(no subject)
Well, Brady’s officially on his way out to Colorado, for good this time, leaving behind only the song lyrics stenciled on his ceiling, a couple holes in the wall, and a well-thumbed, bookmarked copy of Cannibis Culture magazine, sensitively left on the breakfast room table for my dad to stumble across.
I got him some charcoal pencils & various kneaded erasers for his going-away present -- he randomly started taking up hand sketching a couple weeks ago. He’s pretty decent, too, especially for having no experience or drawing instruction of any kind. Most of his stuff’s stylized, definite influences of Seth & the tattoo culture -- abstract curlique designs turning into tentacle-like protuberances with horns, things like that -- and he gets some really nice depth to it sometimes, gets it to pop off the page.
He & Mum were up til two in the morning last night packing the truck. It was touch & go for a while as to whether everything was going to fit, and as it is, he’s barely going to be able to tip his seat back for a cat nap at rest stops (no hotels because he doesn’t want to leave the truck alone in a parking lot with all his worldly goods). This morning, they finally managed to wrestle & cram the futon mattress in on top of everything, and then the truck didn’t want to start. It took five or six tries, the rest of us standing around with farewell smiles frozen on our faces, knowing how upset he was going to be if, after all this, he couldn’t leave for another couple days waiting for the mechanic, but finally it roared to life & took off. To return an hour later because he’d forgotten his pillows, but then it was truly off into the wild blue yonder with him.
For all that he’s been a total asshole to everyone and especially to my parents for the past couple years, he’s gotten a lot better recently, and either way I’m really going to miss the kid. I always thought of him as one of my best friends until he went really nuts, and even so…well, hopefully Colorado & independence will snap him out of it completely, and we can go back to being good friends, albeit long distance.
He’s one of the very few people I can just kind of let go around, when he’s in a normal mood; something about being the only two siblings left at home those last couple years, something about being the two youngest and neither quite as overachieving as the older two…he’ll call me on my bullshit, very bluntly, and he recognizes it when he sees it, and I do the same for him, although he generally doesn‘t pay much attention. His judgment on some things about me is awful -- oh, the friends he’s tried to set me up with, the first one a crack head and the second a pot-head-Pitt-flunking-anti-terrorism-major -- but I feel like he’s one of the very, very few people who knows me, without sugarcoating. Seen me at my absolute worst and still likes me, somehow. There’s been a TON of arguments between us over the years, especially recently, which also meant a lot of forgiveness on both sides in order to be still on speaking terms, which is a pretty powerful bond, and something I'm grateful for. Yes, in many ways he’s still a complete jerk right now, but underneath that somewhere there’s a nice guy waiting to float to the surface.
Hopefully, in Colorado…
I got him some charcoal pencils & various kneaded erasers for his going-away present -- he randomly started taking up hand sketching a couple weeks ago. He’s pretty decent, too, especially for having no experience or drawing instruction of any kind. Most of his stuff’s stylized, definite influences of Seth & the tattoo culture -- abstract curlique designs turning into tentacle-like protuberances with horns, things like that -- and he gets some really nice depth to it sometimes, gets it to pop off the page.
He & Mum were up til two in the morning last night packing the truck. It was touch & go for a while as to whether everything was going to fit, and as it is, he’s barely going to be able to tip his seat back for a cat nap at rest stops (no hotels because he doesn’t want to leave the truck alone in a parking lot with all his worldly goods). This morning, they finally managed to wrestle & cram the futon mattress in on top of everything, and then the truck didn’t want to start. It took five or six tries, the rest of us standing around with farewell smiles frozen on our faces, knowing how upset he was going to be if, after all this, he couldn’t leave for another couple days waiting for the mechanic, but finally it roared to life & took off. To return an hour later because he’d forgotten his pillows, but then it was truly off into the wild blue yonder with him.
For all that he’s been a total asshole to everyone and especially to my parents for the past couple years, he’s gotten a lot better recently, and either way I’m really going to miss the kid. I always thought of him as one of my best friends until he went really nuts, and even so…well, hopefully Colorado & independence will snap him out of it completely, and we can go back to being good friends, albeit long distance.
He’s one of the very few people I can just kind of let go around, when he’s in a normal mood; something about being the only two siblings left at home those last couple years, something about being the two youngest and neither quite as overachieving as the older two…he’ll call me on my bullshit, very bluntly, and he recognizes it when he sees it, and I do the same for him, although he generally doesn‘t pay much attention. His judgment on some things about me is awful -- oh, the friends he’s tried to set me up with, the first one a crack head and the second a pot-head-Pitt-flunking-anti-terrorism-major -- but I feel like he’s one of the very, very few people who knows me, without sugarcoating. Seen me at my absolute worst and still likes me, somehow. There’s been a TON of arguments between us over the years, especially recently, which also meant a lot of forgiveness on both sides in order to be still on speaking terms, which is a pretty powerful bond, and something I'm grateful for. Yes, in many ways he’s still a complete jerk right now, but underneath that somewhere there’s a nice guy waiting to float to the surface.
Hopefully, in Colorado…