The Sewing Machine Quotes

“There was a danger that the words might become unravelled and rewoven into something new after so many softly spoken passes, but anger had bred an engineered precision into the swell of vowels and consonants, and there was no confusion at all in the message.”
― Natalie Fergie, The Sewing Machine

“You have to do what’s in your heart, not what a man tells you to do.”
― Natalie Fergie, The Sewing Machine

“The sewing machine has provided work in manufacture, eased work in the home and facilitated work when there was none to be had. By designing with the individual components of a discarded machine, I connect with the hands of the workers who built it in the factory, and with the people who used it in the home. In doing this I acknowledge those whose experience and determination paved the way for the working lives we have now.”
― Natalie Fergie, The Sewing Machine

“Michael is clearly torn between pride in his new cast and jealousy that his little brother has had all the fun.”
― Natalie Fergie, The Sewing Machine

“the silence broken only by the tap of rook and pawn as they battled for victory in the hands of men.”
― Natalie Fergie, The Sewing Machine

“A time to rend, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak.”
― Natalie Fergie, The Sewing Machine

“I am so boring and pathetic that being on her own was better than being with me.”
― Natalie Fergie, The Sewing Machine

“I needed to pick one problem and sort that out and then move on to the next.”
― Natalie Fergie, The Sewing Machine

“I’m just going to enjoy my pudding and try not to think about it anymore.”
― Natalie Fergie, The Sewing Machine

“She wondered how many women were right now doing the same thing. Hiding briefly from their world as it pressed in around them and attempting to shut the door against it all.”
― Natalie Fergie, The Sewing Machine

“But, to be honest, I really don’t know what I’m doing. The decision-making all feels very complicated and not at all as straightforward as I thought it would be.”
― Natalie Fergie, The Sewing Machine

“It would be an adventure, she told herself. And if it wasn’t, she would just have to make it so.”
― Natalie Fergie, The Sewing Machine

“Oh, I’ll always get work,’ he states with the assured confidence of someone who has never been unemployed.”
― Natalie Fergie, The Sewing Machine

“Jean had been lying awake for an hour, and more than anything else, she wanted to stay under the woollen blankets and pretend to be ill.”
― Natalie Fergie, The Sewing Machine

“she could no more discard useable cloth than she could catch an unnecessary bus.”
― Natalie Fergie, The Sewing Machine

“The hem is raw. It was never finished.”
― Natalie Fergie, The Sewing Machine

“Annie is absolutely right. You must always tell someone if there is something wrong.”
― Natalie Fergie, The Sewing Machine

“And then he would open the biscuit tin and get out the packet of chocolate fingers that was always there and which never ran out because it was a magic tin.”
― Natalie Fergie, The Sewing Machine

“On this occasion, of course, everyone was sad, which was a bit surreal because Granda wanted the walk-out music to be that mad song from Life of Brian.”
― Natalie Fergie, The Sewing Machine

“That’s me told.”
― Natalie Fergie, The Sewing Machine

“In my experience, people surprise you when the chips are down.”
― Natalie Fergie, The Sewing Machine

“Thank you,’ he says, so quietly that she sees the words instead of hearing them.”
― Natalie Fergie, The Sewing Machine

“You wouldn’t believe,’ he says, realising too late that she might know exactly how it feels to be bereaved. She might even know what it is like to clear out a house of family stuff that is inconsequential and yet at the same time precious beyond words.”
― Natalie Fergie, The Sewing Machine