dadadad – sea.ess.em.jay

You have led me home and you’re not even here.

Dear Dadadadad.

The gulf of time between us is now pre-teen. An expanse of ocean, wisdom and moments all wrapped up in the grandchild you only held once sits before me. She speaks, she reads, she thinks, she grows. And just as she levels up in height, years and age, so too does the space of time since I last squeezed your hand. As her life measures and moves, so too does this space between us. She is a glorious reminder of how far above us you watch, and how much more life continues.

I told myself last year that I wouldn’t write to you this year. That ten years was enough – I needed to let go now. But someone close to me reminded me that I have let you go – I let you go before you went, in fact. The thing is, I don’t have to stop writing to you. There is no statute of limitations on this, and I can write to you and the UM a million-billion times more if I want to. Sometimes I want to, sometimes I don’t want to.

You are still a force to be reckoned with. Yesterday, as she and I were playing a game of Scrabble Dash (you would love it!), I had to play a proper noun and your name formed out of my available letters. She stopped, looked at it and smiled. I stopped, smiled and played my turn. I won that game, but she went on to defeat me in three more. There, right there, you were a force to be reckoned with. You’d find this hilarious.

As a family, we play another game – Rummikub. It’s not one I played as a child, but it’s become one of our Sunday evening family favourites here. I win, a lot, but not enough to lose my humility on it. I’m being kept on my toes here. No idea where these people get it from (spoiler alert: I know it’s you).

We play a lot of table, board and card games here – I think you’d like that about my little triangular family. I think you’d love our dogs too – Jake mostly. He’s your type of hound, while Zoey is the cute yet feisty sort that barks more than she should. I think you’d love them. I hope you would. You’d laugh at how they rule the roost round here. Sometimes, in my woowoohead mind, I think Jake learnt to look at me from you – the way he looks at me like I’m the most ridiculous person he’s ever clapped eyes on – it’s that same expression you’d give me over your glasses. I laugh when it happens.

Dadadad, I’ve not written to you to tell you that I’m getting married. I did, to Mom, but not to you. So, if you wouldn’t mind pitching up round then, it’d be great. I need a dance and someone to march me down the aisle. I’ve got the spot filled already, but if you’d like me to ask them to step aside, just yell and I’ll sort it out. I know he’d agree with me entirely if you suddenly just pitched up. He reminds me more and more of you each day, as I watch him parent a family too. Can I just borrow you and mom for one day, though? Just one. You guys can carry on and have the rest, promise. Heck, I’ll take an afternoon, sunny or not.

(But yes, really. I retract the one-sided argument I tried to have with you about this in 2001. Also, you were right on that whole honey thing. Also the freshly mown grass and the way people smell like home, even when they’ve irritated you to the point of grimace. That waking up in the morning and it’s okay again. It’s funny how I knew. Thank you for telling me how to spot it. I’d probably have missed it entirely, were it not for the roadmap you laid out for me. It has led me home. You have led me home, even when you’re not here).

Dadadadadadad, you’d love this part. The craziness, the noise, the quiet and the soft comfort of a house that’s funny in so many ways. I want to be able to write you into these days – the easy ones and the hard ones, and insert your voice into these conversations. I like to think I don’t have to, because the voice of you still booms across the sky of my life. You’re in the clack of my keys as I type too fast and mutter as I have to backspace the entire word to correct it…because that’s how we do it round here. You’d know.

I miss you forever, plus one. Just one afternoon? See what you can do. Surely you can grab an afternoon after eleven years of good behaviour (oh wait, good behaviour? Hahahahaha). If you can’t make it, just send the feathers. I’ll know.

Keyboard clacks, whisky and eleven full years of this,

eightyone.

Dear Dadadadad,

It was your birthday yesterday, and I had to skip writing you a letter because my eyeballs were square from working most of the weekend and spending a tonne of time poring my strength into words for other people.

But, today, as I sit here on the precipice of my tether, with minimal sleep, a furrowed forehead and well, really, what else can I do today, except write to you?

You’d have turned 81 yesterday, and I ponder at the gigantic nature of that number. It seems ginormous and almost unattainable to me. Yet, I do know people who have gone far beyond 81.

This month has been difficult for me. It’s felt like an obstacle barrage, never mind a course. But, there is sunshine in the spots where I know I can go to. There is peace in the places that I have come to rely on. And, Dad, I know I can rely on, and not in that half-a-toe-in-maybe-I-might-have-to-escape-them-one-day way.

