Today my mom would have been 70. Unfortunately, she passed away far too young at only 51. I and my younger siblings were all still teenagers. I wonder sometimes what our relationship would have been like as adults. I have never had the option of calling my mom to ask for advice – by the time I left home, she was confined to a hospital bed and on a ventilator, unable to talk. I expect, had she lived longer, that there would have been some rocky times as I found my own place in the world. But I am sure she would have been proud of me, and of my brother and sister. For starters, we all cleared the “don’t join a weird political cult in your 20s” bar.
But I also think she would be proud of the things we have done too. My brother for all of his self-taught craft and home repair skills, and for working to get into the navy, and making a success of it, despite the skepticism some may have felt about whether the military in any form would be right for him. My sister for getting her accounting degree, keeping music in her life and raising a kid. And me for making the most of each career opportunity which came my way, while also doing a bit of art here and there. I know she’d be proud of all of us for the travel we’ve made part of our lives, and which she never had the chance to do.
And I wonder if she, like our dad, would be slightly bemused to learn that all of her children, to one degree or another, have a fountain pen collection. My dad gave me her old Montblanc this year, and I cleaned it up and got it back in working order. She bought the pen when she was working for a printing company doing editing in New York, and it was one of her prized possessions. Given the use if got, and its age, it’s in pretty good shape. So I used it, and my new Visconti QWERTY to do a portrait of her.
The tools:
Source and finished portrait side by side:
And the portrait by itself:
As I do each year, I pour a glass of wine in remembrance of my mom. However, I don’t go all the way and get boxed wine like Franzia. I’ve got a decent bottle of Bordeaux, with a good percentage of Cabernet Franc, one of my favs:
