Ponies and quilts

I finished a quilt top and put the binding on another quilt - pictures will be at the end of this post. But first, I want to talk about the new MLP: FiM episode. After here be spoilers.

It was called "Keep Calm and Flutter On," using the old British-poster maxim that has become so popular (and which I did not like so well, and honestly found a bit depressing, when I learned its full history - it was to only be used in event of a Nazi invasion, and people were to be told "Keep calm and carry on." To which I'd probably wind up thinking in that situation, "Hell no: Go down fighting.")

Anyway. First up, my major complaint: the resolution of the issue felt rushed. At the last commercial break (9:52 am or thereabouts), I said to myself, "This has GOT to be a two-parter, no way they could fix everything in five minutes."

Well, there is more in Cloudsdale and Ponyville that dreamed of in your philosophy, Horatio. Or something like that. It WAS resolved, and resolved in a friendly sort of way that seems satisfactory for a children's show, unless of course, it goes very dark later in the season and the character who claimed to be changing his ways was actually lying. (But I am not sure that would work, given the ethics of most kids' shows. Just as there were certain rules that Golden Age mystery writers (mostly) stuck to, I think there are certain rules of kids' shows, one of them being "Don't kill off a major character on-screen." and another one being, "Don't give the kids reasons to think their trust will be betrayed by folks in real life, though they probably will eventually experience that.")

Well, anyway: the spoilers. For some unspecified reason, Discord's magic is needed by Celestia, so she wants to release him and see him reformed. (Or perhaps the real reason is that she desires Discord's repentance and redemption; I'd almost be willing to buy that, especially given some of the themes I see the episode as touching on). We last saw Discord encased in stone (though apparently, as he notes, not made insensate: he can still hear what's going on around him) by the actions of Our Heroines.

So they are the ones to release him, as they wield the Elements of Harmony and that's what put him away at first.

And one of the Ponies is to work on reforming Discord.

And of course, there is considerable doubt about the task - reform Discord, really? (That was my reaction, too.) The one who drove a wedge in their friendship and stole the Elements of Harmony and screwed up the whole world (and screwed it up in a way that would have been particularly painful for poor Twilight, if she is as much like I am in personality as I am assuming. Having things messed up or out of place or not working is actively painful to me....)

Even more disbelief when Celestia announces the pony she is appointing as the one who will teach Discord how to be good: Fluttershy.

Yes, Fluttershy. The pony who, faced with the chance to be brave, prefers to run in the other direction.

And here I have to stop and note my initial impressions, and later I'll note how I now thought I was wrong:

"Unleash Discord? Really? Try to reform him? He's....he's a malignant narcissist or a sociopath or something. He only thinks of himself and what's amusing to him. He would destroy everything around himself for a laugh, or to make himself feel better about himself."

and then later: "Fluttershy, don't be an idiot! Don't trust him, you canNOT trust him. He is only making overtures of friendship so he can laugh at you later on."

And, okay - here is probably one of my "issues" talking. When I was younger (much younger) I did, once or twice, have the experience of someone acting like they were my friend, getting my confidence, only so later on they could turn what I said against me, or get together with their like-minded friends and laugh at me. And while it was never anything TOO depraved that was done to me in the name of "doing it for the lulz" (and it occurs to me that such a thing still exists today, in certain darker corners of the internet), still, it's a fairly poisonous thing to do to a kid who is (a) a little lonely for friends and (b) perhaps more trusting than was ideally good for her. And perhaps part of the reason that I tend to be slow to open up to people, and sometimes am suspicious of people's motives, is that early experience. Anyway. I couldn't believe that they were writing a show where such a potentially dangerous character as Discord could be shown friendship and forgiveness by someone who was a fundamentally defenseless character.

But then I started thinking about it more. Actually thought about it a bit after church today and realized that perhaps I was looking at it the wrong way. And while I do believe that someone who IS a truly malignant personality, someone who will destroy another person if given the chance is probably best treated with tough love if they are treated at all....there's an important fact, a couple of important facts here.

The biggest one is that Celestia apparently believed Fluttershy could do it. Even though her friends really didn't think she could, even though Fluttershy had doubts at first - she trusted Celestia.

Celestia is a powerful being. And very wise. And while I think it's too pat to recast this as some sort of parable with Celestia as the God-figure (some in fanon do cast her as a sort of goddess, but she has been shown to be neither infalliable nor omnipotent), still, the fact that Celestia believed she could do it counted for a lot.

