Paisley and mandala arm sleeve in grey

The pit wheel stopped again on Tuesday, so Mam has been at the kitchen table with her pattern book since dinner. She is copying a shawl from the weavers' catalogue Mrs Pryce brought up from Merthyr, teardrop after teardrop, each one curling over at the tip like a wave that thought better of breaking. She says the lace-makers in the old country stitched these to keep the dark out of the house. I told her coal dust doesn't care for lace, and she told me to hush and hand her the lamp.

The flower in the middle is the hard part. Mam draws it with a pin, counting petals in threes and then in sixes, and the ring of little dots around its heart has taken her two evenings. She says the dots are the only bit that stays true when the rest wanders. I think she means you, and the men on the night shift, but she doesn't say so.

Last week Evan Rees came down the row with a paper of his own, a drawing for a medallion he wants pricked into the pit-office lamp-check tin so the men will know his name if the roof comes down. I laughed, and then I didn't. Mam only said a circle with no beginning has no way of ending either, and went back to her dots.

When the wheel turns again, come home by the river path, not the road. I'll have the shawl finished by Sunday, and I'll keep the lamp lit in the window so you can find the house.

Your sister, Gwen