Raffey,
Brave and wonderful Kentuckian old woodworker, the equally wonderful women who preceded you are proud of you.
You wrote a play perfectly, described the story so well, it touched me deeply, beautiful in its bittersweet beauty.
It touched me for all this, for your greatness, for the great love between two loved ones, and because I also lived with my younger brother - practically a son of mine - who fought cancer at home, surrounded by his family, until he , being without strength, drugged, I had to call an ambulance to take him to the Cancer Institute of the University of São Paulo. In honour of him and our love, I published “Palliative”* on Medium.
"I readied for retirement and downsized like a champ (move over Marie Kondo, I am the downsizing queen)".
I don't watch movies on TV, Netflix or any other program; I was curious to know what "downsizing queen" is: I bought the book. I'll find out.
"I was just like them; we'd led un-believable lives. But our stories were true. I did all that, I knew all those people, I went to all those places, I did all that work and so had my grandmothers ".
"Reading those journal pages is like reading a book".
"And so, I am neck deep in a work of art. This journal of mine has a life of its own and is turning into a graphic book, cross fertilized with essays, photo album, scrapbook. I can't possibly live long enough to complete the required artwork.
Yes, you, with the energy that exudes from your words and deeds, will live to see your various “revised and updated editions”.
But for my sake, who will be turning 88 in 40 days, please publish the first issue soon!
"They need to be digitized, but my litle digitizer will take hundreds of hours' time. I looked up digitizing services and cannot afford it".
Bicho was the first to offer you support. Many will want it too; and in this troop I enlist, with as little or as much as I can help.
Congratulations, Raffey, and thank you so much for publishing this beautiful and charming trailer for your book