I'm so tired. May I talk?

[mopinko]

38. well, you just go ahead.

i slept w my dogs, cuz it's what i had to do.
but if i had needed to scream and cry and write (which i do do. you should see my email draft file.) you can bet your bippy that is what i would have done.

i feel for your absence of family. my family story is good and bad. i was the target of my only brother, the middle of 7 kids. i was #6, and i have no idea why i was picked out. could have been a lot of thing.
otoh, i had a real relationship w my alcoholic dad, rly the only one. my older sisters had an intense relationship, but it wasnt happy. but me, for some reason, i was his dinky, and his last hope for a kid to fulfill his frustrated dreams. rly took me 60 years to appreciate it, but there was that acceptance.
i had always tried to be grateful for my genes, at least, which are interesting.
but it really took old age to really grip the extent of it. how they left me perfectly positioned to launch this crazy little farm.

but my figurative paintings are all about family, motherhood, love and life.
they are abstracted, and have no faces. tho this does bother some people, my feeling is that i try to paint the universal, and there is nothing more universal than that we all had a mother, at the least at one point. for some they can see their own mother, family, love, in that blanks space, but also for some there is nothing but a mother/family shaped blank hole. and they can see that, too. what it might have been. what their dreams might be.

i have gone back and forth, but the loss of the first sibling brought us all together, as such things do, followed by another family member shortly after.
i am #6, and #7 and i have a deep but sometimes prickly relationship. the baby and the favorite of only brother. but she needed me, and i helped her get elected to a county board, in spite of how shitty i was feeling.
it's good to be back in the family, but i had to tell my brother to fuck off.
all of which is to say that the absence of a family can have as big or bigger impact than an actual family.

i have wondered aloud many times why the feeling of accomplishment is so fleeting, but regrets last a life time.
here on the other side, i find myself enjoying my accomplishments immensely.
in year 8, my farm has matured into a little bit of paradise. my chickens are gorgeous and my eggs are delicious. my fruit trees should actually bear fruit this year. i have outlasted my critics to become a neighborhood institution.
my life is good, and i try every day to be grateful for that.

and yes, i sure do wish we could all meet in meat space some time.
it used to be a thing that happened around here, but it went bad fast when the weirdos moved it. there are always a couple.

hang in there, dear.
i'll be waiting for you over here on the other side.