were gotten by with jeans and “decorative” T-shirts of activities I had done or the occasional one that caught my fancy. Our clothing budget, which for years was never very great, shrank accordingly.

Even after moving here, it was largely unchanged– yes, more long sleeved shirts and warmer clothing for Winter, but generally jeans and t-shirt or flannel shirt will get one through 90% of one’s interactions here. I kept my one suit that I had purchased 15 years earlier on the off chance I would need it for a wedding or a funeral (I have attended no weddings and I fully do not intend to be buried in it), but other than that my wardrobe is primarily set up for comfort and function (in that order).

But even with lesser needs, things wear. And common-place items like socks, underwear, and undershirts also wear. For years I have mended them all; in that sense now is no different.

When my wife passed away, one of my daughters took her sewing machine. It was fine: I had occasionally played at sewing, but never had any skill at it. Her sewing box though, with its threads, needles, buttons, and other items, came with me.

Now more than ever, the simple skill of being able to mend something has come in useful.

Interestingly, it is not the bigger items – pants and shirts – that need mending the most. At best pants need their knees replaced, which once upon a time was done by patches and an iron (I have an old cast iron iron that my parents owned; using it when I have to may be an experiment all its own). It is the smaller things – socks, underwear, undershirts – that seem to bear the brunt of my needlework.

To make it easy on myself, I slowly build a pile of items to be stitched up; then, when there are enough (or if I turn out to be running out of socks), it is time for the session.

The work itself is not overtaxing. There is a certain rhythm to mending items: threading the needle (the most difficult part), tying the knot in the end of the thread, then stitching and counter-stitching until the gap closes, knotting the final end, cutting the string, and moving to the next item. One can think different thoughts as one stitches away until the current pile is gone.

I have done this for years now, more to reuse the items I own and be frugal as to any particular need to live this way – after all, my socks always wear out in exactly the same spot. Why should I get rid of 95% of the item because of a 5% problem? So in one sense, this is not a change from anything that has gone on before.

It does make me wonder, however, what will happen if this goes on long enough.

For a while, of course, there will still be new clothes, or used clothes anyway, stored by people or frankly (and sadly) made available by their deaths. But this will dwindle in time, due to use, degradation, or re-use. That I can guess, there is no-one manufacturing new cloth any more and even if there is, it will not be cotton or linen but only wool. In the short term, who will have the time or energy to grow cotton? It is a part of an age when large amounts of population (without machines, of course) and water and agriculture are needed; it appears currently we have none of those in abundance.

There is leather as well, I suppose – certainly plentiful around here in cattle country, although I do wonder if anyone retains enough skill to finish it in sufficient volumes and amount to use it as a material for clothing.

It strikes me as odd, Lucilius, how what used to be simple and unassuming tasks become a real discussion of the basis of civilization and production. It is quite remarkable how much we used to take for granted.

Your Obedient Servant, Seneca