day 2

i miss my grandparents.

not too long ago i was driving by where my grandfather lived in retirement before he passed away and i wanted to badly to swing by and sit with him for a bit.

it made me think of their old house in sugartree. growing up i always wondered where the name came from...but i always felt important as we drove into the gated neighborhood and my dad would tell the gate guard "john brackin going to see dr. brackin" and the guy would write something down on a clipboard and check our plates and wave us through. it felt so super exclusive. i think going through the gate made me feel a big like a long lost celebrity.

it was alway one of my favorite parts of visiting them.

i miss gammy too.

going to their old house was quite the opposite but i only realize this later in life as i now think like an adult.

they lived in a more affordable down to earth part of the world. but at times their house felt richer...

their were cardboard boxes full of dress up clothes and make up and my sister and cousin kelly and i would dive into it with gusto.

later when i was a counselor at camp marymount i brought along dress up clothes and some of the other counselors looked at me as though i was from another planet...but my campers wore the dress up clothes out.

when i was at gammy and rays i was never bored though i don't remember there being many toys.

i loved their backyard and that is where my strongest memories lie.

i played in and out of trees and leaved and collected rocks and acorns and played pretend games with my sister and cousins though i have plenty of memories of playing all on my own.

i did have a healthy imagination for pretend when i was younger.

i already see it some in my son and only hope that it grows. i'm so glad to give him a sister to play with.

i hope they are as close as my sister and i when we were kids. we have grown into very different adults but i will always treasure memories of the good times we had. we fought sure...but when push came to shove we needed each other...

joel and his sister were also close and still are...i do envy that they can still foster their friendship in ways my sister and i seem to have lost.

back to my gammy.

she was a painter...and i thought she was the greatest painter who lived.

her death was so dramatic in my memory.

so much fell apart then

i was at an awkward age to be dealing with a close death...it never really left me.

i am reading "lovely bones" again and there is a part where as the main character is dying she brushes past someone as she is leaving and that person is forever haunted by her passing...can't seem to get away from it...

i felt that way about my grandmother for a long time.

part of me wonders if she dropped in on me in my sleep for a goodbye and that feeling lingered forever.

death is a funny thing. its often the cause of loss of faith as well as people reaching out desperately for it.

goodbyes aren't as hard if they aren't for forever after all..

well...i am in need of getting ready for work.

heres to a blog that i NEEDED to be public...but yet...it feels so private....