I had a lovely Christmas and am sad it's over. The world looks a bleaker place without bright lights continually promising cheery respite from real life.
But...
Something happened a few days before Christmas that, while is most likely for the eventual (and even present) best, has caused much sorrow between myself and my mother. Ever since it happened I've had trouble getting my brain to focus and get things done. I am really not sure why. Perhaps because the air is full of disrupted dust from memories that I had let settle in a dark corner a while ago.
Not to be histrionic, but I don't really want to talk about it. I don't really want to talk about anything, really.
I'm not uninspired, just terribly unsettled. So I'm writing snippets of stories, eating entirely too many sweet things, falling in love with Nina Nastasia's album, Dogs [a Christmas present from Younger Brother #1], and waiting to see what will happen next.
(The aforementioned Nina Nastasia album with a penguin puppet Younger Brother #2 gave to me since I have quite a thing for penguins. He joked that he regretted getting it for me since I was having waaay to much fun with it Christmas morning. I haven't decided what to name her yet... I know it must be a her since the rest of the penguins in my collection are boys.)
This is not much of a post, but I haven't posted for almost 3 weeks which is uncharacteristic of me. I wanted to let you know I am still here, as alive as I ever was.
I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas. ♥
{'Dear Rose' by Nina Nastasia - the opening track of Dogs. Hmm, I'm noticing a trend of me putting music at the ends of my posts these days. What can I say? Music is good.}
As Christmas lights twinkle at me from neighbouring windows, I must accept that November's candle has nearly burned to the end.
This is not neccesarily a bad thing, though. I journaled a lot during the month of November and looking back, I realize how bemusing it was...
--We took a day trip down to see our paternal grandparents. It was my first time seeing my grandfather since he's been diagnosed with cancer. [This next bit is copied from my journal] He's undergone half of his treatments and I was shocked... because he looks no different! I would never even suspect he had cancer. I almost feel guilty, because I have been relatively untouched by tragedy & now that it has come... it's a nonentity. So far, that is. I should be giving thanks to God but I'm just sitting here wondering what the catch is. Sad, n'est-ce pas?
--Less importantly, I found out I have "misophonia" which is a form of decreased sound tolerance. From wikipedia: "People who have misophonia are most commonly annoyed, or even enraged, by the sound of other people eating, breathing, coughing, or other ordinary sounds." My whole life makes sense now! Or at least the past couple years do. :P
--On November 21 my "baby" brother had his 13th birthday! I could have sworn he was still 6, I really could've. As often as he drives me crazy, I love that boy so much. This one's for you, love muffin! ;)
--And most shockingly, my older sister has a boyfriend. Her first. Our whole family’s first, really. Let me put this in context: she's never had a boyfriend because her convictions do not include dating for dating's sake or transient relationships. This relationship is a serious one: one with the goal of possible marriage someday.
*excuse me while I scream inside*
I feel... a tumult of emotions. This all came on so fast - I almost feel threatened. My sister and I are close and she's already away so much; I wasn't prepared to lose her to a guy so soon! We all finally met him today. He seems nice and a little bit shy. Still... this is shaking my world. I'll get used to it, though... eventually.
As I've watched this whole thing unfold, (the talking, the texting, the praying, the texting, the texting) all I can think is Aww...! [I don't want this for myself. I don't want this; I don't want this.] Perhaps it's my young age, but the knowledge that I am not expected to stay single my whole life makes me sick. But this is a bewildering topic I could wax on for hours. Let us drop it for now.
November has been strange for me, emotionally speaking. One day I'll feel driven and inspired; I write/bake cookies/paint with my brother; and then the next day all I want to do is crawl into a hole where there are no people and I can cry in peace.
These past couple weeks, I've developed an ennui: the grey, sticky kind that's so hard to wash from the folds of the sky. I thought it was circumstantial, temporary; I thought I could keep it at arm's length until "that time" ended. Apparently not. It's still here.
November has sounded like a Laura Nyro song.
Practically all I listened to the month of November was her album New York Tendaberry, and (starting this past week) Eli and the Thirteenth Confession. On good days and bad, her music remained the only thing I didn't weary of. But those aren't the only reasons why I say November has sounded like one of her songs. Her changing tempos, the soaring flight; then landing; then soaring again of her songs has mirrored the carousel rhythm of my emotions. Except, I lack the passion she sings with; I don't seem to feel anything deeply anymore.
