Some family tales are not stories as much as they are embellished non-fiction shaped by archetypes and character studies. It isn’t always the spoken words that are relevant, but the unspoken history shared by the orator and the audience. Without the history, it is more difficult to discern whether the action is predictable, ironic or just plain dark.

My grandmother’s hands resemble lengths of knotted rope. They have looked that way as far back as I can remember. Frayed with age, swollen knuckles comically out of proportion to otherwise slender digits. It’s amazing they remain capable of grasping at straws much less fastening the clasp of a shiny bauble, but like others marked by the Great Depression, she persists. I’m not sure if it is the hardship that fueled her or a sour feistiness that sometimes impairs her ability to see beyond the current moment.

After my Grandfather passed away, she continued living alone, tackling day to day tasks, occasionally interrupted by moments of shear madness.

Once, when she was unable to to turn the lever of the can opener, she reached for a old fashioned meat cleaver, one of the few relics remaining from grandfather’s career as a butcher, and brought the blade crashing down on a can of corn. There was corn on the counter. The floor. The ceiling. A single serving remaining in the bottom of the can. Maybe it was a fit of madness, or the realization of being alone after more than fifty years of co-dependency marriage. Either way, the roots of impetuosity were deep.

After an unwelcome encounter with a rodent, she took the offensive. She tried a traditional approach and purchased a package of spring-loaded mousetraps. She set a few, but manipulating the spring with her gnarled fingers was difficult, so she opted for sticky strips.

One mouse foiled by the adhesive strip, was caught by his back foot..When she she saw her trophy, she just couldn’t bare “to let the little fellow suffer any longer”. So she put on her garden gloves, picked up the trap, mouse dangling upside down by a single limb, and beat him to a bloody pulp against the side of her house.

The award for stating the obvious? I haz earned it.

My mom was kind enough to save the watches I had as a teenager. It looks like someone was overcompensating in the accessory department. Apparently this is an unfortunate sided-effect of never having your ears pierced. I’m not sure if I qualified as a geek or a nerd, but classification is rarely so simplistic.

There were other more vanilla watches during that time, two Fossils, a
Bulova, and countless throw away digitals, all too scratched up to justify a second life. Looking back, I’m not sure if the obsession was related to fashion or existentialism. Now, I tend to wish time would go ahead and pass already.

In the spirit of the Hemingway Challenge.

Broken watch.
Time stands
Still indefinitely.

******
Stereotypical desires can manifest in non-stereotypical ways. Take the biological clock. I have one. I know I have one. What I don’t have, is the desire to care for a helpless little being that leaks, cries and remains unswayed by pragmatism. Yet there is a clock, and my inability to hear the faint ticking doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist, only that I exercise selective hearing.

*****

He asked if it was my biological clock, but I couldn’t be properly indignant about his assertion because I had already asked myself that question. It wasn’t THE reason, but I can’t say it was void of influence. I’m not so arrogant as to dismiss things I do not understand.

The other reasons, the certain ones I understood. I thought it would give me a feeling of purpose. I thought it would provide a catalyst to get out more. I thought it would be socially acceptable focus that would reduce my preoccupation with the inconsequential things spinning around in my head.

So, we rescued a dog, a ten month old Australian Shepherd mix. She is housebroken, intelligent, sociable, and cat tolerant. Hopefully she will make a good hiking partner after obedience training.

Poetry Friday is good for me, even though my grasp of words and acceptable language arrangement is frequently dismal. It gives me a challenge to be a better me once a week. Some people need a moderate sense of structure in their lives to feel purposeful, and I am one of those people.

I’m not so rigid that I plan out my entire life on a day planner and bristle at the thought of grocery shopping on a non-designated day, but I do like knowing that I will go to yoga on Monday and Wednesday, and workout three times a week. These are self-involved task, but they help me feel I am progressing toward something rather than miring myself in inertia.

It felt weird not posting something for Poetry Friday, so here is a small panel painting. It’s a reflection in the outdoor water feature at the Chicago Art Institute, one of my favorite museums to visit.

Untitled
Oil on Panel
7″ x 5.75″

The following are pictures of frozen blackberries. Each year, I freeze them so I can cook black and blue muffins (combination muffins with blackberries and blueberries) at will, rather than waiting for them to be in season during the summer months.

Macro shots taken with my cell phone’s 3.2 megapixel camera.

The Spouse and I sometimes take photos of ourselves like this:

It’s interesting to observe our likenesses and dissimilarities. When I gaze at our shadows, he doesn’t seem as tall, but my hips seem unpleasantly accurate..

Sometimes it feels like humanity pays more attention to the shadows people cast that it does to the people themselves. Our brains can get wrapped around the axle of a distorted two-dimensional impression we get of a person, rather than considering the depth and complexity of their entire person. Easily digested impressions require less interaction, and releases us from the obligation to engage ourselves.

The past few years I have been more intrigued by soft shadows. Often these are cast through organic objects like trees or plants. The distance from the light source to the subject lends itself to softer edges which deemphasize the representation of the object and leave behind an abstract dreaminess. An example:

These photos are the basis for a series of abstract paintings. The resulting execution resembles little evidence of the original concept, but the dreaminess remains largely intact.

Untitled
Oil on Panel
7″ x 5.75″

Pen & Ink, Marker, and Colored Pencil

When my brother and his wife concluded their family was complete, it was decided that he would go under the knife and take one for the team. Although he is embedded in the DIY culture, my brother concluded decommissioning the family jewels was a task best left to a professional. The professional solicited was not as experienced in vasectomies as he was in blood pressure cuffs and the results left my brother feeling more sore during the recovery process than is typical for this routine procedure.

While seated ever so delicately watching television, his rambunctious two-year-old son stepped on his swollen sac escalating his discomfort level to unbearable. Since his doctor failed to prescribe any painkillers, he resorted to self-preservation and raided the kid’s medicine cabinet. The only pain medication available was a liquid prescribed for an ear ache. He self-medicated directly from the bottle, thoughtfully ignoring dosage recommendations.

As he stood up, a few minutes later, the combined effects of codeine and an empty stomach caused him to pass out and fall back onto the sofa. Petrified, my SIL called 911, and then hung up before speaking with the operator because he regained consciousness. 911 called back before dispatching assistance and scolded her for not staying on the line.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone and if you don’t celebrate, then Happy Saturday!

Mixed Media: ink, marker and colored pencil