All the Obnoxious little things

There are little things in our lives that we are blind to until the day comes that they prove their obnoxious importance.  

Those days come with exasperated sighs at underestimated chores and overwhelmed hands chasing task after task. I never saw how much it really took my mom to clean a whole house until it became my job. I never saw how much skill making meals three times a day takes. The errands, the doctors appointments, the bills, the family things you just have to do, the small things that just fall through the cracks. There are so many little things, that I never saw being tied up nice and tidy. 

If I could go back and help her more I would have, I would have learned more, but now I sit in an unraveling nest, frustrated and tired. This is how my mom says strong women are made. But I didn't want to be a strong woman when I was a little girl, and sometimes it feels like just yesterday I was chasing dreams. 

However there is an undeniable sweetness in learning to be more than you have been, that doesn't fail to be seen this time. I know this is a hard time, but I'm learning. Maybe one day all the little things I do for the family I don't have yet, wont be unseen. 

2020 has really been a trip

 I am really pleasantly surprised at the way this class is formatted, the video lessons on Cengage (although a bit slow and boring) are really a great way to learn and the word projects are the perfect way to test what you learned. I can really see myself getting a hang of all these programs and have already learned new ways of doing things I had been doing wrong for years. 

Its good that this week wasn't that stressful because unfortunately my cat died. It was something we expected for a long time now, she was 18, going on 19 years old. But it was still really unexpected. Shes been with me since I was in kindergarten and has seen me through really hard times. I got to say goodbye to her on Saturday and although I didn't quite know it was a goodbye, I felt it. She was so tired. And so when I couldn't find her the next two days I knew she had passed. On Tuesday morning we found her resting peacefully in the garden right outside my window. I had looked for her non-stop and there she was right next to me the whole time. 

Precious was one of those cats you only get once in your life. She would hunt and bring me (kinda gross but much appreciated) gifts of dead birds, insects, and small desert animals until her very last days. I came to call them her gifts of death and have used a lot of them in my artwork. Weird, I know, but she would literally hunt for me and make sure I was provided for even when she only had like three teeth left. She never lost her fierceness and aloof attitude but was so loving and gentile with all my sister's babies, even when they pulled her tail or pet her too rough. As a kid I would dress her up in doll cloths and we'd go on adventures in the backyard, sometimes we were princess Jasmine and her tiger, other times a powerful witch and her wizard cat. When I was a teenager full of melodramatic angst, I would sneak out, and she would join me walking at a distance from me until I came back home. Last week I was painting and she laid on my desk next to me the whole time, I wish I had known it was going to be the last time we painted together. She was my guardian in life and will continue to be in death.