(Cobbled from an email)
I’ve not come back from this trip the
same way and feel a weird sense of duty. I know I’ll be up there again soon,
and now I’m playing a daily role assisting my sister with the handling of their
television. I’m taking a role to make sure he has a soccer match on if there is
one. It’s just background at this point, but there’s no way he or my mother can
control it. So, I’m sort of always there now and thinking maybe I do need to
help out more and try to make the eventual transition smoother. I don’t think
he’ll last too long like this and there’s always the potential for further
deterioration.
So I find myself putting distance between a lot of friends because I don’t entirely want to be in a happy place. This is a time where I am more connected now, and that’s changing me a bit. I need to adjust my attitude. But I also need to figure out how to make sure my own life doesn’t go off track like I think his did
My father started an
electronics manufacturing company in the basement of our house in Campbell
County. This was in 1985 after he left another place thinking he could do a
better job, and he turned it into a firm that eventually employed over 150
people at a factory I got to watch grow. It’s part of my childhood, one that
isn’t really shared by my brother and sister because I was younger, 12 when my
basement slowly became a place where a handful of people worked. That didn’t
last too long and he moved it into one place, expanded that place, then built a
new place next door. I worked there a lot over the years and at one point moved
back to Lynchburg to try to learn it so I could take over one day.
That didn’t happen.
Part of why I wanted to buy
their house was to preserve the history. And to maybe find a way to rethink my
own. I was ready to leave Charlottesville and… now I’m concerned I’m stuck here
because I feel this need to be part of a community!
Now there’s a fight in the house brewing as Mink really resents BB being here. His behavior has been changed by the chemicals in the sense that he feels more bold to try to jump on things because he sees BB can do it. At dinner time they all get along for the most part, but then it can come crashing down in a moment.
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| "That smarts" |
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