Jim in France, Donna at Home

A marching band in San Marco Square – this one always made me smile

Portait of me and YES he added weight!

In my dream, Jim Innes, beloved college drawing and painting prof, dear friend and scribbler of yurs truly, had just died. He’d been living and painting in France these last years. A friend from high school, (Tom, who in real life didn’t know or know of Jim) was taking care of/cleaning up the man’s estate – his worldly possessions. Amongst these were a few sculptures I’d done way back in my college days. Jim had brought them along when he moved from the U.S. to Ceret, a small town near the Spanish border. I’d no idea that he'd had gone through all the trouble of moving these big pieces all the way across the ocean and was mondo flattered and touched.

Jarringly, Tom's first words to me were NOT I’m sorry to give you sad news but Jim’s passed – nope. They were, I found these things of yours. Obviously they’ve no value so, if you don’t come pick them up, they’ll be tossed.

Yes, all this was delivered in the most sneering, you’re-less-than-nothing, tone of voice. Ouchie!

my recent bunny headed nude

Where’s this shit come from?

In Wakey-Wakey World, in the lead up to the last disgusting presidential election, Tom had gone all condescending, knee jerk BernieBro on me. I posted some utterly factual (with links to reliable sources!) pro-Clinton pieces (not mentioning Sanders, let alone slamming him, at all). Tom emailed me, accused me of talkin' out my ass and then scolded me for posting rumors and propaganda (Dude, check out my footnotes, my links fer fuck’s sake! These are the actual facts!). The most scornful, god-you’re-an-idiot tone was taken.

I really don’t understand his motivation. Did he honestly think that, if he talked far enough down to me and put just enough derision in his text, I’d feel the Bern? After the election, Tom and his wife moved to France. Lucky him, he held dual citizenship so this was, relatively speaking, an easy-peasy thing to do. Meanwhile, the rest of us, the majority of Americans who voted for the smart broad, stay and we fight.

So yeah, Tom and I aren't in contact anymore. I’m sad that, though we’re both Lefties, we couldn’t have common ground. I’m happy that my other BernieBro chums took a less scorched earth attitude.

Back to Jim Innes – in real life, he died in 2009 down in coastal South Carolina where he’d lived ever since retirement in the early ‘90s. After I graduated and moved to Boston, we kept in touch with regular phone chats. During the wild tides of life, our connection foundered and, of course, that makes/made me sad (Hell’s bells, what doesn’t make me sad lately?!). I miss our talks, his advice and just laughing together.

In my less than humble opinion, I think he’d like what I’m doing now.