Grandmas and others who died, live in the branches of trees outside family homes. When John was in Vietnam he talked to the country people who saw and talked to groups of their family members in the trees. I’m wondering if these people were Hmong, whom I’ve heard were saddened to leave the mountains of the east to come here, because their dead loved ones stayed behind.  Native peoples from Australia, native North Americans, and a few Euro Americans I’ve met, converse with those not yet born into their families as well as  family people who have “died”.  Several of my friends exhibit a longing  for their dead Grandmas. My friends’ arms, back, and legs are tattooed; a living art exhibit of family faces, dates, and symbols.

Around the picture below are painted bamboo loops, the life cycle. The picture itself is drawn on cancelled postage stamps, a symbol of moving from place to place. We see one of the worlds available to us, a body- family- house  type thing under a cloudy sky, beside a tree full of not leaves or fruit but family.

I wonder if we lived before this life in families, if we have a funeral or a baby shower type celebration as one of us leaves that grand place, to take our turn here in this “veil of tears?”  nancymauerman.com

Grandma In A Tree – Framed