May angles lead you in mother of Pat.

how can i feel so much for people i have never seen. my dear friend pat as lost her mother, and somehow i feel like i have known her all my life. i wish i could simply put my arm around her shoulder and we would sit and cry together.

May angles lead you in mother of Pat.

just a little bit of hope

You look everyplace for something. Some hope that we will all make it though this shit on our road of life. I think maybe if we can all come together to create something beautiful maybe that can be our hope. We can carry it with us like a shinny penny in my pocket. When I am down I can take it out and remember those who are also in pain like me. I would never forget.

i miss my own grandpa

i miss having someone to look up to. someone's shoulder to rest my head on when i am blue. Someone to tell me a story about when things were different. Someone to make me feel o.k. with the way things are now, but to mostly give me hope for the future. Someone to play with me when I am happy, and to cry with me when I am sad. I miss having a person of my own. Not someone on loan. not someone who should be someplace else. just someone who should be with me.

just stay strong kiddo

Budist thought of the day:

"But if you do not find an intelligent companion, a wise and well-behaved person going the same way as yourself, then go on your way alone, like a king abandoning a conquered kingdom, or like a great elephant in the deep forest." - Buddha...

I like that. It makes it o.k. to be alone, maybe special even. I like to think that one day will find my well-behaved companion. Until then an elephant I will be.

some days

i just wake up wondering how much my heart can hurt before it just explodes inside my chest. i got to do something to be happy. it might be talking to you or maybe just being left alone. just wait and see..

Do i look like i have been hurt? Well i probably have. Do i look like i have been crying? Well i probably was. You might notice, or you might just keep walking. It really does make a difference what you do. Just remember I have also had good days, no matter how far between. I also have people that love me, no matter how many of them are gone. And maybe if you remind me of those things instead I wont have many reasons to cry.

timeframe??

When i hear about those who are told, your loved one only have X amount of time left, i wonder why thats not me. Nonna has got no standard of life left- she sleeps almost all day, she only wakes up to have a fit at me or one of the nurses. There is no getting better, there are no good days left for her. She has been fighting this for at least 7 years now when will her time come??

I dont know how i will deal with this if things are the same when i have to go back to school. Can I really just go back like everything is ok, because things wont be ok with me here- nobody will visit her. I told myself at the end of the school just to go home and spend time with her now because the end is near, but what if it is not near at all?? and i cant even say this stuff with out wanting to burst into tears.

20 Years

For 20 years I have been in the world. It may not seem like alot to most people, but it to me. I have changed a lot in those 20 years. I have been draged though alot in those 20 years. I hope maybe in my next 20 years I can be ME FOR ME. I hope I change more. I hope others can learn to see me not as a child anymore.

just a poem

on the window sill sits a bottle
child-prof the lock pops he
fishes out a small pill maybe one maybe two
three four
cork pops bottle of chianti
scrached glass filled to wash down
the little circles
rocking back forth back forth sips again and again
body calms as veins fill
watched from so close but seems
far
she hopes she wonders confused
glances not to catch atention
walk slowly past him
step faster now
grab

copd

i have started using a copd chat room. i will add these kind people to my mental list of people to "hope" for. I worry that once again i have joined a group i dont really belong in. I am still young for all of this, and in a way i wish i never had to know anyone who has the problems that most do in this chat room. But then again i know they are kind people. i think i can bring some hope to them.

not going to the nursing home tonight was good, but i find myself missing her. i have gotten used to the nights with her and the other people at the nursing home. i dont like much being home home. it hurts just as bad.

deformed babies and scared firefighters

today at work i photographed some very deformed babies in the morning and then a firefighter who hardly survived a fire in the afternoon. not to say i dont love my job, but its just hard going from that to the nursing home no wonder i am to depressed to move by the time i get home at night...

maybe tonight someone else will check on nonna and i can rest, that would be nice...

my heart rots with anger, guilt, and sadness. so much that my hand shakes and my stomach churns. i wish i could snap my fingers and make myself feel differently. maybe when she finds peace- i have to just keep thinking that.

i am sorry if i hurt you. know i didn't mean to. know its only because i hurt as well. i am sorry.

head on your shoulder

i would like to just rest my head on your shoulder feel safe in your arms
know i am loved
i would like to be myself for myself and not for anyone else
maybe i could breath freely with my head on your shoulder
because you know more about what has happened then the rest of the world
you feel pain to
you feel hurt to
you feel loss to
maybe i just want to know i am not alone
and resting my head on your shoulder well that would be all i would need
just for a minute can i?

Thoese eyes

I used to look into those eyes from about 3 ft shorter. I would look up and thing how wonderfull this woman is. So strong, and brave. Always there for people she loves. I have grown and her eyes have become empty. They search every day for some truth, and when she finds it she does not believe it.

I will hope that some day she finds the truth she is looking for, and she goes home to the place where she is the woman I used to know. The woman I will allways look up to.

sadness anger and what else...

My uncle who is 64 years old and has had so many health probelms is smoking again. I dont even know if i can say he ever even stoped. He had tripple bi-pass allready and many other operations but his health has been very poor. He is killing himself. His depression is bad, really bad. He is upset about nonna all the time. He talks about bringing her home sometimes. He is trying to drag us down with him. I cant take it. I used to look up to him, but now whenever i think about him i just want to throw a punch. I dont know how to handle it anymore because he DEFINALY does not respect me. To him I am a child nothing more. I dont hardly matter in his life so how can i go about talking to him about this stuff?

that was one long day

June 13th huh, well it dident go as i had planed. I woke up this morning shaking and felt as if i could throw up. I am going to make myself sick if I don't give myself some slack for last night. I am going to try because i know Nonna would want me to be healthy and happy.

