Читать книгу Things Korean - O-Young Lee - Страница 15

The World in a Thimble

Kolmu

Among those devices which man has made from steel, we might say that the most symbolic contrast can be found in the sword and the needle.

Man uses the sword and woman uses the needle. The sword cuts and severs, and the needle stitches and mends. The sword exists for killing and the needle for maintaining. The sword rules the field of battle, to fight and conquer, but the needle rules in the inner recesses of the women's quarters, to mend and make anew. The sword calls us out, and the needle beckons us in.

In this extreme opposition we can see the intriguing contrast between man's helmet and woman's thimble. The helmet is worn on the head to ward off the sword, and the thimble is worn on the finger to stop the needle. Just as man wears his helmet when he goes out to do battle, the woman wears her thimble when she picks up something to mend.

It is a small and delicate world in that thimble there on the tip of the finger, and the woman arms herself with this thimble to protect that world. It is a quiet world which does not know the male's arrogant hunger for fame and glory. The world which the thimble guards is not a vast empire but one the size of a sewing box.

The thimble is the smallest and lightest of helmets. Like the bits of thread and fabric left over from sewing, like unmatching buttons, it is a microcosm of everyday life.

And so a glance at the thimble can bring back countless nights to us out of our past, like mother sewing with her nimble fingers as she listens to the soft breathing of her sleeping children, with elder sister at her side, learning while assisting. Woman's long nights are lit by the soft glow of the thimble's magic. The thimble is her helmet in her struggle with time, so intent on wearing her down. It comforts her in longing and loneliness, in sorrow, in waiting.

Man's helmet.

Woman's thimble.