Trey's

My close cousin, Trey Stevens, decided to jump off a radio/cell tower to kill himself on July 4th.  He lived in the country outside of Seguin (where I was born).  I'll miss him, especially on Thanksgiving.  He's one of three people that I had a special connection with, loved to be around and looked up to all at once - the other's being Rob Bailey and Brian Elmore.  My dad makes four :-)

He had a degenerative hip that was just unbearable for him.  He had some other issues too.  I posted a couple posts back:

The world isn't all painful... but sometimes the pain is more than one can bear.  Thankfully, I'm okay, but I understand pain... even with the best family and support there is.

  The painting in that post was called "hurting".  When I did that painting I was contemplating what sort of pain/misery it would take to end one's life.  It wasn't at all an expression of how I was feeling.  I've been doing really well.

What you see in the picture is Trey's rock garden.  His mom told me that he'd sometimes be laid up in bed a week after working "a" rock.  The garden reminded me of something Van Gogh might do.  I so wish I could have gone to see Trey in that tiny house and talked about the garden.  Maybe we could have gone to find some big rock somewhere.  That is the kind of thing I love to do and really really really wish I could do with Trey.  There's just so many nutty artist types in the world and we could talk crazy talk with each other and be crazy.  I've always been more comfortable and had more fun with semi-nutty people.  Wish he would/could have stayed on this side of the edge.

PS: It's my parent's 45th anniversary.  Heading to Surfside to meet the Mary Ellen Dix family.  Heard Will brought "the boat".