Your question made me think about something that I normally just take for granted. Over the years, I guess quilting has been many different things--a way to connect to the past, an act of creativity, an expression of love for friends and family, a way to deal with stress and unhappiness. Right now, my best friend of 35 years is dying of leukemia. She has only a month or so to live. I am making a quilt that she promised to another friend and was unable to complete and, in doing so, I'm helping to deal with my own sadness.
I think there is something inside us that needs to create and that need finds expression in different ways--photography, painting, sculpture, basket weaving. For me, it's mostly quilting.