(I am reminded of the line, attributed to Mother Teresa though it doesn't sound quite like her to me: "I know God will never give me more than I can handle, but some days I wish He did not trust me so much.")

Apparently Discord is unlikely to destroy things totally, or if he comes close, someone (either Celestia or the Mane Six, wielding the Elements of Harmony) will be able to stop him. So there's perhaps a failsafe.

But Fluttershy trusted Celestia, even when perhaps her friends did not.

The second part of this - dealing with an enemy. I admit, I have no one I would truly consider an "enemy" in my life. I have a couple people who make my life more difficult when I have to work with them, and I admit my MO is to try to avoid working with them as much as possible. But there's another way of dealing with one's enemies, a riskier way than avoidance, but perhaps a better way:

⁴³ “You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ ⁴⁴ But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, ⁴⁵ that you may be children of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. ⁴⁶ If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? ⁴⁷ And if you greet only your own people, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that?

(it probably goes without saying, but: Matthew 5:43-48.)

Also: "To the contrary, “if your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink; for by so doing you will heap burning coals on his head.”" (Romans 12:20). (And I admit I've always had problems with that passage: is it really desirable for the Christian to "heap coals upon" his enemy's head? That seems a bit vengeful-minded. Perhaps it's a translation thing, or a "modern people don't fully understand the ancient culture" thing). 

While, as I said before, a Gospel According to Ponies doesn't quite work (Though fandom being what it is, I would not be at all surprised if there were a Bible study out there somewhere using clips from the show as a jumping-off place. After all, there is an "Andy Griffith Show" Bible study out there). And it's probably vaguely blasphemous to say Fluttershy Is Best Christian here (seeing as the world of the ponies follows no religion known on this earth, even beside their being imaginary characters). But still. She is doing something that Christians are called to do (but few of us are really truly capable of). And I realized that in this episode, the character who is literally afraid of her own shadow is doing something *I* probably wouldn't be brave enough to do were I confronted with an opportunity like that in real life. (And strangely, that's a little bit humbling)

(And all of that is why I REALLY want to see that Discord is truly reformed, and not that he's going to come back as bad as ever in a future episode, because that WOULD feel like a betrayal of trust).

It's funny - though perhaps it's not - that a show aimed at children, a cartoon with the ostensible purpose of selling toys leads to a greater deal of self-reflection for me than any other half-hour television entertainment program I can think of.  

At any rate: I think it shows some of the quality of the writing that goes into the show, that a 43 year old woman can spend that much time thinking about the spiritual and philosophical implications of that episode.

And on to the quilts....

I had gotten the Bits and Pieces quilt (a variant of Puss in the Corner) back from the quilt shop for a while but never got around to putting the binding on it until this weekend. (Bindings take a lot of work; the machine-sewn part involves negotiating the whole quilt under the presser foot of the sewing machine, and then the handsewn part can take hours.)



It is kind of a pale, maybe slightly faded looking color scheme, but I like it. And I like the backing fabric:



I have never seen fabric printed to look like maple samaras (well, okay, more colorful than real samaras, but still) before. Most of the fabrics are from the "Backyard Baby" line that was out a year or so ago.

I also finally got the borders on the plus-sign quilt (it has a more formal name, and I used the pattern from that "Simplify" book I've talked about earlier, but I think of it as the Plus-Sign Quilt). Borders are another thing - because they're long seams and you have to be careful about cutting the fabric and you have to be careful not to stretch anything when you sew it together so the borders don't "ruffle" a little bit and make the top not lie flat - that it can take me a while to get to.



But I finally did.

One of the things I like so much about piecing quilt tops is how there is such a diversity of fabric out there you can use. I know most of my recent quilts have been "strong" pastels or bright colors, but I also love the more subdued, vintage-looking fabric in this quilt, with its more restricted palette and the large amounts of greys and beiges (and also a greige color that is sort of in between). The fabric is one of those Jelly Rolls, I think it was called "Petite Ecole" and some of the fabrics do have either a French language print or typography on them. 

I also used a French-language print for the big border, but it was from a different source:



Sewing terms (Aigulle is "needle" and Fil is "thread") and antique sewing implements. The colors go and I especially like that they style goes.

Not sure how this will be quilted yet; I'm actually leaning to putting this one aside to hand quilt somehow. I'm still picking away at the Dozen Roses quilt in the frame but anticipate getting that done in not too much more time now.