The first stitch my mother ever taught me was simple. “Needles remember gentle hands,” she used to say whenever I tugged the thread too hard. “If you force them, they’ll fight back.” I never understood what she meant until years later, standing alone in my bedroom with tears running down my face while holding the last thing she had ever made for me.

“I know.”

“Then let me.”

She shook her head.

“One day you’ll wear this dress, and every flower will remind you that your mother loved you enough to finish them herself.”

My eyes filled with tears.

She gently brushed my cheek.

“Don’t cry.”

“I’m trying.”

“I didn’t make this dress so you could remember me with sadness.”

“What am I supposed to remember?”

She looked continue reading …