Today in church, though... I felt inspired. I can pull my act together this week, I thought. I can pull my whole life together!
Sitting in church seems to be the place where I make my best (and oft most random) resolves. Sermon-listening doesn't always happen, but that's just how it goes sometimes.
My ennui has not made a peep all day, and I am hoping this week will be better. That is one thing we must always cling to: surely tomorrow will be better. If we didn’t believe that, I’m not sure many of us would choose to wake up ever again.
So, though November has been an altogether bone-rattling month, I face the beginning of my favourite season with careworn hopes dug out from under the bed and grasped in my hands again. I’m not sure they will help, but I need to hold them and try to seek the truth again. I'm tired of being lost.
('The Man Who Sends Me Home' by Laura Nyro. I realize her music is not to everyone's liking, but I think she's pretty darn amazing, so I dinna care.)
{1st picture is text from the book I Am Half-Sick of Shadows by Alan Bradley and the 2nd picture is of Laura Nyro.}
As I drove, scents and sounds flew in the open windows. With them, they carried keys. Keys to open the bureaus and chests where my memories sleep, folded and tucked away. Suddenly, the lids of these safeholds were thrust open, causing memories to scatter all over the streets behind and beside me. The air became foggy with remembrances. Memory after memory sped through my mind. Memories of houses belonging to great-aunts and uncles; of the rows of shops in Chincoteague; of playing with Lily on summer twilights; of gravel driveways leading to exciting places. Numbly I sat and my hands automatically kept up their cradle-rocking motion on the steering wheel. I felt blind, a blanket of reminisces over my head, a Janis Ian song playing on a loop in my mind. {Lover, am I coming home again?} In turning every corner, new memories would spill out. The most random of remembrances: that time of Sunday wandering with my brothers and father; countless dinners out when the grandparents were in town; exploring a green expanse of grass with my sister. As I neared home, they quieted down. They've dissipated by the time I've pulled into the driveway. My father who sat next to me was unaffected; he felt, heard, saw nothing. But it was all I could do not to stumble up the porch steps; weary, yet wishing the memories would come back in all their intensity. But everything was locked up again... except for one sole memory lingering centerstage. It was a new one, with a polished sheen and beguiling gleam in its eye. Twas the memory of this car ride and the not unwelcome evocation of feelings and experiences I’d nearly forgotten. I hung the shiny new memory where I could see it, not willing to put it away just yet. I wanted to ponder it for a while longer...
(This strange incident happened to me yesterday. I almost feel like I imagined it all, it was so out of the blue. It always amazes me how short the line connecting memories to scents and sounds (&c.) is. Such as, whenever I hear the sound of a large/long zipper being zipped, bam! I'm miles away, camping and lying in a tent listening to a member of the family opening the zippered door. Or I'll smell something and find myself cast years into the past. The mind and our five senses are wondrous things. Do you, dear readers, have any sound/smell associations?)
I've been thinking a lot about the past again. My family's past, specifically, as I've been making friends with my grandmother's "Heritage Scrapbook".
There is an entry in my journal that sums up the emotions I've been feeling lately, so I'm posting it, with a couple revisions and clarifications. (This entry was written last September when we were in KY for the first time in forever, to go to the Creation Museum and visit family also since a lot of my father's family comes from there.)
"We are in Kentucky. [...] We went to the annual [family] reunion. The highlight of this was seeing great-aunt D- (my grandfather's oldest sister). We set on her porch for a while, the porch of the house her (late) husband built! (Though, as she said, there have been improvements made.) And as I sat there on the porch swing, I started thinking about old people & how many stories & memories they have & how they are our tie with the past. And once they die all their stories & memories die with them. One more tie with the past is severed. It makes me wish I could just spend time with people like Aunt D- & my grandparents & ask them to tell me stories of their life. Where are we without the past? I say I hate history [as a subject in school] - I don't. I hate textbook history. I don't just want to know about impersonal, large battles. I don't want to know about dreams of the nation. I want to know about the individual battles of every day. I want to know the personal dreams that the generations before me held. I don't want to lose our connection with them."
Does anyone else ever feel that way? It makes me wish I had a stronger inclination to be a biographer or something. Now I always make sure to pay close attention when my grandparents start telling a story. I don't think I remember often enough how blessed I am to still have all my grandparents alive.
