Tag Archives: family

Family History, Word of Mouth

Spent the day with grandma and grandpa, which means I have tons to say, and even more to reflect on when it comes to life, work, love, and family.

On the surface my grandparents may seem to have the typical 80+ snydrome where you talk alot about aches and pains and how everything sucks. But once you finish lunch, put away the dishes, and gather around the fireplace with them, that is when the magic happens.

Sometimes, I admit, I set it off on purpose. I’ll ask a leading question, maybe because Ive got my camera ready to record the magical response… I’ll ask: So how old where you when you started working grandma? And she won’t give me a second look… no hesitation… she breaks right into “Oh.. me… 9 years old. I was nine years old and my father made me guide the cows because the cows never knew where they were going and it was during the olive harvest and …” She goes on and on for hours. And you know what? I don’t mind one bit.

Maybe I’ve even heard half the stories already.. but I don’t care. I want to hear them again. I want to burn them into my head. I sometimes catch myself daydreaming while grandpa talks.. picturing how I will tell my children about their great grandparents. I’ll tell them the stories about the wine harvest and the great-great grandfather who was the town poet… it will all be told as if I was there. Because I will adopt these stories as mine.. because when it comes down to it.. they are.

To Get My Groove Back

I’ve been a blogger for over 5 years. So you figure lots of things happen to me, my life, my general mood, and the obstacles I face, that don’t always come accross in text. (maybe audio.. and probably video!)

Despite the fact that I tell stories and give my personal opinions. I don’t always write “Im sad” and that sort of thing, both, because I don’t think it is important, and because I think there are bigger fish for me to fry on this site. (thats actually the same reason, i love how i can write in circles) But here’s a rare revelation… I’ve been on a down cycle lately.

That’s a wishy washy way to say I lost my inspiration.. my will to fight and write and plan and plot and whatever it is that I do as a fledgling personal media un-pire. There was sickness. There was aging. There was job loss. And somewhere in there all manner of emotional bad stuff. All of which made me question every single act of my daily life and my lofty goals.

I can tell you this now because I’m starting to return to what I think is.. good form. It will be a long road.. but step one begins Thursday:

In order to get my groove back, I will return (for a visit) to my roots.. my ancestry.. my other country and a large chunk of my family and friends: Portugal. Most importantly I will spend days with 2 people who together made an enormous difference and influence on my life and personality.. my grandparents.

You may have seen the videos in the past. I’ve been working on a modest audio and video archive of them and their stories.. to keep for future generations and for my own personal enjoyment. And yes… to share, sometimes, with the internets. So stay tuned, thursday I make that oh-so-familiar trip to Lisbon, and for two important weeks, I’ll be travelling on that road… towards getting my groove back. (no matter how corny and cliché it sounds).

bmtv24 My Nephew Has Rhythm


Click To Play

Time to start going through the archives and putting together vlogs from the past few months. This one is for all the A-Ren fans… brace yourself.. he’s got a guitar and he’s not afraid to use it.

Explaining The World to my Nephew

Just got off the phone with my dear brother in New Jersey… asking about how things are going for his household, and of course, my dearest 2 year old nephew known as A-Ren. Throughout the latest events transpiring between Israel and Lebanon, I’ve been thinking about how people explain things to their children, or what lessons children learn by observing the behavior of nations. Although it’s not really something a 2 year old needs explaining, I can imagine at the more inquisitive ages, say 5 or 6, kids will have lots of questions about why things are happening this way or perhaps they will in some way be effected in the long run, in terms of their behavior in relation to conflict.

Photo Hosted at BuzznetThat said, the following is a brief letter from ME to A-ren… which I imagine him reading maybe when he is 6 years old or so. If you don’t like the letter, please keep in mind, it’s not for you.. it’s for my nephew, and the internets can read it if they want to.

