Touch of Gray - January / February 2004

Modern Weavers Practice Ancient Art
Double Dozen Weddings at Carolina Meadows

Modern Weavers Practice Ancient Art
   76-year old Carolyn Kozelka is still an active member of the Triangle Weavers Guild in Chapel Hill. Many of the tapestries created on her 40-inch loom in her Carolina Meadows villa are on display throughout the community.

   Weaving is an age-old skill going back thirty thousand years to the Paleolithic Age. Tableaus of weavers with their looms have been found in Egypt. The first woven items were mats and baskets of fibers, sinew, or leather spun from animal hair, sisal, flax, hemp and silk. Our Native Americans make baskets so fine and so tightly woven that they hold water.

   Rag rug weaving began in this country during the early colonial period as a way to recycle old and worn out bed sheets, long underwear linens and scraps from textile mills. These were then cut into strips, which were woven into rugs on a loom. This technique produced durable rugs that were both reversible and washable.

   Carolyn always enjoyed using her hands. Since childhood she has liked to knit, sew, embroider and appliqué. Back in World War Two Carolyn - then twelve years of age - made news in the fall of 1941 with this story published in The Sentinel, her hometown newspaper in Fitchburg, Mass. "Carolyn has been knitting for the Red Cross for a year. She has put in 100 hours of work for the organization. The youngest Red Cross knitter has turned in work as perfect as that of any experienced person. The garments will go to all parts of war-stricken Europe."

   When Carolyn was thirteen she went to summer camp. She saw someone weaving on a loom for the first tine and was fascinated by it. She wove a small sampler and as she recalls, she never looked back. In 1980, while her husband Bob was teaching at Williams College, Carolyn took courses in rug weaving. She followed with classes at the Campbell School in Western Carolina.

   Woven rugs today provide more than warmth and cover. Many of them make a statement. Over the years Carolyn has donated many rugs and tapestries in Chapel Hill to be auctioned off for various causes including Habitat for Humanity. She wants her weaving to make a statement about conservation concerns. She uses many different kinds of visual elements in her weavings to convey her message.

   One of Carolyn's favorite causes is NC WARN, a nonprofit group headquartered in Durham that helps to protect communities from radioactive and toxic pollution. Two years ago for NCWARN she created and auctioned off a striking 24 inches by 36 inches tapestry showing a factory chimney spewing out volumes of pollutants. The piece was created from the recycling of a pleated skirt. As she explains it, she cut diagonally along the pattern to give a different texture, "A Touch of Red" she called her finished work. "I enjoyed it so much because I did not have any limitations or specifications," she added.

   Triangle Land Conservancy works to create a regional network of open space and natural areas and Barbara Roth, one of Carolyn's Carolina Meadows neighbors, is one of its biggest boosters. Barbara recently challenged Carolyn to prepare a striking 24 inches by 30 inches Eno River scene woven in brilliant red and green illustrating the group's objectives. They named it "New Hope". "It was quite a challenge," Carolyn said. "It was the biggest challenge I have taken yet." The proceeds from this remarkable creation have been turned over to the Conservancy and "New Hope" now hangs in Barbara Roth's villa.

   Her other neighbors in Carolina Meadows enjoy much of her work too. She volunteers in our Health Center where she cares for the animals and reads to housebound residents. One afternoon Carolyn showed some of her tapestries to Bobbie Gray, Director of Health Services. . Bobbie invited her to hang them along the wall beside the main Dining Room opposite the Beauty Shop.

   Carolyn calls her show the Museum of Fiber Arts. It features a pictorial display of weaving, which explains in detail the way weavers ply their trade. "I felt a need to show how complicated and complex the process of weaving is so people will have an appreciation of the time and effort that goes into hand-woven articles," Carolyn explains.

   Carolyn describes the pleasure of designing and choosing color and imagining how the finished piece will look. She likes to include various media, like beads, in her work. Most of the time required, she said, is spent preparing the materials and the loom. Warping or dressing the loom requires warp threads (vertical), measuring them into even lengths, winding them on to the loom, then threading each one and tying them to the front beam. She says that when people wonder about weaving being dull, or boring, she responds. "The challenge of the process, the anticipation of the end product keeps me going. It's all very exciting Weaving is quite an adventure!"

   Carolyn talks about the satisfaction she receives from using her hands and she would like to pass that appreciation on to her grandchildren. Over the years Carolyn has saved childhood colored artwork of her children's and grandchildren's colored artwork of people, animals and flowers. We later reproduced them in weaving, appliqué and embroidery. Some of them now grace her living room mantelpiece.