But, as is the way with this time of year and me, I know it’s coming. I thought I’d been able to skip past it at one point, but then it all really came at me like an arrow. So, I plod on.

By the way, I’m done complaining now.

Do you remember how you used to hang on to this photo? I remember having to rush off and get a copy made at the office, so you could keep the original by you, all the time.

I wanted to say thank you for that. I don’t think I did at the time and, in the hurly burly chaos of everything that came afterwards, I don’t think I really got to the chance to. We were lucky, you and I, because we got to spend all that time together, and you even came with me for one of my final scans (having everything happen in the same hospital works, hey?). I loved that we got that time together, especially because we both knew (and aptly avoided talking about…) that we wouldn’t get the time after.

What it did, Dad, was imbue a sense of you into the after. Yes, genetically, that happens anyway, but it has served to create a bond that can’t be seen. Your name will come up in conversation and your grandchild #1 will say “you know, he used to help people” or “yes, he had very tough hair” or (my personal favourite) “my mom says he used to eat her toes” (I’ve long since been able to convince her that you never actually chewed on them, although, for a while there, she did think that toes could be eaten and would grow back).

My point, Dad, is that you’re not here. I can miss you, write to you and wish for you, but none of that will change the fact that I cannot call you up and bore you with one of my stories, or make you eat 25 servings of macaroni cheese, just to be funny.

But I can, and do, still find you.

Dadadadad, happy birthday. I hope the whiskey was fab and the dancing girls (family joke) limber.

Seven Years.

Dear Dad,

Seven years. My daughter has grown from a mewing infant into the tall, gregarious child I see before me as I type this. In the same time that her life has progressed, your life with us has been over.

There have been a million times I’ve wished for you, wanted you or needed to hear your voice. I have craved your guidance, your support and your love. I’ve wondered out loud if you know anything that’s happened and, sometimes, in my happiest and weakest moments, I’ve hoped you were watching. I’ll never know whether you are or not but I have felt my heart come home when I remember something you once told me.

One evening over books and tea, I had my feet tucked under yours as usual, we talked about life, the universe and everything in-between. You expounded upon your own theory of how life carries on once someone passes on. To you, people carry on through their genes and the funny quirks we all inherit from our parents. You said it was like your DNA left a trail that muted over time, but was always there. Even when generations have passed and children grown, the faintest trace of your genetic code lives on within the generations beyond you.

It is this very theory, and the thinking over it, that’s drawn me to a place where I am okay today. It’s strange that as the years have passed, I’ve seen your theory come true. And that evidence has given me comfort.

When you were ill, you would keep a picture of one of my baby scans next to you, at home or in the hospital. You’d refer to Cam as “your little friend”, and you’d tell me that she was the future and that’s all I needed to worry about. We’d talk about it and I’d tell you I was scared of this parenting notion. You’d remind me that a child needs four things – good health, infinite love, the ability to trust and the opportunity to learn. I’d doubted myself then but, you believed in me. You believed in my motherhood more than I did and you trusted that I’d do it with love. You taught me what you could and told me to go with my gut when I didn’t know what to do.

I have missed you most in my motherhood. I have missed you most in my family life. The family life I have been lucky enough to be able to build, with love and memories being made every day. It is those times, over dinner or when the house is full of people and sounds suspiciously like a Jenkin household, that I wish you and Mom could witness. I wish you could be there and laugh with me. Smile with me. Squeeze my hand and tell me you see it and it’s wonderful. Marvel with me over how I got so ridiculously lucky to find love in a man who loves Cam and I as though we were made for it. Laugh with me over the times I’ve been confused and wound myself up inside my head. Berate me for my sometimes grumpiness and celebrate with me every time I got it right.

But there again, I find my comfort. I see you carry on in the expressions of my child. I see your toes in her toes. They’re the same shape. I see your hands in her hands. And that mischievous glint in her eye just before she pulls a prank on me (this happens often), that glint is the very same one you’d have when you were pulling my proverbial leg.

They say it takes twenty-one days to break a habit, thirteen months to grieve and seven years to digest chewing gum. Whether any of that is true, I have no idea. It is also said that it takes seven years to work through the loss of a loved one. Whether or not this is true, I don’t really care.

