Time with my Mama (Hi Mama!)

Nearly every Wednesday night I head over to visit my parents and brothers. Sometimes it's all four of them, and I have to dole out my company carefully while other times it just me and my Mama getting to catch up and gab for a while. This week it was spent pouring through a veritable treasure trove of books sent up to us for pleasure and safe keeping. These tomes traveled all the way from Lake Tahoe and were such a lovely surprise. Reading books from 1900, Autograph book from 1880, a much abused math book from 1912 gave my mother and I such pleasure to read over. We would read the best bits aloud to each other, amidst commenting on curious little notions from the different Cyclopeadias, school child scrawlings and treasured signatures from old friends.


This was my favourite.

And then I was blithely commandeered by this young fellow to help with his new "Smoke Bombs" for his on-going project of his Zombie Movie. I assure you (Mom and Dad) nothing actually exploded, but things were rather smoky and loads of fun. It's such a pleasure being a part of the young lives of my brothers. Both boys are becoming young men so rapidly, it's sometimes difficult for me to keep up with what new activities they are doing. Evan is writing scripts and making movies while Levi writes story snippets and bangs out metal marvels on the backyard forge. I am so honored to call myself their sister.

A novelty and reflections on a life misplaced

First off, my new gnome lights. Yes, I bought novelty lights in the shape of little gnomes. Now my family is saying I love and collect gnomes. Let me set you straight, not really, but it's slowly turning into a minor fetish.




Yesterday I spent most of the day at my grandparents house in West Seattle. My mother's childhood home and the place of many of my childhood memories. I love my mum's room with it's french doors leading out on a little closed balcony. I love the lion's head down in the garden below. His name is Aslan, naturally.





Now it's just my grandpa living in this big house, and it feels kinda lonely without my grandma there. She's still living, but she's at an Adult Family Home where they can take good care of her with her dementia. There's bits and pieces of her still around my grandpa's home. Her perfume, make-up, clothing, jewellery and I often find myself looking through them wondering what she was like as a young girl, mother. She wasn't a milk and cookies grandma, she was strict and hard on my brothers and me. For all that, we respected her as she was and still is our grandma. I just don't know much about her, from her in her own words. On the flip-side of this is my own family who has raised me with tales of my family history. I know what my parents were like a kids, and teen-agers, adults. All the parts I wasn't present for, I've experienced through their words and stories. So I wonder, looking at my grandma's things, what was her life like before I met her? I wish I could know, I wish she could have told me. Taught me how to sew without a pattern, cook by instinct. With each thing I discover about her, I want to learn more only now she barely remembers herself. It's a sad thing, and I pray that some day I might learn more about her so I can tell her story for her, to my children, and they can tell their children in turn.

December 20th

My baby brother is eighteen and I can't believe it. It seems like only yesterday he was shorter than me. Now he's on the brink of manhood. The next few years will, I believe, shape the adult he is fast becoming. The jump, leap from eighteen to let's say, twenty or twenty-one is mind boggling when you look back on it. On how much you actually change. Granted there are other, more significant leaps, but this is the one that has impacted me the most.



I admit that I wait with baited breath to see what he's going to come up with next. My brother is an inventor, and innovator, a steampunk, a bookworm, a lion, a gentleman and a gentle man. He's kind, strong, brave, insightful, quiet, loving, and warm. I treasure his hugs, his moments of mischief, and there are many of those, his smiles, laughter, and jokes.



Eighteen years ago I wanted to name him Tigerlilly. I was four at the time and my favorite film was Mary Martin's Peter Pan, can you blame me? I hope not too much. I remember lying awake at my aunt's house, snuggled into my sleeping bag, when the phone rang. I had a baby brother. I was taken down to the hospital in the snow to meet him, this tiny squirmy red bundle of baby brother. We've had our spats, arguments, and fights, it's all part of being siblings. There will be more in the future, that's human nature. The really special thing about our relationship is how much we love each other. Our bond is so strong, it's a little surprising at times, and other times I'm so glad it's there. Cultivated when we were young, and nurtured as we grow older, may it last for years to come.



Well world, here's my Big Little Brother. Watch out. He's an amazing artist who will surprise you with his humor, embrace you with his love, and watch you with his insight. Oh, yeah, and he's probably inventing something on the side that's likely to blow up, or careen madly around the house, so do watch your step.
I love you Big Guy!