cassie's post from yesterday.

Today my older sister described a moment in which she knew: It is time to go. And I knew exactly what she meant. And then I starting thinking…that feeling. That IT IS TIME TO GO feeling. That is in our blood.

Cheesy but true: I envision sometimes- 100 years ago- some sparkly eyed McIntosh or Walsh man woke up in a small grey cabin on a big green shore, he read the newspaper, suddenly felt the full weight of the pending war and knew: it is time to go. Everyone thought he was crazy. He got on a boat.

Fifty years later in Canada: our frugal, tough as nails in work/love grandmother, she looked at her abusive husband circling the pond with another woman again , looked back at her tiny blonde children, and knew: it is time to go. Everyone thought she was crazy. She got a divorce.

Twenty years later in Providence: our father played his final hockey game and graduated from Brown, everyone said- join a sports team bobby- get a desk job bobby! And he looked at Jenn, and at the same small town where he grew up and the same game that had brought him so much, and he knew: it is time to go. Everyone thought he was crazy. And he drove south.

And now something inside of us strikes us suddenly, strongly, irrefutably, and we just know: IT IS TIME TO GO. And everyone thinks we are crazy, and maybe we are, but hey- craziness channeled the right way means extraordinary---- so we will marry the wild emotional egos of our grandfathers with the grounded, calculated ambitions of our grandmothers to show that.......high risks mean high returns- even the financial analysts can't deny that one.

So Congratulations- my sister is realizing the dreams of our ancestors.....! She is, yet again!, a wonderful inspiration to me and many others.

::::::

written by my sister, cassie.

ciao, cassandra.

Sent at 11:05 AM on Wednesday
Cassandra:

Cassandra by Robinson Jeffers

The mad girl with the staring eyes and long white fingers
Hooked in the stones of the wall,
The storm-wrack hair and screeching mouth: does it matter, Cassandra,
Whether the people believe
Your bitter fountain? Truly men hate the truth, they'd liefer
Meet a tiger on the road.
Therefore the poets honey their truth with lying; but religion—
Vendors and political men
Pour from the barrel, new lies on the old, and are praised for kind
Wisdom. Poor bitch be wise.
No: you'll still mumble in a corner a crust of truth, to men
And gods disgusting—you and I, Cassandra

Sent at 11:14 AM on Wednesday
me: hahahahahah

eternal optimist

I say: Dad I have to get a mouth guard because I grind my teeth at night.
Father says:
funniest thing I've heard all day.

perks of being a boo.

after three and a half years this is what our conversation has come to!

why my sister is my sister:

good good monday

we're all in this together.

(that's how strong my love is)

oh happy canada day.

breakfast on the raft,
lake of bays, ontario.

:: the mythical woman keeps watch ::

partial reunion this sunday.

one sixth of the herd is visiting!
she is the second little one on the left.
she is stopping by to see Jackie and I on her way to fiji (so jealous).

back story

compare & contrast.

fall 2005.

graduation, spring 2009.

graduation.

cassandra jane graduates tomorrow.

three sisters. two parents. two grandparents.
cousins, second cousins, great grandparents.

the optimism of our ancestors is realized in us.

my family: a brilliant, kind, grounded group of people.