““After she’d collected all she wanted, the Bird Lady would sit on a bench with needle and thread and sew her precious scraps into paper stars and give them away to any passerby who bothered to approach her. To most, the shabby tokens were nothing more than trash, but Eleanor had kept every star the Bird Lady had ever given her. She planned to string them in a garland and hang them in the shop window come Christmas. Every fold, every stitch the woman made, was filled with care and thought; somehow the Bird Lady found meaning in what the rest of the world tossed away.””
![“To thousands of elder women in the late sixties and early seventies [the private women's club movement] came like a new gospel ofactivity and service. They had reared their children and seen them take flight; moreover, they had fought through the war, their hearts in the field, their fingers…” quote by Laura E. Richards](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/img-quotes/8a2/laura-e-richards-39353_active_to-thousands-of-elder-women-in-the-late_1900479.jpg)
