What I hope to achieve by all of this

Why have I started writing journal style on a public setting?

Is it to make my family's eyes roll right on out of their heads?
Is it because I am a special snowflake and think my words are important?
Is it because I am bored and angsty?
Do I need money and I have to work irregular hours because of my irregular household?
Is it because being a writer is my secret hope have been to scaredy cat to give it a shot?
Is it because if I don’t try my brain will just be turning it over and over anyway?

Yes. Yes to all of these.

Repressed Artist. 8 year old pic. I thought I was so cool looking ;) Bless my late 20s heart.

The topics I want to zero in on are

Special needs parenting

Tulsa history and culture

Interviewing women who inspire me

AND THE BIGGIE

I am going research and write my Grandfather's story. Jim Hara is a mystery, a Goliath and a skeleton in my closet. The Hara side of the family is 75% skeletons but he is the most documented and the most outwardly dramatic. First up he changed his last name from Haire to Hara. No one knows why. Who does that?

His military career as a Naval aviator in World War II is jaw dropping.

1944-1945

I have half a dozen commendations of this caliber.

His love letters that he wrote to my Grandmother at the same time as he was completing these missions.

"Take care of yourself, darling, and be good like me. Don't Study too hard and keep 'em happy. Regards to all, Love Jim xxx"

His rise out of first generation Irish poverty to be President and CEO of Skelly Oil Company. His attempt to keep it from being absorbed by Getty and to keep it in Tulsa.

I will need to cross reference history books, the letters his medals, interview anyone who knew him and is still alive and ultimately visit the USS Yorktown down in Corpus Cristi.

I am going to have to drum up some of the Tulsa Oil industry elites so if anyone wants to help me approach millionaires and billionaires about my Grandfather I would like some help.

I would also like some encouragement. Because I am a special snowflake who needs head pats.

Comments

Susan

If you know me in real life. You know one indisputable fact. I am a graceful gazelle of poise and dignity. Balanchine wishes he choreographed something as elegant me lumbering around with one kid on piggy back, 6 shopping bags, both kids backpacks in my teeth, one shoe on and wearing a tee shirt with holes and stains. This is not a new development. I've always been a beacon of art in motion. Me right now. I've been wearing this shirt for 3 days. There are running jokes in my family about me falling down stairs all the time. There were running jokes at the barn I grew up in about me falling off horses all the time. The day after I got my drivers license at 16, I had a car accident in front of my house at a stop sign. (Don't ask.Just imagine something stupid and that was probably it) I've lost track of the number of times I've had to get random stitches on my face or jacked up my ankles playing some game in inappropriate footwear.. ...

Achilles, Wherein I make it all about me

Let's start with a laugh. Because the rest of this exercise aint no joke I think people falling is funny. It’s a quick cheap laugh. Like a fart joke or a dog getting its head stuck in the trash can. LOL that person ate it. I'm that person and I have always been that person. It's a knee jerk being a jerk reaction. Mama tried to fix me early on but alas the instinct was too strong. Buuuuuuut if I give it 2 seconds of empathetic thinking I’m the ass here not Joe Blow McClumsey. I am the one making light of someone getting hurt. I consciously or unconsciously am making the choice to separate myself as better than that person on the floor. If it's not a human can I still laugh? Next up in my understanding of the problem is the middle school stage of development. I fall and get laughed at. I feel the pain of the injury and the insult. It’s embarrassing especially when it’s in front of people I want to like me. In my old age I can say “Self, You fell. Ev...

Unstructured Time: Thunderdome

School scheduling is our happy place. Kids know the expectations and the rhythm. They would never admit it but they are much more comfortable in that routine as well. Everyone gets a break from each other. Everyone has different things to do but in safe places with familiar people. Room to breath. Copacetic. I am admittedly not good at enforcing an internal structure. Or horrible at it. F- I should pray for the intersession of my high school's saint. Saint Rita of Cascia: patron saint of lost causes, motherhood etc. Sidebar: Ain't that a kick in the head. Lost causes and motherhood. Well played Vatican. Well played. Example.The kids need to burn off the energy and get some fresh air. I can have everything set up to go to the park. One of them throws a fit about going to the park. I scrap the plan. Because I am a coward like that. I don't have the strength of character to say to pull off that coveted parental "My way or the Highway...

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