gift

closes my eyes.
blank.
receives whatever comes.

the word gift encompasses so much meaning for me.
the people who pass through my life.. all gifts.
the ones who stay, are the most precious.

closes my eyes.
blank again.
receiving........

i have been given many incredible gifts
i am blessed
a good upbringing
parents who supported me when i wanted to be a .. gulp .. musician
talent

a voice

some of the greatest gifts have been the people in my life
the ones who stay
they are few
the ones who share knowledge and spirit i cherish most.. my teachers in life.. those who trust that the knowledge and wisdom and craft imparted will be honored and respected and loved when given over.. and so willingly.. this, i do not take lightly. 

i am blessed
i have received much in my life
many many many gifts

the most rewarding of all
giving

Gift

Blank look...

This might be twenty minutes of thinking and no writing.  I have a very hard time about gifts.

....

Tears
Frustration,
Foggy glasses.
A drink of water.
Wipes eyes

Smiles.


When I was about 30 I wrote my favorite Great Uncle Dalton and told him in an hand written letter how much I had appreciated his kind words growing up and how important they were to me.  I thanked him for them. And I thanked him for teaching me how to whittle.

He wrote me back a nice letter thanking me and said, "You were my favorite of all the kids"

He enclosed a hand made jewelry box with my name inlaid in the lid in wood.   It's absolutely the most precious thing I own. 

Brother

Names redacted at family's request.

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What a dumb-cluck Danny's brother was getting into such a scrape and bringing FBI hounds down on the family to search and harass them in 1971.

They were born 9 months apart, which means that there was a baby growing in his mother's womb right after he was born.

She was overwhelmed.  I was told that Brother was such a handful and Dan was so quiet, that she would leave him in the bassinet so long that his head developed a flat spot.

 Brother was rolypoly as a baby and was so round and overfed that he had difficulty walking at 18 months.  Dan was skinny and long legged and looked slightly undernourished in photos.  I do know that in that family you had to eat quick or the food would be gone off your plate.  The four older children ate hunched over, guarding their plate the first Thanksgiving I ever spent with them.  I had never seen a holiday meal treated like timed trials at a speedway.

Brother used to pound on Dan. He was an angry difficult child, and did not like sharing the space with Dan.   Dan was a quiet defensive one who learned to be passive aggressive to survive and to get around Brother.  I had talked to one of Dan's high school friends who told me it was disturbing how verbally and physically abusive Brother was to Danny.

When we were first married and learning to sleep together,  Danny would have night mares, and scream Brother's name, and punch out into the air or sometimes land a blow onto me or the pillow I would wedge between us for buffer.  As time went on, those dreams stopped and we could snuggle, but the first two years were rocky.  Danny is still a bit passive and won't venture forth an opinion or make a decision unless you patiently coax it out of him.

 ======================================================================

 skipping

Father as ww2 decorated hero, compare/contrast
FBI and trial
visiting the federal penitentiary

skipping to the farm
=====================================================================
Dani and I bought a secluded farm in a very rural part of Missouri on the Arkansas border.  Even though it was secluded, we soon noticed that people in town knew of us and were curious to find out if we were Amish or what, because of Dan's long hair and our homemade clothes that we wore.

So it wasn't much surprise when this clean cut young fellow walked into our place, with a knapsack and asked for a place to stay.

Gosh we were trusting.
How did you find us back here?

Asked around...

okay.  Why is your hair so short?  Man it's pitiful.

My last job made me cut it.

Oh okay. and that was that.  Come on in.  our food is your food,   Let's get you fed.

So he stays. and we talk and shoot the breeze. There's not much to show him on the farm, we're keeping bees and gardening a bit. We don't exactly work up a sweat and don't expect him to.

"Do you guys ever get into politics?" he asks, tucked in with a bunch of other questions and stories.  Like what's your family like?

Oh hell no.  we tell him.   Not anymore!   We got a dumb-cluck brother that keeps us from getting anywhere near politics.  We are done with protesting.  War ended.   Brother was just here visiting, (right after his release from prison) but we couldn't let him stay.   He's out in Colorado working explosion details in the mines.

That fellow was real handy. He taught us how to screen dirt for stones and helped build a compost pit.  After a few days he left, walking out the way he came in.

Turns out to have been an FBI agent.  They followed Brother for ten years after his release, just checking up on him now and again.

Shared places

This shared blog is a safe place.  I feel protected here.  I'm sure it's all illusion, but it's a nice illusion.  When we were little we used to call crawling under the branches of a fallen tree and vines, our hidey hole.

When I say 'Thanks for sharing." It is the old kind of sharing.  the shared place of safety and warmth.

Alphie

I always say I dont play well with others.. of course, in jest.  I play really well with others.

When I was a kid.. my sister had cool stuff..
she had all my ma's old records
and art stuff
and games
and she had an Alphie robot

she didnt share.  she didnt have to.  she was the only girl.
we had to share everything we had.. us boys.
we shared a room and clothes and toys and up til dad built us our bunks.. a bed.

so I was curious about her stuff
and I didnt care if she got mad that I was snooping around her room

I stole her Alphie and hid it in our closet
I played with it when no one was around..
I dont know how long I had it before she noticed it was gone.. but it was days

I remember the day she found Alphie..
she let out a blood curdling scream and ma went running up the stairs. 
I creeped up the stairs slowly, curious what was happening.
my brother didnt flinch, just kept watching TV.

I peeped in the doorway to my room, and there was my sister bawling her eyes out in ma's arms.
poor Alphie was in a pile of screws and nuts and bolts and springs and stuff, all over the floor of the closet.
I swore to her I didnt do it.  I didnt.
she never believed me.
that night, my dad put a hook lock on my sister's door.

it didnt matter, I would never steal from my sister again.  Im not saying I never snuck in her room again.. lol.. I just never left anything out of place.  Im fairly sure my brother and I had discussed dismantling Alphie at some point together.  apparently he didnt want to share either.