Beyond the image.
hiya. :)
Veterans day was the definition of lazy in every sense of the word. So much so that if I attempted to go into details about it you'd promptly fall asleep. I speak truth. While up there however, surrounded by my quirky mother in my crazed grandma's house, I couldn't help but laugh. My grandma is the type of person who freezes butter, gives people towels for Christmas and when naming her cat, got confused and accidentally did it after the mouse in Stuart Little, not the cat. It's not like Stuart ever listens anyways (stingy, rigid bugger), but a part of me secretly wonders if it's because deep inside he knows he was named after the "much less superior animal" he typically feasts upon (those words in quotations being his own). And my Mom? The type of woman who won't pick up a call from a number she doesn't know in fear of a tax invasion, buys an expensive MP3 player and asks I only put twenty specific songs on it (Mom, I could of just burned you a cd or two with these on it?.. Sara, don't argue with me!) and that has saved every single newspaper clipping (it's amounted to THOUSANDS) she has acquired in the past thirty years that she fancied.. no matter how much the times and practices has changed. They're both kooky, old fashioned, paranoid, dorky nut cases and when I try and inject a drop of sense into the madness, am promptly dismissed as somehow not getting it. It's a sightly, eye rolling, amusing laughter fest when I enter that household.
On Sunday however, my grandma did something that caught me by surprise. She took up painting a few years ago.. many of her master pieces coming out tragic at best and as they've been pawned off to various cousins, none of us have had the heart to say no. One of my favorite "oh gosh, did she really?" moments was the one she gifted Ryan and Jess with as their wedding present. I've no idea if the explanation I'm about to give for it will -ever- do it justice, but it was of a Mountain Lion stoically placed upon a tree branch that we assumed was somewhere back where we grew up in Mt. Charleston, Nevada. A freakin' mountain lion. The one animal we feared MOST up there as we madly ran about those hills she painted for Jessica and Ryan on their wedding. Nothing pretty, joyful, hopeful or with peace.. a monstrous lion of DOOM painted upon a canvas to watch their every move. Bless Jess and Ryan for having the grace to thank her for it.. because deep inside I was having to control my every move in hopes of not breaking indefinitely with laughter. I love the woman.. she's just insanely insane in more ways than I can count. I'd say her other creations have been much hopeful.. however I'd be lying. :X Later on Jess, Ryan and I were all able to openly laugh about it and I wouldn't doubt if it went to thus hang in their garage from then on out.
A few years ago, we lost two pieces of our lives that meant very much to us. Our childhood dogs, Bernie and Griff, were taken away from us due to Cancer. Big, lovable, Bernese Mountain Dogs, they were a rock I knew I could always to turn in my childhood. As my parent's divorced and I came to be the only child living with my Mom, they were both my friends and also filled the void of not having my siblings near. I loved those dogs with everything I had. When my Mom first moved back to Canada, she took them along with her. Above all else they had always been her's and as she moved away from us, would come to soon also replace the void of not having her children near her. I'm not sure if it was the drastic change in weather or lifestyle, but soon after they were both struck with illness (however they weren't that old). My Mom took it very, very, very hard and to this day still has a rough time thinking about it or getting another dog. One Christmas I tracked down a night light that when lit, glowed with an image of two Bernese Mountain dogs in their remembrance and when she first plugged it in, she began to cry. In so many ways Bernie and Griff weren't just dogs to us-- it was our family that we lost.
As I walked into my Mom's on Sunday, hand's full with bags stuffed to the brim with her (my Mom's) continual requests from the states, I looked to my right upon entering and something caused me to stop. Setting down the bags and coming closer, my heart leaped into my throat. Above the front room's sofa there was a painting hung. Within a rocky, wooded setting (no, it wasn't another mountain lion :), green bristlecones like those back home and jutting grayed mountains in the distance, there lied two dogs. Marks above their eyes and tongues askew, Bernie and Griff sat there looking back at me. Posed next to each other and their paws sloppily crossed as they always did, my grandma had somehow took a miraculous leap in skill and caught both their size, their markings and who they were perfectly. And as I looked up to the hills of a home I still miss so much and two dogs that meant to me than any words here I could say, I found myself too at tears.
Thanks, Grandma.