   We have some other notable weavers here in the Meadows. An early arrival, in 1989, was Alice Harfst, who converted the garage in her newly constructed villa in Phase Two into a room for her loom so that she could work there. Alice specialized in traditional two-tone overshot quilts and had received her training at the celebrated Penland School of Crafts in the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina. Nine years later she married Bill Straughn and they moved to The Fairways, our assisted living facility. Incidentally, Alice and Bill were the 18th couple to join Carolina Meadows' Newly Weds Club, an organization which now numbers 24 couples.

   Compared to Alice, Margaret Hays is a newcomer. She came here in 2002. Margaret is a native Texan who spent 22 years in Foreign Service with the State Department. Her mother was a weaver and she is a weaver too. She has lived in Argentina, Columbia, the Philippines, Mexico and Hong Kong and has a unique collection of weavings from all over the world. Margaret recently exhibited her small foreign pieces in our monthly exhibit in the breakfront in our Club Center. -- Des Reilly, Resident

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Double Dozen Weddings at Carolina Meadows
    A recent arrival to Carolina Meadows was overheard remarking to a resident who had been on campus for some time, "There are clubs for everything around here from bocce to book discussion. We have everything except a newlyweds club!" He was right about his first assumption -- there are 45 committees and activities sponsored by the Residents Association in addition to many other special programs. But he was wrong about his second assumption. His savvy companion replied that Carolina Meadows did indeed have a newlyweds' club with a total of 24 couples at last count. And this group has had some pleasant social occasions getting together once in a while under the name of Meadow Weds or the shortened version -- the Mead Weds.

   There are interesting stories about each of the courtships and marriages. As Valentine's Day approaches, it seems appropriate to reminisce with some of these couples about their introductions to each other and, later, how they planned their weddings.

* * * * *
   Jack Parry moved to Carolina Meadows from Washington, DC, in 1998 and Margaret Fallers moved to Chapel Hill from Chicago in 1995. Both had lost their spouses many years before their move to this area. Their daughters had been friends for 30 years, had lived elsewhere, but by chance, in the 1990s they were both living in the Triangle -- which was the reason that both Jack and Margaret relocated in North Carolina.

   The couple met in 1998, and according to Margaret, "In very little time, we found that being together was extremely satisfactory and we married in 1999 in Jack's daughter's home in Raleigh." All members of their families were present, with the exception of one who was serving in the Peace Corps in the Solomon Islands. Their families have melded in interesting ways and they have many happy gatherings -- the combination includes five Parry children, 11 grandchildren, and one great-grandchild, and two Fallers daughters and five grandchildren.

   Other ties for this couple include Ruth Lamanna, who with her husband, Carl, moved to Carolina Meadows in 1990. Their son, Dr. Roger Lamanna, is the husband of Margaret's daughter, Beth, who teaches in Public Health and Nursing at UNC-CH. Ruth introduces Margaret and herself as "co-mothers-in-law!" Jack's daughter, Susan, the current chairman of the Wake County School Board, is married to John Montgomery, a Raleigh violin maker and son of June Montgomery, also a Carolina Meadows resident.

* * * * *
   Movers who helped Marian Andersen move to Carolina Meadows in August 1998 had to meet a deadline for returning the truck and left a number of boxes on the sidewalk outside her apartment building. Norm Wells, a resident in the same building, came home to find these boxes outside and a thunderstorm was approaching. Marian answered the doorbell a few minutes later and found that her neighbor, Norm, had brought some of the boxes to her door and before the rain came the rest were safely inside.

   Later in the fall they began dating and by early 2001 they had decided to marry. The couple wanted a quiet wedding, and one Saturday in early February they drove to South Carolina to find out about the requirements for a license. At the wedding chapel, they were told that the wedding could be performed the next day. So they thought it over and decided, "Why not?" Marian and Norm had been dressed casually and needed to find some more appropriate attire. The closest store was Wal-Mart. In fact, Marian says, "I was wearing black and I didn't want to be married in black!" She found a dress she liked and a dressy pair of shoes. On the way out they remembered they didn't have the wedding bands that had been ordered in Chapel Hill and, as they passed the jewelry counter in Wal-Mart, they found two gold rings -- and on special sale!

   Norm and Marian were married Sunday afternoon and word got back to their neighbors who soon arranged a reception for them. Later at a special Valentine's Day party in the auditorium -- a Mad Hatter's luncheon that featured residents wearing creative hats -- the Wellses came dressed as a bride and groom and John Banks, who is a retired minister, performed a ceremony. The couple hosted a reception later in February for friends and relatives.

