We knew it was coming. No matter what anyone says or how much you expect it the phone call still is a shock. You have a bizarre mixture of loss and joy all at the same time, a grand sense of relief and tension but at least the suffering is at an end.

Today my grandmother died. Her name was Sylvia and she was one hell of a lady. She was in a word – spunky. Small in stature but she was great in spirit. She birthed seven children and raised nine. She outlived two husbands and man could she draw. 

While I was growing up we didn’t spend as much time at her house as we did at Grandma Maurer’s and somedays I regret that choice. I would have liked to known her better. I remember her house in Minister as a young boy, we would go there and she would always give us 7-up in these wonderful glasses that had big inverse bubbles carved out of them. They had a sort of irridence to them that I remember. Its funny what memories stick with us – how the image of that glass and that drink stick with me.

Every year on my birthday – including this last year while she was ill – I received a hand written birthday card from her. She never forgot, never missed a one. I think only once or twice did I ever send her one on her birthday or send her a thank you for taking the time to write me yet every year there it was – I’ll miss those cards.

Mostly I remember her as a tough old lady who loved to smile, enjoy a good beer, and who would shoot raccoons out of a tree with her old 410 shotgun. No foolin’. When she lived on the farm, she had a ton of cats, and would feed them in the barn. Well the Raccoons would come and eat the cat food – so Grandma would shoot the buggers to keep the cats from starving. Plus I don’t think she liked raccoons all that much either.

Now I’m off to Ohio to mourn her with my family to say goodbye to another matriarch of my family and comfort my mother in her time of grief. I’m not that sad, really, not yet. It was hard seeing her in June. Seeing that frail little woman bundled up on a hospital bed not weighing more than 75 lbs, but what I’ll remember always about that visit is what happened the last time I saw her as I was leaving…

I was walking out of her room, my Aunt Annie was sitting next to her and I had said my goodbyes. Right before I walked out the door I looked back just one more time – there she was in a beautiful red sweater and she caught my eye. Then she smiled and winked at me. She actually winked! I thought to myself – spunky ole’ lady I’m gonna miss you. I grinned back and walked out of her life.

I’ll miss you grandma. See you on the other side.

J

Well so far so good. Its been several months since starting this insanity of recording my life in various ways. Thought I’d drop an update on how it was going. Things that have been working and things that haven’t.

1. The daily snapshot of self – Well this is pretty much a no brainer when I’m home. Its when I am traveling that it became problematic. There will be gaps to be sure I think as I know I did miss a few days here and there. I’ve been not just standing still but posing each day. I need to look at the current mass of them and do some experiments with them to help me think of new things to do.

2. The daily drawing – This overall I think has been the most successful of all the endeavors. It is the most labor intensive, but it really gets me thinking about my day, what happened and how I felt. My chief problem so far is that I’m not able to keep up with the work load and actually finish a drawing a day. Life has a funny way of getting in my way. However to combat this I have been jotting down in my sketchbook notes and drawings so that I can develop them. This has gotten me into a situation where I am about a week or so behind… arg. This week I plan on buckling down a bit and knocking them all out to catch up. I also plan on posting the next selection of them probably next sunday.

3. The photos from my iPhone – this has been the most interesting I think. It is super easy to do and kinda fun. I’ve been doing experiments with the phone seeing what it can do -the tossing the camera thing is wicked! Looking for unusual and more bizzare things each day. I’m surprised how much truly wack stuff there is all around us each day that I think we just glance over or pass by without comment.

4. Lastly the daily word – this is a super no brainer -cuz it just get’s emailed to me. They are stacked up in my mailbox so I will have a list of the words by day at the end of the year. Its easy and will give me text to play with. What will be interesting to see is how the word plays off the mood of the day in the end. I’m and deliberately not comparing the two now so in the end any links will be purely random.

All in all so far it has been a fun experiment that is helping me get back in touch with myself and the world around me. I’m looking forward to turning all of this into some form of film or experience at the end, but what an interesting story it will be – one without a beginning or an end but just a moment out of time with its own ups and downs.

j

Day 12 – Animated!!!Check out the link for a preview of what I am thinking about doing for each daily drawing. I’m considering connecting them in a film that shows the year 365 shots all transitioning into each other. So figuring that many shots – I’m going to need a team. So about December or so I’ll be sending a call out for animators and compositers – keep a look out!J