Time Portal

I ran into Jenny, Finn and Ozzy at the Leahy Farm this afternoon and I was struck by the moment; on the top of that beautiful Douro Hill. I am always very moved by the love shown to me by Finn and eventually Ozzy. Love was a dance with both of them; as I hemmed my way around the ever endearing passion of my daughter’s love for her sons. My spirit in their lives must be a scant offering of intense love that never competes. I hug them way too much and I am so proud of the fact that they have Jenny’s unconditional love. It is surreal to be a grandmother. You never really feel the part, in all its wholeness; because it comes so soon. One minute you are a mom yourself and the next you are holding your daughter’s baby.

The journey is a wonderful one, but not without its challenges. I prefer gut bucket emotion and real-ness in my writing. I think I have lived my life on this raw edge of emotion and it chooses its own portal into a life lived in a difficult fashion depending on my frame of mind. Grandmother love must be gently measured in teaspoons, so as not ever to infringe on the lives of my daughters. This is a common thread in all of our lives as we balance years of living, with youth and vitality of the next generation. When we allow ourselves freedom from our internal need for meaning, we sometimes find meaning; in its different forms. Developing my understanding of my daughters’ lives, has meant a lot to me because quieting my own need for purpose, through their existence; is of paramount importance in order to ensure their independence and freedom from memories that are often debilitating, if you focus on the passage of time too intensely.

Time Portal is an idea appropriated from Jenny’s paintings, when she described to me the feeling she wants an audience to discern from her paintings when they look at a lily pad. All of you can appreciate this thought, because I know that my readers appreciate the finer details in life that are often incomprehensible beyond a raw emotion, that we most often cannot express.