feelin' funky

oh dear.

graduation approaches but not fast enough. i'm tired of the fight but won't dare quit now. the "little things" are taking over my list, growing it to a full length page and a half. it's spring break and everyone seems to be in such hap-happy moods. kids are going nuts, running into the library at full speed and leaving me feeling trashed. that's how i feel this week, 

trashed.

but that's what i get from trying to do this alone. Lord, forgive me.      set me free.

until this week there were two of my grandmother's siblings still living. tuesday my aunt juanita passed away from complications caused by pneumonia. from a recent post you know that i have been remembering my grandma a good bit lately with the weather and her favorite time of year in full bloom. this week i feel as if i lost another piece of her, one more person who could help me remember. my family all says that i looked most like my grandma - and grandma looked most like juanita. somehow that brought me closer to her with a stronger kinship than some of the others. 

it seems that the more "greats" you have to add to describe a family relationship often translates as distance. many assume that great-great grandparents are not as close to heart as great-grandparents, and that they are not as close as grandparents. but some families are quite the opposite when we are taught to hold those with more "greats" even closer and more dear because of their seniority. 

i was raised in part by fifteen great aunts and uncles on my dad's side alone. they lived in the same community, shared and farmed the same land they had inherited from their parents, cooked the same great food year after year, and scolded us with the same hearts they loved us with. and just within the past three years their numbers have dwindled leaving now only one set; my grandma's youngest sister and her husband.

how can one feel the excitement of a life just beginning in the same beat as the deep sorrow of losing so much. 

my family dwindles.

my mood fluctuates.

it's a funk i hope to shake soon.

here's a few words from one of my granny's favorites:

"rock of ages cleft for me, let me hide myself in thee"

let me just hide for awhile and i'll be good to go.