All Souls' Day

Annie with a hat

As humans, we come from multiple ancestral origins contributing to the genetic cocktail that helps shape our characteristics, likes, dislikes, interests, etc. In our recent history, my family knows of a particularly strong Scottish influence named Sarah. Sarah was my great-grandmother and when her husband abandoned the family in the early 1900's, she raised five boys on her own, financially supporting her brood by doing domestic work - cleaning houses, doing laundry and mending. From what my grandfather said about his mother, Sarah was frugal, stubborn and determined. Well I guess she had to be. Poor woman, like many other families at the time, after all that work raising those sons, two of them died overseas in the First World War.

Today being "All Souls' Day",  I am thinking of Sarah and others who have gone before me and feeling lucky I know a bit about these people. I try to forgive myself when I am not the person (yet) that I want to be. The biggest thing to remember is unlike my paintings which can be completed, I will ALWAYS be a work in progress, or just "a piece of work" some days.