Tag: family

The Family Farm

The Westside – Blair Rd.

In Jacksonville if you head west out Normandy Blvd, you will cross a line of demarcation. A boundary, a separation, a distinction.

The people that grew up in this area know that border. As you cross Fouraker Rd. you are on different terrrain than the other areas of Jacksonville. The land has now been quartered and re-quartered. Subdivisions have been built on what was once sprawling pasture land.

It is no longer recognizable as the majestic acreage that it once was.

Cattle grazed under massive oaks. They lumbered to the creek for their daily water. They gave milk and beef, complimantary to the garden vegetables. Biscuits were a staple. No one knows biscuits like people who were raised on the Westide.

Even in my life time it was not uncommon to see someone traveling on horse. ( That was me! )

Many of us, whose family’s have been there since the 1840’s know we have a different history.

Peculiar personal histories.

Continue reading The Family Farm

Change and Elevate

I am on the other side of a rough 4 1/2 years. Two of those years were spent with my daughter. She had cancer and toughed it out, getting chemical treatments and willing herself to live. It was so hard. We had wonderful times together. We experienced a beautiful closeness. The following two years were engulfed in Red Bulls. After having started drinking them to get myself through her life celebration, I had a serious addiction. Quit them October 20th, 2022. Then another six months, three in Fernandina and three in Costa Rica.

Costa Rica has saved me from myself. The air here is clean. You can feel the health as you inhale. I’ve just been quietly passing my days, playing with my kids here, swimming or Cross Fitting. I feel like a different person.

I dread going home. I look forward to seeing and being with friends. But I cringe at the thought of amped up tourists and new-to-the-island Yankees. It’s a prejudice.

A long time renter has moved out and that has left a void.

But I have some over-the-top neighbors that helped me tremendously. They let me wander around and be crazy. Reaching out to them. Making a nuisance of myself.

Trying not to become a recluse.

My family is shredded.

But I have a plan. I had hit a bottom when I arrived here January 1, 2023. I am going to adapt once again. I am an artist and I have been painting and woodworking. I have to do something to flee from any and all negativity. I want to be the best person that I can be.

It’s a tough road to navigate. But I am up to it.

66 – Thoughts on Bull Shit

I called a legitimate sister to discuss yet another sister who has showed up on our 23 and Me Ancestry. I don’t know why she would find it a hard to believe that this is our sister. Joan Ariel. DNA does not lie.

Continue reading 66 – Thoughts on Bull Shit

Day 153

This is day 153 of the year 2022. There are 215 days left. And I am here in the moment. En Route 66…………….

“Think of the life you have lived until now as over and, as a dead man, see what’s left as a bonus and live it according to Nature. Love the hand that fate deals you and play it as your own, for what could be more fitting?” – Marcus Aurelius

Did Marcus Aurelius say that!?

Buried at Sea

This is just a journal. Nothing more or less. Just words typed on a digital page. Important only to me.

After the funeral fiascos over the past five years, and the refusal of my two oldest sisters to relinquish funeral plots, following their bold embezzlements from my mother’s inheritance, I decided to be buried at sea. The ocean has been my refuge, my entire life.

The other day I had one of the worst days. It involved lifeguards, called Nippers.

I lost it. I couldn’t believe these little boys, which they are in my eyes, the same as I am an old lady, in theirs. They even name themselves small boys. They removed me from the water. I was removed from the water, by little creatures that nipped and bit. I just cussed.

I wish the best for them. I hope they “save” many people. I hope they “sell” many surf instructions. That was their mantra as they were asking me to leave the water. “I am surf instructor.” Hearing that, over and over, just did something to me.

I feel buried at sea, before my death.

I apologized to them for my behavior, but the beligerent boss, (short, red head) turned his back on me.

He had a assumed I was a rich tourist. He erred in his eagerness to possibly rake in 65 an hour, which is what they charge as “instructors.”

You know what they say about assumptions.

I love the ocean. I will just go somewhere they’re not.

That was the mistake in the first place.

A synonym for nipper is nuisance.

God Bless us All

They actually named themselves after a Mongrel dog. A little nipping terrier dog. I call that fitting.

Angele Dulin

My grandmother. Brought from Paris. (Suresnes, Hauts de Seine, Lee – de – France)

I want to know the story. More. I have scoured ancestry.com and discovered more than I wanted to know, at the time. She was sixteen years old and lied to, by my grandfather. She was a WWII war bride. She went from Paris to Bainbridge Ga. Her name is on the walls of Ellis Island.

What a history my family has.

My father was born into poverty. Deep poverty. He was born into violence, as his father was. That was the excuse for his insanities. He wanted out and he got out. He fought his way out.

We are all still surviving.

My grandmother committed suicide in March 1957. The most popular song of that year was The People of Paris.

How to Create a Character *

You have one man, with volcanic rage, simmering below the surface of his skin. You have one woman who is iron clad and formidable, prepared to protect the family at all cost. Each has their own story, steeped in alcohol, violence and money. Smiles would turn to grimaces – smile, frown – smile, frown – it was a dodge ball game. You would eventually get slammed.

Then take the kid. Twelve years old, eager to please; anxious to get every detail correct.

The man had given orders, “Go saddle up my horse”. Continue reading How to Create a Character *

Ocean Educated

My mother would drive us out of the swamp, to the ocean once a year. Then in 1966 she bought the beach house. – she kept one hand on an oak tree and the other on a palm – thank you Mama – Now I get to pass it on. It’s not for everybody. Thank God ~

!Costa Rica!

An international tourist destination. The once, lonely planet spot on the map, that people were scared to go to, is now a place that people, will sell everything they own, sight unseen, and traipse down here. Convinced they have found paradise. The tropics.

I had the smallest snake in my shower with me. I killed it. Then I had a tiny scorpion on the shower curtain. I killed it. This was in the last week.

As I am beginning to write the monkeys have begun to howl. I love that.

I have my Red Bull. Red Bull and monkeys make the world go around.

Continue reading !Costa Rica!

Complicated/Simple

If you can live your life successfully and make it look simple, you are a hero. Life is tough as hell. First – your born – and maybe you have the good fortune of doting parents. But many of us didn’t. You got kicked around. Filled with anxiety.

Bukowski has a repeated line in one of his poems – people are not good to people – people are not good to people – people are not good to people. Reading this, I felt I knew exactly what he meant. People were not good to me. I was a little fat. I could not speak up for myself. I became prey.

Continue reading Complicated/Simple