Click here: WLOS feature about Shirley
September 28, 2024, as the waters of the French Broad River receded after Hurricane Helene, MPC member Shirley stood looking at an unimaginable loss. Her rented studio building — with brick walls three layers thick — had been swept down the river. Gone with it were forty years of weaving work, tools, and carefully collected yarns gathered over a lifetime of creating.
It would have been understandable to stop there, with grief and memories of what had been lost.
But artists and makers know something about beginning again.
Today, Shirley has set up her weaving studio once more. Through the generosity of strangers, replacement looms have found their way into her new space. Support from churches in the Presbytery of Western North Carolina and many caring hands in the community helped make the recreation of a teaching studio at Marshall High Studios possible.
The flood took much, but it did not take Shirley's gift, her creativity, or her determination to weave beauty into the world once again. Threads are once again passing through the loom, and a new chapter of Shirley's work is being woven.
My Life is but a Weaving, often attributed to Corrie ten Boom
My life is but a weaving
Between my God and me.
I cannot choose the colors
He weaveth steadily.
Oft’ times He weaveth sorrow;
And I in foolish pride
Forget He sees the upper
And I the underside.
Not ’til the loom is silent
And the shuttles cease to fly
Will God unroll the canvas
And reveal the reason why.
The dark threads are as needful
In the weaver’s skillful hand
As the threads of gold and silver
In the pattern He has planned
He knows, He loves, He cares;
Nothing this truth can dim.
He gives the very best to those
Who leave the choice to Him.
