Every now and then Charles does something unexpected. Like a couple of months ago…

Dad told me he had something special to give me and I could tell he was excited about it. When we got together he handed me a manilla envelope. Inside was a typed letter explaining that he had found some of amm’s writings and chose to make copies and share with a few of us. I am not sure how you made the short list of his mailing list, but I am happy I made it.

I feel it was a big step for him. Her thoughts on paper are so personal. And opening. And raw. It was a big step for me.

I love seeing her writing typed out on her old typewriter. Somehow it makes the writings more natural. More amm. Oh, that typewriter. I haven’t thought of that for so long. I loved writing and playing on her typewriter. Using the eraser pen and corrector and thin paper. Wow – that was a tangent. Now I am thinking that as I type this, the keyboard is making the “clickety-click” sounds. And when I was first in the hospital with amm when she was in Saskatoon I was typing on my laptop for work, and she was writing in her notebook. And she wrote down “clickety-click”, because she was writing down the thoughts she was having at the time. The things she saw in her hospital room. What she heard. And now I am sitting here crying, because those were some of the last words she ever wrote. Wrote out. Out on paper. Pencil to paper. But I was with her. I was with her. Even then her writing was more child-like – big and round. At the time we didn’t have answers yet…just feeling terrified.

Ok. Time to stop this one.