Have you ever noticed how something that once gave you great joy now hurts to look at it. Lately I have been having that problem a lot. The stuffed sheep dog my big brother got me nearly 20 years ago made me cry the other day when I had it out when I was cleaning. The little Easter bunny my mom got me when I was about 6 that sets here on my desk it looked so much bigger that Easter. It makes me long for those days when I look at it. When my family was all still together. None of them had gotten married or died yet. It was just mom, dad my 2 sisters my 2 brothers and me in a really back woods house with not indoor pluming. The nearest neighbor was about a mile away. There was no direct heat in the upstairs. The only heat in the house came from 2 wood burning stoves one in the kitchen where the stair door was left open for the heat to rise, and the other in the living room where a hole had been cut in the ceiling to let heat up to my sisters room. In the winter mom would but my brother and I in bed together and cover us with and Indian print blanket she had got with green stamps. She would then throw a heavy wool crazy quilt my mom had made over top of it. She had to put the blanket between us and the quilt because we were all allergic to wool.
My brother and I would wrap are arms around each other to share body heat. We looked like those hugging teddy bears you can buy. We did not have much, but we had one thing money can not buy. We had love. I saw proof of how much my parents loved us one night when I was about 7. My dad had came home drunk which was not unusual, and the fight started also not unusual. The fight woke me and then I heard dad say I am going to take the gun and kill you all. That scared me and I started crying softly I did not want them to know I was awake. Then out of no where and a floor below me I heard my dad say to my mom you better go check those kids one of them is crying, and just that fast the fight was over. Mom came to sooth me and get me to try to get me to go back to sleep. I told her what I heard daddy say and she tole me he would never do it he was just talking. Well she was right!, but when you are 7 years old and your daddy says something you believe it. It still amazes me that in the middle of this fight a floor below me my daddy heard me crying and sent mom to check on me. That is love. Most people today if they and their woman are fighting would never hear a child crying a floor above them, and they certainly would not send their wife to check on the child when they were fighting. From what I have seen lately many NOT ALL but many fathers and mothers are still children themselves mentally. They have no clue what it takes to be a good parent. Even with the arguing over dads drinking dad and mom both knew how to raise kids. I miss them both and my brother very much.
People do not need to be dead for something that brought you joy when you got it to make you sad now. I have sitting here on my desk a beautiful piece of petrified wood. It is red, black, brown and tan and if you turn it the right way it kinda looks like a dragon head. That was given to me about a year ago by someone I love very much that appears to have walked out of my life as any attempt I have made to make contact has failed. I am still not 100% sure why it happened like it did. All I know for sure is I was being myself and apparently it no longer was ok with my friend. I guess the pain will pass in time. My problem is I have things in nearly every room of my house this friend has sent me. I should put them away out of sight because when I look at them it brings back the memory of the loss, but I can not bring myself to do it. That would mean I had accepted she is gone from my life for good and I am not ready to do that yet.
Lets move on to another remembrance of friends that are gone. I have 4 huge stuffed animals in my bedroom a bear as big as a 2 year old and 3 frogs 2 the size of pillows and one just slightly smaller. The bear and one of the frogs came from 2 friends that died about a year to a year and a half ago. The other 2 frogs one came from the sister of the one that died who gave me the frog. The other one came from a friend that moved far away. I have only seen her 2 times sense she moved about a decade ago and I still miss her. She and I did not always get along and have had a couple fights, but when I was sick she was there for me and stayed with me and brought me home when I was done at the er. That morning was awful. I was in so much pain and so sick at my stomach I thought I was going to die and would not have cared if I hand. That is how you tell a real friend one that you can disagree with, but they will still be there when you need them. So you see what brings you joy when you get it can cause you pain years later.
jane_and.the_dragon
joined:
Worry about your character, not your reputation. Your character is who you are, your reputation is who people think you are.
ht
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