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   In the same apartment building, Bobbie Wilkerson Hahn's friends in Building 6 received word that when she was in Michigan in October of 2001, she and Maury Hahn, who had known each other since their college years in Ann Arbor, were married. Maury's wife had been Bobbie's sorority sister and a bridesmaid at her wedding, Bobbie sings in the choir of University Presbyterian Church and in the Meadow Singers -- the Carolina Meadows choral group. She is active at Chapel Hill's Botanical Gardens, leads a quilters group, and swims almost every day. In addition to being a precinct representative to the Residents Association at the retirement community, Maury serves on three corporate boards of directors and on boards of nonprofit groups. When they are spending the summer at their house on the lake in Niles, Michigan, he enjoys sailing his Hobie Cat. Each has three children and their combined grandchildren number 11.

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   In the campus monthly newsletter, The Meadowlark, an interesting article appeared in 1997 about the courtship and wedding of Alice Lawless and Jim Lash. The story carried the title "Ever After at Carolina Meadows," and opened with a quote from Alice: "One evening he began discussing budgets and finances at length," said the pretty lady you used to know as Alice Lawless, "and I finally said, Are you asking me to marry you?" Jim Lash's proposal consisted of one word: "Yes."

   After Alice and Jim golfed together and had luncheon and dinner engagements, some of their friends had them pegged as a couple before they did. Then, according to Alice, they got tickets together for the Playmakers series and things jelled shortly thereafter.

   They were married at University Presbyterian Church in Chapel Hill on May 31, 1997, with 21 children and grandchildren present. Three grandchildren decided to practice Beethoven's Ode to Joy separately, but when they got together to play as a piano/trombone/trumpet ensemble at the wedding they discovered that each had practiced in a different key! However, it wasn't a problem. Three different versions were performed as solos at the wedding.

   The Lashes are a familiar couple to most of the residents because both are active in campus activities. Jim currently chairs the Mac Computer Club and arranges for the UNC University Speakers who appear at Carolina Meadows; Alice was chair of the new residents Welcoming Committee until recently and she can be found many mornings in the library helping with the book circulation.

   Another member of the Meadow Weds, Ruth Hopkins Connelly -- who married Chuck Connelly in May, 1989 -- has written several articles for the monthly newsletter, The Meadowlark, about the campus marriages, including the story about the Lash wedding.
In a recent discussion with another resident about the happy couples who have married after moving to the retirement community, Ruth commented that these marriages should be successful. "By this time," she said, "we should be old enough and wise enough."

* * * * *
   The Meadow Weds have gathered periodically as a group for get-togethers: dinner at Carolina Meadows, a pizza party, a box lunch social on the screened porch at the Fairways. Roz and Ginnie Lewis, who married ten years ago, were the original planners for these social occasions. Then Bob and Edith Blaylock took over the planning, and, in addition, Edith has perpetuated the memory of the weddings by compiling a handsome photo album with pictures of each of the couples, which she placed in the campus library. Many of the couples who are part of the Meadow Weds have given parties on their anniversaries. The Blaylocks hosted a party on each of their first five wedding anniversaries and included all the residents. The Lewises have remembered their anniversary with special gifts to the community Health Center, including a television, VCR, and digital piano.

   The first Carolina Meadows wedding on record is that of Drs. Joyce Shaver and George Hitchings on February 9. 1989. Dr. Hitchings was living at Carolina Meadows at the time and he had just been recognized the year before with the Nobel Prize in Medicine/Physiology for his work in discoveries of important principles for drug treatment. The Hitchings held a gala: "Nobel-Jul" party for Carolina Meadows residents in December, 1996, that featured a Swedish menu and many blue and yellow balloons (the colors in the Swedish flag) floating high in the auditorium. It was held at the same time as the Nobel Prize ceremonies were being held in Sweden and commemorated the 1988 ceremony when George Hitchings was given his award.

   Another Chapel Hill resident, Dr. Martin Rodbell, received the Nobel Prize in 1993, for Medicine/Physiology. Barbara Rodbell, his widow, is now living at Carolina Meadows.

   By the time the Hitchings held their party, there had been 14 resident weddings; the most recent at that time was that of Gean Didow and Dr. Tyndall Harris who were married in May, 1996.

   Candace Owen and Hugh Steele are the latest couple in the Meadow Weds group. They married in February 2003, but they had met each other about six years before when she had moved into her apartment. Hugh was in charge of the woodworkers shop and Candace contacted him to see if he could find a home for a very old woodworkers bench that she owned.

   Meadow Wed couples have had their first meeting at Carolina Meadows in various places --on the golf course, on the croquet court, and even through an introduction by the marketing department when a resident was contacted to show her villa to a gentleman who was considering moving to Carolina Meadows. . Several couples were married at Carolina Meadows and two weddings have been held at the gazebo facing Golden Pond -- a perfect picture-book setting. By the time another social event takes place, perhaps the "double dozen" Carolina Meadows weddings will number 25 -- or even more. February is the month for hearts and flowers! -- Pauly Dodd, Resident

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