Looking ahead

Momanimal, beloved, best & terribly missed.

the whole you left is so unimaginably big that I sometimes don't know who I am. Said it before and it sounds dumb. But that's it exactly. I feel like Goldie Hawn at the very end of "Death Becomes Her", Meryl Streeps character shoots a whole into Goldie's and she looks like a donut with a human around it. I am basically a human donut. The center is missing. Stupid. I am almost 40 and should be my own person and I am. But everything will change. I never can drop by just because I feel like it and I never realized before how much comfort that really was. It felt like comfort for a couple of hours being with you. Now I know it was essential comfort, calming me for days and weeks to come. Going home. Soon I probably won't even be able to visit your home – where I at least can feel close to you, because it will be rented. And it's still another pain to know I will loose your world entirely sooner or later. Your things, your furniture, your bedroom... oh, your cosy kitchen, always stocked, always open for everybody. All of you will have to live in mind and the minds of my brothers and your friends.

As everything has to change so dramatically I should take advantage of it. I decided I will. I will. I will work less and have more time for Tonie. In the beginning while she was tiny it was easy to work with her beside me, she just watched, slept and lied on my desk... But by now she gets really bored and mad when I work too much. Oh and me myself I am also unbearable, because I can't focus or fall into work for hours on end. And I miss it.

I decided to take on less graphic design projects. If at all. Maybe I just keep the clients I had for years but no new ones. Instead I really want to concentrate on the bracelets, on the setup of the shop, production. Inventing new products. Reproducing the little felt-bags from several years ago. I would like to be a visual... inventor? producer? creator? I don't want to be the visual translator any more – finding the visual form to the clients message. Instead I will translate my own.

Christmas Cards?

Dearest Mom.

Finally I put together the Christmas Cards I did this year. I did several for companies but the most fun are the ones for families. Especially families I have been portraying for the past few years. I started all design with J and O – I did the letter shoot with them an it was hilarious! We all had lots of fun. Whereas a few years ago (age 6 months and 2.5 years) they were so shy towards me when I arrived with all my equipment, lights and tripod. By now they know I'll show up sooner or later and they just go with it and are actually excited to make pictures again. I should add the Christmas of the Two from last year and two years ago when they just jumped on the bed!

Unfortunately Tonie's card didn't get finished yet. With bracelets and all. Now I am thinking about sending a New Years Greeting? Easter Greeting? I don't know yet, I just love the collage concept. And I want to send cute pictures of my daughter, TOO! Right now all the images of Tonie used in the design were shot while you were still alive. Something that always goes through my mind. In this picture of me I still have a mother.... I bought this shirt with you. Last time I was here, I was with you. The jolts of pain are back with force. Several times a day I think of you and can't believe you really, really won't be back. I still can't understand or believe it. And each time I think of you shoots through me: You are dead.

Our heater is broken. We are at your place, it is so cold at our place. To be here and stay overnight. Strange again. I am tired.

I love you and I miss you. Please come back.

J & O letter design... first I thought it wouldn't work... but – shift, move and bla – now it does.

A more classic baubles design I translated from a fashion client Xmas Card.

Tonie!

Graveyard bully

My dearest, cutest, most beloved Mum,

next to all the wrapping and packing I have a great story for you. Ahh, I wish I could tell you in person. You would be so mad and we would talk it over and over.. and have a glass of wine and rant some more! An evening of guilty gossiping and slaying. 

Your once upon a time BFF – for so many years you always had tears in your eyes talking about her and the loss of your connection.. because of live choices? Or social reasons or simply because your friendship never was what you had believed – Apparently she is very unhappy about how we handled your burial, memorial, etc., etc. She can not believe that we organized everything according to your wishes. The three of us seem to be too immature – nearing our Forties –  to manage a traditional burial as it is supposed to be for our mother. Unfortunately she couldn't atttend you memorial because of a weekend trip to Spain. And she fixed our shortcomings  and her remorse quickly by ordering a little steel-thingy lamp that has to be installed and fixed permanently unto your grave. She ordered everything. 

Minor little detail. She didn't bother to check with us first, whether it is ok that someone digs a whole into your grave, fills it with cement and has a light fixture installed for Christmas and beyond. Grumph. What to do. I only know because your friend Jay was with her at the cemetery. Now I had to call her to let her know that we don't really appreciate people installing things on our family grave. Once I finally found the time to call her between packing bracelets and being sad she was oblivious to the fact that she might be a bully. Instead of ranting on and asking her what the f. she was thinking and why she didn't confirm with us before changing something on your grave - I very politely told her that we had already chosen lamps matching your tombstone. Thank you very much. Still the egocentric she has become, she didn't get the hint and went on explaining how important a Christmas grave lighting is for catholics. You weren't catholic, you weren't even protestant and you DID NOT GIVE A S. what happened once your were cremated! Besides we did follow your wishes concerning your burial exactly and really didn't save a penny on anything concerning you and your new home and your journey to your final resting place. 

But I didn't tell her. I was nice and understanding and a stupid pushover. And I am so mad about myself that I didn't tell her... anyway. I am certain that you would be very happy about everything we did and how we did it. You'd tell me it wasn't worth telling her off it would only get me in trouble and she wouldn't get it anyway. 

I miss you. Don't you think this is a stupid bully story? How can she bother us with her "etiquette of the graveyard" when she wasn't even there for you while you were still alive. That day I was so mad and she made me feel so bad, I almost hated her. Sorry.

Your birthday

Happy, happy, happy birthday. Bunny-jumping birthday song! Best Mom ever on the whole wide world! Even if you yourself can't celebrate your birthday today – and you probably wouldn't if you could as you hated birthdays... there are a million reasons for me to think of you and celebrate this day and the littlest and biggest reason is Tonie. Without you she wouldn't be and I wouldn't be and Mooks and W wouldn't be. Imagine! Thank you. I miss you. It was a beautiful day. Sunny and warmish. At "your place" with your friends and lunch after. It was a new image of your loss I had not realized before. Because this time I was watching from the outside: Seeing your girlfriends I was constantly filling you in before my inner eye and you were so obviously missing...

I love you so. When will you be back?

PS Tonie called you cell yesterday. 15 month old: she unlocked the Iphone and managed to click your name on my list of favorites... Mama Cell... But your phone is already disconnected.

2013

Tomorrow is your birthday. Your friends are meeting at your grave and later for lunch by the lake. They invited me to come with. I wish you'd be 68 tomorrow.

We spent the past week skiing, all three of us with our families. You would have been proud of us, we didn't fight, hardly, anyway. We were kind of tidy. Tom and I were skiing all by ourselves for the first time in two years because Tonie loves being with her two Uncles and her two tiny cousins.

We are back home since Friday. I am not well. The crushing pain is now a sinking pain. It drags me down numbingly. I am terribly tired, I have difficulties falling asleep. I watch one episode of friends after the other at night. What a relieve that there are 10 Seasons. Once I'm done I'll start with Sex and the City. I am sick of packing bracelets and the orders keep coming. 

I dreamed of you for the first time since you died. Twice. You were with me.

I miss you. More and more every day. It does not become better, right now it feels like it's getting worse. I love you. You were so difficult and so special and I loved you. Please come back. 

Tomorrow I'll try again. To look for the happy stuff.