Miss you, Bernie and Griff.
Veterans day was the definition of lazy in every sense of the word. So much so that if I attempted to go into details about it you'd promptly fall asleep. I speak truth. While up there however, surrounded by my quirky mother in my crazed grandma's house, I couldn't help but laugh. My grandma is the type of person who freezes butter, gives people towels for Christmas and when naming her cat, got confused and accidentally did it after the mouse in Stuart Little, not the cat. It's not like Stuart ever listens anyways (stingy, rigid bugger), but a part of me secretly wonders if it's because deep inside he knows he was named after the "much less superior animal" he typically feasts upon (those words in quotations being his own). And my Mom? The type of woman who won't pick up a call from a number she doesn't know in fear of a tax invasion, buys an expensive MP3 player and asks I only put twenty specific songs on it (Mom, I could of just burned you a cd or two with these on it?.. Sara, don't argue with me!) and that has saved every single newspaper clipping (it's amounted to THOUSANDS) she has acquired in the past thirty years that she fancied.. no matter how much the times and practices has changed. They're both kooky, old fashioned, paranoid, dorky nut cases and when I try and inject a drop of sense into the madness, am promptly dismissed as somehow not getting it. It's a sightly, eye rolling, amusing laughter fest when I enter that household.
On Sunday however, my grandma did something that caught me by surprise. She took up painting a few years ago.. many of her master pieces coming out tragic at best and as they've been pawned off to various cousins, none of us have had the heart to say no. One of my favorite "oh gosh, did she really?" moments was the one she gifted Ryan and Jess with as their wedding present. I've no idea if the explanation I'm about to give for it will -ever- do it justice, but it was of a Mountain Lion stoically placed upon a tree branch that we assumed was somewhere back where we grew up in Mt. Charleston, Nevada. A freakin' mountain lion. The one animal we feared MOST up there as we madly ran about those hills she painted for Jessica and Ryan on their wedding. Nothing pretty, joyful, hopeful or with peace.. a monstrous lion of DOOM painted upon a canvas to watch their every move. Bless Jess and Ryan for having the grace to thank her for it.. because deep inside I was having to control my every move in hopes of not breaking indefinitely with laughter. I love the woman.. she's just insanely insane in more ways than I can count. I'd say her other creations have been much hopeful.. however I'd be lying. :X Later on Jess, Ryan and I were all able to openly laugh about it and I wouldn't doubt if it went to thus hang in their garage from then on out.
A few years ago, we lost two pieces of our lives that meant very much to us. Our childhood dogs, Bernie and Griff, were taken away from us due to Cancer. Big, lovable, Bernese Mountain Dogs, they were a rock I knew I could always to turn in my childhood. As my parent's divorced and I came to be the only child living with my Mom, they were both my friends and also filled the void of not having my siblings near. I loved those dogs with everything I had. When my Mom first moved back to Canada, she took them along with her. Above all else they had always been her's and as she moved away from us, would come to soon also replace the void of not having her children near her. I'm not sure if it was the drastic change in weather or lifestyle, but soon after they were both struck with illness (however they weren't that old). My Mom took it very, very, very hard and to this day still has a rough time thinking about it or getting another dog. One Christmas I tracked down a night light that when lit, glowed with an image of two Bernese Mountain dogs in their remembrance and when she first plugged it in, she began to cry. In so many ways Bernie and Griff weren't just dogs to us-- it was our family that we lost.
As I walked into my Mom's on Sunday, hand's full with bags stuffed to the brim with her (my Mom's) continual requests from the states, I looked to my right upon entering and something caused me to stop. Setting down the bags and coming closer, my heart leaped into my throat. Above the front room's sofa there was a painting hung. Within a rocky, wooded setting (no, it wasn't another mountain lion :), green bristlecones like those back home and jutting grayed mountains in the distance, there lied two dogs. Marks above their eyes and tongues askew, Bernie and Griff sat there looking back at me. Posed next to each other and their paws sloppily crossed as they always did, my grandma had somehow took a miraculous leap in skill and caught both their size, their markings and who they were perfectly. And as I looked up to the hills of a home I still miss so much and two dogs that meant to me than any words here I could say, I found myself too at tears.
Thanks, Grandma.
Miss you, Bernie and Griff.