The Popsicle Stick Prophecy: How a Craft Kit Became My Life's Cautionary Parable

In the ’70s, especially during the summer months, my sister and I would adore spending long days visiting the dust‑drenched and picturesque historical living‑history museum called Museum Village. It was tucked away in the humid hills of upstate New York where our family would escape the sticky and merciless New York City summers in Monroe, NY.

Museum Village was postcard quaint and featured “olden time” interactive experiences helped by volunteers who couldn’t resist two blond, curious, and bored little girls who were summer day‑camp dropouts (we had a lot of time on our hands).

19th‑century modest structures, activities, sounds, and unrecognizable smells wafted throughout the village and showed us what life required “back then.” Museum Village was the perfect make‑believe haven for my sister and me to lose ourselves in imaginary play, explore, and get dirty. It had everything: shops, horses, dirt potholey roads, wagons, adults wearing period costumes, and of course — the quintessential old‑fashioned candy store.

One infamous summer day, my sister and I found ourselves inside one of the newer maker sites where weaving was being demonstrated.

…Thump, thump.

There was an odd, muted thump sound that initially drew us into a small hot room. A woman was seated at the loom, making cloth. Towering in front of 10‑year‑old me was this chunky, massive wood loom beast. The woven cloths were beautiful. With awe and fascination I watched how the interconnected wooden parts worked in concert — its rhythm, its flow, its weird foot pedals. It had horizontal arms which would move, somehow connected to the foot pedals. Strings would line up, and move, and conjoin. And yet, this behemoth maker thingy would churn out the softest and most beautiful woven material.

It was magic.

Thump, thump.

I was hooked. Enthralled. (My sister, less so.) I couldn’t leave the demo space. I was drawn in — so, so curious — asking many questions, more, more, more. I couldn’t figure out how this thump thingy made this woven cloth.

A little personal history

My mother was a single young mom raising two kids in the late ’60s and ’70s, and was incredibly fortunate that my grandfather “Poppy” also helped raise us. As my stand‑in father, he and I had a very special relationship. He saw everything I was capable of. He listened to all of my interests and ideas. Without interrupting. He was funny, attentive, dramatic, and my favorite person in the world — my greatest champion and fan. He believed, in his soul, that I was a creative genius — a precocious, brilliant child‑artist prodigy able to create or do anything. (Yes — this version of “the drama of the gifted child” would be the center of my future adult therapy sessions.) I wanted to be as special as Poppy believed I was destined to become.

Pressure and possibility.

In the historic loom room, Poppy, upon seeing how transfixed I was, begged the demo volunteer if I could be given an “upgrade” and have a real tutorial. Poppy convinced the woman (he was charming) to teach me 1:1. I jumped up onto the loom’s bench, leaned over to push and pull a large wooden bar (the beater?), while the kind woman put her hands over mine to guide and glide the movements.

It thumped and thumped.

My dangling feet, unable to reach the pedals, made the whole thing more giddy and fun — pure joy. After an hour or so (we often were the last to leave the village), I slid off the bench, and I begged for candy as we continued to drag my now super‑bored little sister with us — she had the tedious thankless job of watching my loom lesson. She would have been much happier riding the horses outside.

Later that early evening at our home, my Great Aunt Belle had heard of the loom lesson experience and she — a no‑nonsense, highly opinionated Jewish New Yorker — took initiative and had purchased me and my sister a store‑bought kid‑craft loom kit that used popsicle sticks and yarn to practice weaving. Great Aunt Belle was always quick to fix and critique our non‑traditional, kid‑centered life. She always had a better idea.

Tearing open the cardboard packaging, Sis and I enjoyed assembling the small popsicle‑stick pattern. We followed the directions carefully and made gestures over and through with our brightly colored kid yarn and shiny ribbon strips. Poppy watched over our modest project carefully, but couldn’t hide his heavy disappointment when only tawdry potholders and woven scraps were presented. Sis and I went to sleep unremarkably that night, watching our nightly comfort TV — The Partridge Family reruns — featuring my ’70s crush, David Cassidy.

The next afternoon, I remember hearing the loud sounds of a truck in our driveway with a lot of attention‑seeking beeping. Several work men produced ramps, which were zigzagged and maneuvered expertly to fit a massive mysterious mass through our average‑sized back door.

It was impossible to grasp fully what had been delivered. It was heaved against our back hall wall, consuming most of the room’s space.

Glaring at me was a HUGE wooden antique loom — exactly like the one we had used at Museum Village.

”How about THIS?”

“How about this?” Poppy beamed.

I vaulted myself up onto the loom’s thick wide bench and tried to glide with my hands the heavy horizontal piece back and forth.

It was impossible to budge. No movement. Nothing.

NO THUMP.

This loom was so big, complicated, and confusing. I was so excited and wanted to show Poppy how grateful I was, but I had no idea how to make it work. Beads of sweat began to cluster behind my neck as I tried to figure out how to get anything working. I was oozing incompetence and disappointing my Poppy as he kept side‑coaching me with suggestions, worsening the pressure. I began to full‑on panic, realizing that, at 10, I would never get this stupid loom thump thing to work. I had loved making the potholder yesterday — why did I feel so responsible for this failed gift?

Poppy’s expectations hung thick in the air.

I wasn’t smart enough, brave enough, or talented enough.

At some point during the loom mess, Aunt Belle proclaimed loudly and cheerfully to the family that the failed loom escapade was classic Poppy being ridiculous. “Popsicle sticks should have been enough!”

She was right, of course.

I am not sure how long that massive ridiculous loom remained in our home. It was not a happy addition. Over time the impact of the loom fiasco became tattooed to my origin story — where my pattern of “over‑reaching” with crazy hard expectations would repeat for many too many years. Poppy could not accept my mortal limitations. For another five years, Poppy and I colluded together — joyful, exhilarating, terrifying — always shortcutting the beginning learning steps and shooting for observable greatness. While many of our projects ended similarly to the loom (badly), eventually they didn’t. I learned. I started making recognizably beautiful things — drawings, paintings, dances, songs, and stories. I grew into an ideal “gifted child‑teen‑young adult.”

Poppy died devastatingly when I was in 9th grade, creating a loss that I am still processing. Impossibly painful and chaotic years ensued, but after some excellent therapy, I learned how to intervene and break the loom cycle, so I could enjoy my imperfect but absolutely good‑enough self.

The fear of being outed for not being the most brilliant or a prodigy ended. I have been “free” from the curse of talent for many years now, and have loved being able to enjoy my art making and teaching.

50 years later, I often remind myself and others when popsicle sticks might just be enough.