———-
Dear A-Ren,

Hi buddy. I write this email to you from the year 2006.. summertime actually. I’m over here in Amsterdam, and I know you’re over there in New Jersey, swimming alot and playing outside. What you probably don’t notice, but lot’s of people are watching – is the news. All over the world people are pretty concerned, as alot of people are in danger and really scared.. while other people are very angry and trying to hurt them.
I know when you read this, you’ll be in elementary school, and learning new things everyday. You’ll have lots of friends to play with, and sometimes maybe some children will not be nice to you. There might even be another little boy or girl who try to make you mad, take things from you, or hurt you in some way.
Other kids might tell you to do something bad to them.. to be mean to them back. You might even get really mad and feel like throwing something at them in the playground.. or pushing them. But I want to give you some really important advice:

When you get really mad like that… take a deep breath. If you feel like yelling… yell. If you feel like running.. run. But if you feel like hurting someone… do not do it. I know how it feels to be angry with other people… I had that too in school. I would get very angry and stamp my feet and yell alot. To tell you truth, I even used to bang my head against the wall when I got angry… pretty dumb huh?

The important thing to always remember, no matter how angry you are, is that hurting someone will not make it better. And if you do hurt someone, you are now just as bad they are, and they might want to one day hurt you back to get revenge.

Speaking up for yourself and standing up for yourself is very hard sometimes, and lots of people will tell you it is important to do it. But there are different ways to do it. Some friends might tell you that in order to stand up for yourself, you have to hurt others. The bad thing is, now you’re hurting someone, and maybe you’re behaving just as bad as the other boy or girl.

Anyway, I’m sure your dad told you all about this. But when you watch the news sometimes, you might see something different. Grownups have lots of disagreements, and lots of them think that hurting others in order to stop them from hurting you is the best answer to fix disagreements and stay safe. No matter what you see on TV or hear from other friends, this way of doing things is no good. The sad part is, they’ve been doing it this way for many years, and they still think one day it will work. The really really sad part is, they keep hurting each other, and many people get hurt.. and even die.. because many grownups don’t learn from the mistakes they made before… just like on the playground.

I hope this isn’t too much advice from your old far-away uncle. I just want to make sure you know that you’ve got lots of help whenever you have a problem, and with a family like ours, we can find the right way to solve it- together.

love,
Uncle BM

Sometimes You Just Miss Family

My family members are pretty avid readers of blog. At least as far as I know. I try never assume that they are or aren’t reading. But I can tell you it’s been a world of help in keeping in touch.. for a boy that has lived across the ocean for the past 5 years. 5 years!

Years and numbers and family came to mind today as I had lunch with BlondeButBright. Truth is, BBB and I don’t see each other that much, but I’m one of her biggest fans in this life. Over some good soup we talked about how time passes here in Amsterdam, and we meet people who remind us of ourselves when we arrived. Sometimes thats a good thing, other times there’s just nothing more annoying then seeing yourself.. again and again. I think it has taken a toll on both of us. But we’re still hanging in, and we agreed that we still love this town and what we’ve done with our years here… it’s a work-in-progress.

She spoke of going home for much of the summer and I admit to yee the blog readers that I’m jealous. It seems like it would be great to be able to be back in New Jersey for a spell, with my parents and my bro and little A-Ren who now says “stop” when he thinks something is too much. Come to think of it, it would be great to be able to be in Portugal for a while and be with my grandparents, as grandpa goes for some important yet routine eye surgery. Is anything routine when you’re in your 80’s?

But back to my point, I wish I could be in these three places right now, and ultimately that is not possible and therefore, somewhat saddening. Time passes. Families grow and get older. I start to wonder if I’ve spent my time correctly; made the right choices, or if I’ve missed some of the most important moments with some of the most important people in my life… my family.

Then again, like BBB and I spoke about today, lots of things are happening and the way things are now is not how they will always be.

In the meantime, I pick up the cross word puzzle out of the newspaper every morning at work. I find time to try and do the puzzle.. not because I like crosswords, but because it is what my father does, and we always do together when I’m home. We’re connected you see… it’s a direct line through the crossword puzzle on a six hour time difference.

postscript thingy: happy birthday to my compadre the mindcaster, few hours late, but it’s the blog-thought that counts.