But what I do know is this… In these seven years, I have missed you. In these seven years I have built my life up, taken it all down, started again and made it better. In these seven years I have grown, been anxious, been scared, been amazed and been sad. In these seven years I have learnt friendship and trust. In these seven years I have hurtled through loss and fallen into love. In these seven years I have missed your speeches and pored over finding the right words to say them myself. In these seven years I have been able to move beyond feeling the loss of you, to feeling the part of you that carries on. In these seven years I have learnt to see it when it’s in front of me, and find it when it hides. In these seven years I have discovered the parts of me that are so typically you, and seen those same characteristics of you reflected in my siblings.

In these seven years I have seen you carry on in the eyes of my daughter and I’ve noticed a spark of you in my nieces. I’ve seen your tenacity in myself and I’ve felt the infinite love of a parent in my own heart. In these seven years I’ve learnt that the cornerstone of being a parent is that infinite love. In these seven years I’ve learnt that the cornerstone of being myself is found in the places and spaces where I am ultimately much like you.

So Dadadadadad, I guess what I’m saying is…

Your theory is correct.

And my life is the proof.

Thank you.

You see, the thing is.

Dear Dadadadad

Wow. Four years, hey? Beans on toast. I didn’t think I’d get this far. And, weirdly, this is the year I felt the most okay, and the most not okay.

If I could name for you the myriad of times where I’ve wanted you to just appear and say “hey, duckie, just tell me about it”, and I could splurge and write and draw things on serviettes, and you would understand, I would. I would pick out the days on the calendar and say:

“this one. right here. you should’ve been there”.

That sounds angry. It’s not. It’s just me still missing you when life kicks me in the ass.

If I could name for you the myriad of times this past year that you would be so proud of. The days and times when I could stomp your toe and phone you, too excited to speak and bubbling forth with ideas and plans and undeniable joy, I would.

I’d pick out that same calendar, and ring those days in green and say,

“Dad, these are the days you would have lit cigars for me”.

But, I’m making it. I’m making it because, for the first time, I think I have an idea of how to.

Most of all, there are days where I just want to pick up that proverbial dog ‘n bone and tell you a funny story, read you something that made me laugh all the way through. How I really think you’d be a total Twitter/Facebook/YouTube/LinkedIn addict.

Does that make any sense?

I don’t just miss you when I’m sad, Dad. I miss you when I’m shining brightly too.

I want to sit you down, with a cup of painter’s sweet tea and tell you about how Cameron can count to twenty and how I’m convinced NBJ is just like me when I was little, and how KJ is so inquisitive and curious it drives her parents mad sometimes. I want to tell you about their school, their lives and how they are so, so, so full of love for every moment.

You have three girl grandchildren, Dad. Three. Yes, I know, we’ve bulk ordered cannons and we have alerted the world to watch out for this lot. I truly believe they’re going to change the world. You should know, you’re their Grandpa. You know how your dynasty, quite frankly, rolls.

I want to tell you about the Ugly Sister and how she’s flourishing. Doing really well, but at the same time working so freaking hard. She loves it, every moment of the insanity. Just like me.

I want to tell you about the Dickie Darling and how he’s a Dad, just like you. Ever-present and never afraid to make a complete tit out of himself, just to hear the tinkle of his children’s sweet laughter. How he listens. The way he listens, Dad, it’s like you’re listening.

I want to tell you about how much I lean on my other sister. How much we talk, how much I know that I am so glad she is, literally, my Ali/Ally (and there she thought it was just a nickname!) in this parenting parade. And just how much she loves your son. She would do anything in the world for him, and she loves him like people should love. Without fear. Without limit. And because of that, how she loves each and every one of us, just the same way.

I want to tell you about the UM and how stubborn she is. Still. How stubborn and yet so in touch with her children’s dreams. How much she really does write now that she can get to the computer, and her stories, all funny or sad, and how she tells them. How she worries about us. How much I get her now, because so often I see her in myself.

I want to tell you about me. About how in all that seems insane, I feel more grounded. I feel like I know what I’m doing. Bet you never, ever thought I’d say that. But, it’s true. For the first time in my life, I really feel like I know what I’m doing. How I’m brave, when it would be so much easier to be a coward. And how every night when I put Cameron to bed, I think, man you’d love this part, right here. With the night-time cuddles, storytime and fiddling around looking for the right bunny to sleep with. You’d love that part, right there.

I want to tell you about how I think that if you were alive, you’d be a phenomenal grandpa. Full of stories and your listening to their laughter. How I wish life could have given you more time with the troupe we all now call “our girls”.

It’s not easy, Dad. And it’s not grown any easier as each year has passed. How disappointed I have been, and how excited I have been. I look back and I understand why you would tell me that every sadness and every smile is just another thread in my carpet of life. How each and every one brings it more to life, and how each and every colour makes it more than it was before.

I hope you’re proud Dadadad. I hope I make you proud.

I miss you, in the way that I know you’re only person who could ever call me this and get away with it,

Cathy.

Rules For Living Cath

After I eventually fell asleep last night (i chilled on the couch, watched a lot of television…) I had the most.random.but.vivid.dream.

It was, however, divine. I was at home, the original one, and clearly someone, somewhere, thought I needed a chat. This dream left me smiling. I woke up after it and wrote down some notes (circa 4am today) and I thought I’d write it up here.

Random, I tell you.

I was sat at home, the house I grew up in, and my Dad walked into my bedroom. I must have been a teenager though, because I remember turning around and saying “what!?”, whilst flinging a smoke out the window (they knew I smoked, it was okay but hey, I was angsty, what can i say? heh). And he said, clear as day I can still hear him in my head now:

“We need to talk about the rules. I think you have forgotten them”

The next thing, we were sat at the dining room table, tea, smokes, papers everywhere, and the big green glass ashtray circa 1973 and is very gorge and retro… He was wearing his cable-stitch jersey and it’s so weird yet comforting…he had his finger on his nose, holding his glasses, in the thinking position, that I know I do too.

And he showed me this piece of paper that said:

“Rules for Living Cath”.

They were scrawled out on the assignment paper I used to have to use for those bloody assignments for University. Weirdly, though, they were written in my ‘anal’ writing. The one I reserved for trying to be neat, back in the day of school and institutional learning and, let’s not fool ourselves okes, bunking lectures to watch movies.

Somehow, though, I know that some of it was talked about in this dream-conversation and other points were written down.

Anyway, here’s what my notes said this morning.

I’ve just noticed now, not that it surprises me, that there are twelve points.

1. Speak your mind. Even if your voice shakes. Somewhere, someone, someday, will listen.

2. Have good friends.

3. Love at all times. The hardest of these is to love yourself.

4. Noone can make you feel inferior without your consent. One day, you’ll realise this and stop giving your consent.

5. Listening is a lot harder than talking.

6. Laugh as much as you can. Try harder to laugh at yourself.

7. Walking. You were born disco-ordinated (emphasis on the disco). So, it’s right, left, right, left. Keep up, you’re doing well.

8. Never settle. yes, I know it’s tempting, but don’t settle. Compromise, in your experience thus far, has led you to screw yourself up. Don’t do it.

9. The moment someone demands you apologise for being you, stop feeling guilty about walking away from them.

10. Pets are for life. So are people.

11. When you die, nobody is really going to care if you ordered your wardrobe by colour.

12. Keep writing. Something’s coming.

I have a lot of gratitude this morning. And a lot of peace within. Thank you Dadadadad.

oh. one more thing.

something my father did, sticks with me daily.

especially when i write something that could be construed as controversial.

he would always point a book out to me, the title of which has always strengthened me.

so this is my middle-finger-in-text-format to people who may not like what i write, for whatever their reasons.

i write what i like – steve biko.

oh, and a comment from my friend and compadre superperson Glugster below:

“I read what I like” – Glugster

If people don’t like what you write, then they should not read it. God, I hate dumb people.

12 July 2008

Dear Dadadad

It’s been three years, since them angels came and took you away to play chess with Ivor and ask all the angel waitresses – “is the kettle broken, duckie?”

I see Tabitha now sat beside you, on the arm of your chair, as it always was, and always should be. My two familiars together and watching over us.

What’s happened, Dadadadad? Where did life begin to speed up so fast? Was there a corner turned or intersection crossed that I don’t remember flying by? I know I’ve started to grow up, not just in this skin, but in this head too. Finally, I hear you sigh. Hehe.

Every day I look at the people around me and see how blessed I am. And how hard I have worked to be here. And how it just makes me want to work harder.

To work harder at work, work harder at life, work harder at being a mommy, and most of all, work harder at being just me. You always said that was enough. Enough for me, enough for you, enough for them, and that if it was not enough for the world, I should just ignore the world and carry on.

I’m carrying on, Dadadadad. I have felt defeated and broken and shitty, to be frank. There have been many days when I have wanted to sit across from you at the diningroom table, sunlight streaming in through the windows behind you (you do realise, we never, ever got around to putting the curtains back up after we came back from George hey? haha) and talk about everything and nothing. To drink tea, play cards, smoke and pontificate, interrupted only by cats and food and peebreaks. Peebreaks. You taught me that word.

