Kathy Ewing’s new book isn’t about feelings. It’s about felt - fabric that is.
“The concept is a little gnarly to explain,” she said.
“A Grandmother’s ABC Book” is Ewing’s exploration of how she spent the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic. The Cleveland State University Latin professor learned in early 2020 that she’d be a grandmother - but her daughter lived in New York.
“I couldn't see her other than Zoom," she said. "I decided to resurrect my obsolete sewing skills and try to make a few things for the babies. I hit upon this idea of making an ABC book. So, I found a pattern, and that's what I did during lockdown.”
A friend encouraged Ewing to keep a journal while making the felt alphabet, and that journal was the basis for “A Grandmother’s ABC Book.”
“It talks about just everything that was going on in my mind,” she said. “It's about the pandemic and COVID and the election and music I was listening to. As a Latin teacher, I'm interested in the alphabet. So, there's a chapter for every letter of the alphabet.”
The short chapters delve into how our alphabet evolved.
“There was no ‘W,’ for instance,” she said. “Our alphabet is related to the Greek alphabet, and the Greek alphabet derived from the Phoenician alphabet. Every letter has an interesting history of originally being a pictograph or a picture of something.”
One letter in the book holds particular importance, signifying Ewing’s thoughts on when she would be able to meet her grandkids.
“When I get to 'V,' 'V' stands for 'vase,' but in my mind it stood for 'vaccines,'" she said. "My husband and I weren't going to be able to travel to New York in March of '21. That was just when vaccines were becoming available. So, I whine a lot in the book about my struggles with hanging out at the Walgreens pharmacy, hoping that there would be some left over at the end of the day, because it was so hard to get an appointment.”
The book ends just before Ewing finally meets the six-week-old twins. Today, they’re two and living nearby in Cleveland Heights.
“I can inflict the alphabet book on the twins every time I go and visit,” she said. “I open it up and make sure they're looking at it, which we actually just did yesterday. So, they're interested in the alphabet. They can sing the song too.”
Music was a major factor for Ewing during the pandemic. She listened to oldies while sewing and thinking back to the songs she and her children enjoyed.
“I talked about our shared affection for James Taylor,” she said. “The millennials seem to be respectful of our music. When I was growing up, it was cool to disdain our parents’ music even though a lot of it was really good. We wouldn't be caught dead listening to Glenn Miller or something.”
Kathy Ewing will be sharing her new book at Loganberry’s Author Alley in Shaker Heights on Saturday.
