"Something your hand touched..."

Lucinda read this quote at the memorial for my father yesterday:

"Everyone must leave something behind when he dies, my grandfather said. A child or a book or a painting or a house or a wall built or a pair of shoes made. Or a garden planted.
Something your hand touched some way so your soul has somewhere to go when you die, and when people look at that tree or that flower you planted, you're there.

It doesn't matter what you do, he said, so long as you change something from the way it was before you touched it into something that's like you after you take your hands away. "

Sort of unexpectedly, it's from Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury.

Today I go to work at the thrift store for the first time in a week (luckily I'd taken most of the week off for something else; death took its place). 
I feel just a little nervous, going back into the world, but also it's very, very welcome--I'm so glad I have a job to go to, not more writing work alone at home, and I'm totally ready, and needing, even, to be around strangers and stuff and other distractions again. 

My intention (fingers crossed) is FINALLY to set up the sewing machine this coming week (after I've done all the dishes from the memorial) and start on all of that--touching fabric and thread and buttons.  

Thank you all for the emails and comments--the contact and kindness means a lot, and I appreciate it: 
your words are a kind of touching too.