Aside from the second act in a play, a more contemporary usage of the phrase is a second career, often undertaken in retirement when one is less constrained by earning a living and putting food on the table each week.
Hopefully one feels freer to follow a passion or love, without particular regard for financial reward or gain. The recent hurricane tragedies have been ripe with stories of rescued animals.
Aside from living sentient beings, sometimes inanimate objects such as quilts have a second life too. Those of us constructing them are simply hearing that calling and cause those quilts to be born, so to speak. Midwives, in essence β not the story, only assistants in the process. Sometimes, giving quilts and others a second life or opportunity helps to heal both the recipients and the donor. I grew up quilting with my mother around a quilting frame in the local church basement with the Missionary Circle.
Although somehow, in that time and place, the irony of sending quilts to Africa escaped me. I think it was the thought that mattered, at least I hope so. I also made quilts by hand with the scraps from making my own clothes.
I also loved using the scraps for things like matching doll clothes made by hand with no pattern. Later, as a teen, I made quilts with those scraps, often taking my quilting bag along when I babysat for after the kids were in bed. There was something soothing and having moved away, quilting connected me with my roots, both figuratively and literally. For at least hundreds of years, women have made quilts for utilitarian purposes, for warmth, to salvage any possible piece of fabric which was expensive both in terms of labor and cost, and to bestow as gifts on those they loved.
