(beware all, this might be a little on the sappy side!)
I have been so blessed to have had one set of grandparents with me for so much of my life. My grandparents on my mother’s side passed on much earlier – early enough that my sadness at their passing was empathetic: I was sad because I didn’t like to see my mums so sad. My memories of Grampa and Gramma Toews are often a little abstract: I have happy thoughts whenever I see Oreo cookies, various fast food restaurants remind me of Sunday family lunches and slow eating contests, and I can’t see hollyhocks or meadowsweet without being transported back to their house on 3rd Street. They were a wonderful part of my childhood, but that childhood often seems so long ago … and I’ve grown used to life with them existing merely in my memories and in our family stories.
But when my Gramma Pauls passed away earlier this year, the loss was much more … shall I say personal? As an adult, this is the first time I’ve faced the loss of a family member, and quite frankly, it sucks. Living apart from family has made me realize just how important all of those wonderful people are to me, and how different my life would be without their love and support. But the next time I visit home and family, I will not be able to go and see her. I’m still not quite sure how that will feel.
So, when I noticed Gramma’s birthday on my calendar’s upcoming events, I thought I needed to find a way to honour her life, to keep my memories of her fresh in my mind. As I have always believed that my ‘artistic blood’ comes directly from her (no offense Dad!), it was easy to think of how best to remember her. It has been WAY too long since I have got down and dirty and actually painted something. Digital photography is amazing amounts of fun … but sometimes it’s just too clean. So on my next day off I went down the street to the art store and grabbed a big new set of paints and a reasonably sized canvas. (Turns out I still had a more than a couple tubes of paint at home, so I may not have *needed* the whole set of new colours, but that’s entirely beside the point!) Once I got home I gathered the remaining supplies, popped in my ‘Singin’ In the Rain’ DVD and started to paint.
12 uncaptioned images
After a couple good days’ work, this canvas is still not yet finished – although I’m thrilled with the progress so far! – and with the busyness of December and the holiday season, I’m not quite sure when I’ll be able to attack it again. But I think the exercise was more than successful. I’m completely inspired. I can’t wait to paint again, and I can’t help but think that Gramma would be pleased that I am finding so much joy in something that she also loved. Also, I’ve re-discovered how great it is to work on creative projects simply for the fun of it. With so many items always crowding my “official” to-do list, personal projects often get shunted to the side for things that have clients or deadlines or are just part of the mundane duties of life. It’s so easy to forgo the non-necessary items and plead excuses of “no time!” or “no energy!”, but this little creative diversion has motivated me to find time for just-for-fun projects more often!
Next up on my nostalgia to-do list: sewing some doll clothes (just like my Gramma Toews used to do for me!) and thinking of something other than accounting that would properly honour my Grampa Toews …
*update: mums just reminded me of Grampa’s love of crosswords, so I will most definitely be buying a book to keep on my coffee table to challenge myself – although I don’t think I’ll be conquering the New York Times puzzles for a while just yet!