Yester-year

My sister posted this photo on Facebook the other day. I feel like so many of us can identify with the grainy, muted color photographs of childhood. No sharp images. No true definition, but that wasn’t a thing then. The thing that was certain then was that we had our imagination and the freedom to be bored… leading to invention. This image here, me with my magic wand and my little sister with Dad’s cigar (!?)… what does it say to me, about me..? Well my Father was lucky enough to have 3 girls. He called us The Boys and did not treat us with any special favor- He treated us as he would have if he had had three sons.

I hiked with him- military style ( he was a Marine), I got up early in the morning to accompany him fishing ( him with his fly rod, me with my reel), I tried deer hunting with him ( didn’t really like it), and would go on skiing trips. I did everything a son would do with his father and I Loved every minute of it. I loved being treated like I could do anything a boy could do and being held accountable.

This part of my upbringing, the core of my childhood, is what I do believe has shaped where I am today. The belief that I am capable. Capable as any male.. no excuses, no bull.

Dad left the family a couple years after this photograph was taken. That action shaped a new aspect to my personality- the melancholy that I still find myself feeling nearly daily. Dad passed away in my teen years, leaving me callused and tough. How do all these things apply to me today and what does that have to do with the career path that I’ve taken? Well, I do believe it is all laid out in front of me..… the imaginative, no boundaries of a Creative. The often melancholic, “everyday is meaningful” aspect of myself that is the Artist. And the toughness, resolve, and discipline it takes to be the Business woman. For all those aspects I am grateful and blessed. They drive me to be my whole-self and to put all that into what is meaningful to me and to create something that lives on as meaningful to others.

grainy photo of days gone bye.

Today the memories of my father lead me to the thoughts of another man. My dear Uncle Frank, my mother’s eldest brother..

Uncle Frank, a father of five, was the only person to ever wash my mouth out with soap ( Irish Spring -no less!). He had stopped by my mother’s house to visit us and say hi. While he was there I was being unruly and sass talking my mother telling her to shut-up.

All while laughing and making his actions seem playful in front of Mom - he enlisted my sister to fetch a bar of soap, wrestled me over his lap and shoved that bar of soap in there- getting me real good.. it took me hours to brush the soap out of my teeth! I was so mad- mad at him, mad at my mom for letting it happen. When Mom asked him about it- he stated that didn’t know it had actually gotten in my mouth…- yea- right! But between he and I knew he meant to do it. I deserve it, and I learned from it. I was reminded that yea- I can act like that, be out of control and have no self-discipline, but at the end of the day-it’s only going to leave the bad taste of my actions in My mouth.

Today is a sad day, we have to let Uncle Frank go. A victim of the terrible disease sweeping our world, Uncle Frank has been on life support for too long. Not the quality of life this man or anyone deserves. Surrounded spiritually by his friends and family that have been blessed to have him in our lives we let him go to be with his wife Dear Aunt Sandy.

These memories of yesterday-year are what shape the Artists in the world and these are just some of the things that shape my work. The work that I am so blessed to share with you all. I have noticed some of my work becoming “tighter” more disciplined over the last couple of years. This is the direct result of pulling these memories together and making sense of them all. Using the sink or swim message from some of the meaningful men in my life and putting all the beauty of life into something tangible.

To my dad and to Uncle Frank.. thank you.