As I mentioned, I've been looking a lot at my (maternal) grandmother's "Heritage Scrapbook" lately. My brothers and I spent the night at her and my grandfather's house yesterday because my parents and older sister were both gone. I adopted the scrapbook for the night so I could spend more time with it, hehe. I took some pictures of some of the photos and thought I'd share a few. (Sorry the quality isn't the greatest.)
This is my favourite picture in the album. It's my great-grandmother (or my mother's mother's mother :P) in the 1920's when she was dating my great-grandfather (the man next to her, obviously). The funny thing is, nobody remembers who the little girl on the right is. My grandmother asked my great-grandmother when she was still alive and she didn't remember either. Still, I love this picture; it just screams 1920's and I love that era.
This is my great-grandfather's family. Yep, he had 11 siblings. I'm not sure when it's from... late 1910's or 1920's is my guess. He's in the back row, in the middle (he's the same fellow in the picture above).
And this is a picture of my grandmother and grandfather in the 1950's before they were married!
They were so cute. :)
Anyway, I hope everyone is having a lovely summer and has a great new week!
It’s hard to remember to be thankful when my grandparent’s house suddenly feels shrunk by the influx of relatives. The air is thick with boisterous laughter and stories. Some funny, some unnecessary. The floor is littered with spoken, inexorable opinions. (Forgotten for now but they will undoubtedly be picked up and shown around again.) All I want to do is hide. (And I do, for a while, with my fellow hermit brothers.)
It’s hard to remember to be thankful when I think that this time next year this house that my grandparents have lived in the past 50 years will be sold and they will have moved to be closer to their only daughter (my mother). I’m going to miss this house so much; it is the place I love most next to my own home. Though I am glad they're moving closer... It troubles me to see how much my grandfather has aged. How slow his movements are… how hunched he stands. (My grandmother seems the same as ever, gentle and full of helpful energy. But still, she's aging too.) I hate how old everyone is getting! Including myself.
It wasn’t until I lay in bed Thanksgiving night that I finally gave thanks to God for His many blessings. I think this year I am thankful for the memories most of all. I cannot contemplate a life without memories. Right now, especially, since remembrances of my grandparent's house are filling my head....
Watching shows like The Brady Bunch and Leave it to Beaver on cable. (Quite a treat for us!)
Anticipating Christmas in the basement with the cousins. (Wondering why the adults upstairs keep talking and drinking coffee while we can’t keep our eyes off the tree and the presents underneath it.)
Playing the ancient piano in the basement that hasn’t been in tune for several decades, at least.
Swinging on the swing on the slope (aka 'hill') in their backyard. Closing my eyes and pretending I was flying. Arguing with siblings and cousins whose turn it was. Sadness when most of us grew too big for it.
Blowing out the gas flame in the fireplace with fellow curly-haired mischievous cousin… The confession when the basement started to smell of gas. (No harm done, thankfully. We weren’t the first ones to do that, either. The constant blue flame proved too great a temptation for quite a few of our predecessors and successors.)
Laughter in the teeny kitchen, crazy games in the basement with my siblings… the list goes on.
My older-younger brother and I used to say that we would buy this house someday and live in it. That thought makes me sad now.
Moving on is bittersweet, I am truly realizing that now. Overall though, I am thankful for the wonderful times I had here and glad I can remember them with such happiness.
(I found this picture in my grandparent’s basement. It’s me, around 4 years old or so, on the aforementioned swing.)
{Sorry if this post isn't very coherent. I'm overflowing with contradictory emotions, reminiscences and tiredness. Oi.}
I was looking for a recipe the other day in a big binder full of recipes that my mum has printed off the internet throughout the years. I couldn't find what I was looking for so I just started looking at all the different recipes. And, in the midst of all these recipes, I found a printed-off email from my dad's {work} email address to my mum's. It was dated April 3, 2000. And this is what it said:
"There is someone I dearly love And ought to tell her so And so I wrote this poem In hopes that she would know There is no line of clever verse To show what’s in my mind – A better friend, a stronger love I never need to find I hope someday I’ll be the things I want to be for her But she accepts me as I am And i like that, fer sure
I love you."
I just thought that was so sweet! I love my parents so much. {And I hope to be as talented a writer as my dad someday.} My parents anniversary is today. They've been married for 23 years! God has blessed me so much with this family. :)