The house, Dadadad, it’s gone and different now. I know you are not within there. I have felt you beyond it since you left us. I know you watch over it, and are happy that the UM set herself free from it. New beginnings. I worry you think we’d forget you, you and your “i am just a mushroom in the dark” mentality. We have not. In everything we do, every day, we remember you.

When I sit here, in this yellow-walled office, behind my laptop and type, smacking the keyboard, I think of you. Think of you, and waking up at 2am to hear you smacking that keyboard. Working towards doing something good in the world, helping someone. Hoping that you’re helping someone, somewhere. I have that same drive. Every time I turn this monster on, I think two things “oh crikey, more email” and “I want to do one good thing for someone today. if i can just do that, i know i’m okay”.

I’ll never be able to thank you and hate you enough for that drive – the drive that you and Mum imbued in each of us. The drive to help, to assist, to aid, to, as it’s called “hold hands”. And in all the noise and chaos and craziness, I know we are all holding hands, somehow, even when we’re shouting at each other.

I’d like to tell you about your grandchildren. I am sure you look at those three girls, and think “oh boy, in eighteen years’ time, i wish you lot luck”. You’d be right.

Cameron is phenomenal. She talks and talks and talks (no idea where she gets that from) and is so honest in her feelings, and expressing them. There was a moment this morning, we were having our morning cuddle, and I thought of you. You’d love morning cuddle. Sometimes I think you are watching us and cuddling too. If there is one thing Cameron has inherited directly from you, it’s her ability to hug and love without inhibition. You always gave the best hugs, and now I get them from Cameron. Thank you.

N-B is growing so quickly, and is the proudest big sister of all time. She’s responsible and caring, and above all things, is passionate. She dives into everything and is not afraid to try anything once, twice and three times if it makes her smile. She is always smiling and is so, so funny. I like to think, she gets her ability to smile all the time from you. No matter what, you always had a smile for us. Thank you.

K-J is just beginning to grow, and I hear very well indeed. When I held her, I felt that extreme peace you always spoke of, when you hold someone that is related to you. That is your family. Her little fingers reminded me of the fragility of life, and the wonder of the world through a newborn’s eyes. My brother, your son, is the proudest and most wonderful father. When I see him, he reminds me more and more of you. Strong and clear and profoundly in the moment. You were so, so right when you said that R and A had the strongest marriage, through thick and thin and inbetween. You were right, I can only think that they learnt from the best.

Sam was just here recently. One thing I can definitely say, is that she got the snore from you 😉 No, really, my sister is just like me it scares me. Just more bravely so. Unforgivingly so. And yet, so much of a soft heart. But, bloody hell, I would not want to meet her in the wrong end of a dark alleyway, if you know what I mean.

The UM. The UM is so graceful. She always has been, in a particular way, hey? Sure, we all know about the ability to throw stuff in the faces of pigs (we all have that ability!) but, with such grace. As I grow up, and keep moving, I see mom’s grace and am inspired. She is happy in her new abode, and I think she loves the way the sun moves its way across the rooms. She always was a sucker for sunlight. I get that from her, I know.

Dadadad, I miss you. I miss sitting on the lawn and talking. In our house, we were always talking, even when we didn’t want to talk to each other. Teehee Teehee. I wonder what you’d think about so much, but I feel your gentle guidance always. You are in everything I do, see. When I work, I know my drive to work is genetic. When I love, i know my unashamed love is purely part of me. When I live, in every second, I know I alive because of the life you gave me. Even when I am sad, I know I am not alone.

You taught me how important people are, and to always remember to honour them, and I try my best to. I look around me at the people I am surrounded by, and I know they are good, and strong, and there. Every day, I hope I do enough back. I know your opinion on this already though, and theirs too. I am very, very blessed indeed, and yes, I “have good friends”.

Dadadadad, I hope you are good. All-round good, and that the chelsea buns are fresh and that you have no need or desire to watch the laundry spin round the washing machine. Only you would understand that reference.

Dadadad, I must end off now. You are in my heart, my hands and my home. Always.

For you today…

My Inheritance – CSMJ

Someone once asked me, what will your parents leave you when they have gone away to heaven?

I had no answer.

The truth is:

nothing.

They’ve given it to me already.

You gave me life. Was that not enough?

Apparently not.

You have in my life
(as little and as short as it has been thus far…)
taught me so much.