87 Years, The Story of a Mad Italian Woman

87 Years, The Story of a Mad Italian Woman

Authors note: I decided since Nonna’s birthday is tomorrow that I would write a short version of the biography I hope to one day write. It’s nothing I would ever publish, but its something I would like to do, and have to pass down to other generations, so that all my children will know Nonna though her story.


June 13th 1920, the year women got the right to vote. Problem was when this baby was born she wasn’t in America. Caserta, Italy a very small town outside of Naples is where Fortunata Pascrell and Antimo Ratzano had Angela Ratzano. She was the forth child, and the only girl. Antimo had a farm, and Angela’s brothers were allowed to work on it when they got older. Angela often refused to go to school just to stay and work on the farm, because that’s what she loved to do. She would sing the most beautiful songs to her brothers as they worked and they loved to have her company.

They never had money for much, and when it came time for her to marry it was another poor farm boy who won her over. Nicola Capasso didn’t have much to offer her but they on a day in August they walked to the church to be married. Only a year later that had a son, and then 3 years later had a daughter. They lived the simple life in Italy, never any money, just living off the earth. They wanted more, not for themselves but for there children. Little Vinchenzo was just 7 and Filomena was just 4 when the moved to the United States. It wasn’t hard for them to learn the new language but Angela and Nicola struggled.

They moved around a lot at first, living with family or friends just to get by. Angela worked at Syracuse China, and Nicola worked with a trading company and was not around much. It was hard for Angela to make enough just to keep her kids well fed. They had been in the states 3 years when they had another child. Nicola insisted they name her Angela. It was clear that this child would have advantages that the others did not have because she was born in the United States. She grew up around a brother who fought in Vietnam, and a sister who married at the age of 16. Her father, Nicola, died of brain cancer while she was just 13.

Angela jr. went to high school unlike the others, she attended college unlike the others, and she even graduated law school. Nonna Angela’s job was not over yet. She moved in with Angela jr. when she had her second child (Stefanie aka ME!). She cared for both of Angela’s children like they were her own. She took them to school in the morning and tucked them in at night. She told them stories how what her life in Italy was like. She told them about there grandfather, and his quite and stern ways. She taught them to love, and to cook for people you love. She taught them to never give up on something you care about.

This is my Grandmothers life. I couldn’t thank her enough for what she did for me, and for what she did for my family. I will never forget it. Thanks for taking the time to read this. It means a lot to me.

i miss her. i miss him. i miss the way it was. its not good to live in the past though. must think about the future. Or better yet lets just get though tomorrow. Then I can look at the next day. Thats not to bad, just make it though each day. Then before i know it time will have passed...

thankfull

today i am thankfull for:
- three grandfathers: I may never have meet you but you brought my family to this country for a better life, and for that I am thankfull; I miss you everyday, but you gave me something so great, the ability to love endlessly; You have been a friend and a family member with endless suport when i have felt lost- i wont ever forget that.

why do i feel like the only person who cares about the little family we have created in the caregiver chat/message boards. whats wrong with this world when the one group that you thought you could count of to be caring can only cause more pain on each other...

i curl up into a ball in order to be safe. safe from the wars i been wagen on myself on my family and on my enimies. fightin every day just to stay alive just to keep kicken and scratching my way though this thing called life. i face you every moment in my dreams in my reality, because its allways about you. the way i act the way i am its because of you. this war you been wagen on yourself you cant win. you got no place to go but down noplace to hide noplace to run. i can hold your hand till the break of a new day but it wont change a thing. you wont be going noplace. its the end of yourtime and the start of mine. thing is i keep hiding away from it. away from the chance that i might miss you to much. your not letting go because i am not ready. i cant do what you did. i cant hold it together like you did. what do you want from me. just 19 huh well thoese years they turning fast. those steps they big. i may not know what i want but i know what i have to do. i got to stand up off this and act. my loooove loooove loooove. its why i hate. i love so much that what i hate things that hurt my love. its because of love that keep me hiding from what i love. keep me curled up becuase i am afraid of loosing what i love. this world of love and hate really brings me to this place of fear.

its ok

"try not to get worried, try not to turn onto problems that upset you
dont you know that everthing, yes everthing is fine"

Work was good today. I had an opertunity to work with new people. I went on another Child abuse shoot. Its sad going there, but in a weird way i feel good. Seeing how far i have come i guess. Tomorrow i will be going to a clinic to photograph a lot of children and there clief pallets. Sounds gross but its not bad, i am excited.

thanks to everyone from the chat, you guys give me a lot of hope.

it hurts

every time she looks at me with her empty face. it hurts me every time she asks who i am. it hurts that she remebers my uncle and my cousins who she doesent see very offten. it hurts because i care for her i see her every day i changed my life for her but she cant remember me. how do i know that she even loves me anymore is she does not know me?

i want to remember when she loved me, but that was a long time ago. i was a kid, everyone loves a kid. she doesent know me now. how do i know she loves me now? its almost like she is allready dead.

harder to wake up

She is getting harder to wake up. When i got there this morning it took almost 5 mins to wake her up. She started to move a little then she seemed like she could not open her eyes... or maybe she dident know how to, i dont know. She still eats she still can walk very little, i dont understand what all of these things mean. Is she going to drift away from me at any moment? Or is she going to be here like this for a long time... and do i even want that?

is it...

she left the milk out. haha she is 49 and she left the milk out. she forgot that i told her i was going to be home late today. she is stressed. its just stress. dont even imagin. dont even think of the posability. 49. its early right. to early. she is fine. i am fine.