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wish i may
i might
make a wish upon a star tonight..
email.
me.
i'm brooke. a short, fatish, bisexual, feminist, pacifist, very-liberal activist. i have 4 cats. and 2 computers, 2 kayaks, 1 masters degree, multiple backpacks, and way too many books.
i live in the most beautiful eugene, oregon. i'm currently disabled due to treatment resistant severe depression. i've been blogging since election day of 2000.
i'm born and raised in the mountains of southwestern virginia. i could join the daughters of the american revolution, i don't think they'd like me cause i hear they like to throw tea parties instead of rallies and revolutions.
links.
lane co. bill of rights defense committee (lcbordc) ~
bill of rights defense committee ~
chel ~
lisa ~
carrie ~
cinnamon
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Saturday, July 19
oh goddess.
i thought about it a couple of times today (friday). but it kept slipping my mind. the ashes of my grandparents- mary draper and alfred foster robertshaw were interred today at st. mary's episcopal church in portsmouth, rhode island.
my dad and stepmom were there, my aunt and her family, my uncle and his family. my brother and i were the only ones not there. i debated about whether to go or not, but just couldn't afford to be away from eugene for so long (i'd have combined it with my upcoming trip home).
it feels like the official end of childhood. both of my grandmothers gone, one grandfather left. but this, baba and grandad.. i have my grandmother's first name, my grandfather's last name.. i've been brooke since i was popped out. but a number of years back i decided to start including the m. as part of my name on everything possible. it was because i wanted that initial to be there, that though i don't want to be called mary, i want the fact that i am not just brooke r. to be recognized, i want the full existance of my name to be known, i want to pay tribute to my grandmother through carrying the m. on everything from my ymca card to my passport. my grandmother was never mary either. she was dede all her life.
so today, friday, marked a final good-bye in our family. i love my grandparents very much, and it is truly sinking in that they are really gone, in this world, permanently. i wasn't in touch as much as i'd have liked to be in their last years.. i only hope they died knowing how much i loved them. how grateful i am to have been born into their family. how proud i am of the people they were, the kids they raised, the love they gave to their grandchildren.
my best memories from my childhood come from that big house in wild rose shores in annapolis, md., sailing on the fat tiger and then the grenadine on the severn river and the chesapeake bay. swimming in the strange's pool. christmases and summers. sitting at the bar in the kitchen with my aunt and uncle around, poker games with my brother and cousin down in the grenadine, uno games with all of us, heated political discussions that i barely understood but knew the importance of, finally getting to be a big girl and when i went to their house getting to sleep in my aunts old room, my grandfather holding me tight and only holding tighter as i gleefully struggled to be let go- me knowing in the recesses of my mind that was one of the ways he showed his love and that fact coming to the forefront of my mind as i entered adulthood and sitting on his lap was no longer. yes. i was blessed by the generousity and love of the two of them towards me, my brother, my cousins.
bye for now baba and grandad. i love you.
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