The way I detail things intimately and fully.
The way I exclaim with joy or scream with anger.
The way I can swing from happy to sorrowful in a moment.
The way I love and hate in complete ways.
The way I love the little things.
The way my happiness abounds when I am joyful.
The way my sorrow is overwhelming when I am sad.
The way my hair grows, my funny toes.
The way I talk with my hands.
The way I stare off into space when I think.
The way I laugh wholeheartedly.
The way I like to do things properly or not at all.
The way I like everyone to listen to me when I speak.
The way I grin when I’ve succeeded.
The way I moan when I have made a mistake.

The way I write things.

one day til

tomorrow will be a hard day. im musing on this.

in the meantime, for my siblings and my mama, and mostly for the man i miss the most. Dadadadadad.

because whenever I hear this song, I think of you, and I am strong enough to carry on without you to phone every day, because you are always with me, throwing feathers my way and boiling that kettle. X

SOTD – the black parade – my chemical romance

When I was a young boy,
My father took me into the city
To see a marching band.
He said,
“Son when you grow up, will you be the saviour of the broken,
The beaten and the damned?”
He said
“Will you defeat them, your demons, and all the non believers, the plans that they have made?”
Because one day I leave you,
A phantom to lead you in the summer,
To join the black parade.”

When I was a young boy,
My father took me into the city
To see a marching band.
He said,
“Son when you grow up, will you be the saviour of the broken,
The beaten and the damned?”

Sometimes I get the feeling she’s watching over me.
And other times I feel like I should go. Through it all, the rise and fall, the bodies in the streets.
When you’re gone we want you all to know We’ll Carry on,
We’ll Carry on
Though your dead and gone believe me Your memory will carry on
Carry on
We’ll carry on
And in my heart I cant contain it
The anthem wont explain it.

And we will send you reeling from decimated dreams
Your misery and hate will kill us all
So paint it black and take it back
Lets shout it loud and clear
Do you fight it to the end
We hear the call to
To carry on
We’ll carry on
Though your dead and gone believe me Your memory will carry on
We’ll carry on
And though you’re broken and defeated You’re weary widow marches on

And on we carry through the fears
Ooh oh ohhhh
Disappointed faces of your peers Ooh oh ohhhh
Take a look at me cause
I could not care at all Do or die
You’ll never make me
Cause the world, will never take my heart
You can try, you’ll never break me
Want it all,
I’m gonna play this part
Wont explain or say i’m sorry
I’m not ashamed,
I’m gonna show my scar
You’re the chair, for all the broken Listen here, because it’s only..
I’m just a man,
I’m not a hero
Just a boy, who’s meant to sing this song
Just a man,
I’m not a hero
I — don’t — care
Carry on
We’ll carry on
Though your dead and gone believe me Your memory will carry on
We’ll carry on
And though you’re broken and defeated You’re weary widow marches on
We’ll carry on
We’ll carry on
We’ll carry on
We’ll carry
We’ll carry on

emo phases.

it’s an emo cath week, this week. this week marks three years of missing someone, see?

(note – being emo does not mean im not happy. i just feel affected more by things, and like to hide out a bit and be glummo. its allowed, and normal, you know)

peppered with outbursts and crying and missing people.

specifically, though, this week means change. it always means change.

and so the changes have presented themselves.

emo week, phase 1, means realising change is coming and loathing it.

emo week, phase 2, means getting up and doing something about it.

emo week, phase 3, means hoping like hell a plan works out.

emo week, phase 4, is having the phone put down on me (yeah, that rocked. not).

emo week, phase 5, is when I write something and publish it and hope like hell i did you justice.

but for now, we’re in phase 3. and i am still wordless and wondering. but, im okay. promise.

So, i’ll leave it to Dylan Thomas because, if i think of you, I think of mom and you and Under Milk Wood on LP.

Do not go gentle into that good night – Dylan Thomas

Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

And you, my father, there on the sad height,
Curse, bless me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

random

my mum just dropped off some of my things she uncovered whilst unpacking after her great move.

in it is a scrapbook of birthday cards and letters and faxes (i forgot how much my family used to FAX each other. no pun intended there, really).

I found a birthday card from Karen! OMG!

And many from my family, still with my Dadadadad’s writing on them.

Some from my Grandfather Len. Still with his writing on them. I lived for those cards some years.

And then, one from Aunty Fay.

And it struck me. Aunty Fay is my Godmother.

I have no idea where she is.