100 Eyes (Illustration Homework #2b) (Patreon)
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Matt and I have been showing his dad around Portland for the last couple days. After flying from England to Vancouver (The Canadian one), training from Vancouver to Portland, and going 53 hours without sleep, he is holding up surprisingly well! I'm endlessly fond of my father-in-law, he's a burly Australian expat with a sharp mind and kind eyes. It would be remarkable enough if he were the only person I knew who had survived a single plane crash, but he has, in fact, survived several (working for a British news channel to cover war torn countries in the 80s will give one those kinda experiences, I guess). I look at him and I can see my husband's face in 30 years.
This is his first, and most likely only, trip to Portland to see the life his son has built out here in this backwards foreign country over the last seven years. Not from lack of caring, of course! But England is pretty far away from the United States and he's got some younger kids he's still raising and he kinda sorta hates flying on airplanes with a fiery passion (God only knows why!). So we've got him for just over a week, a week for Matt to share his city, his home and his life as an adult. Matt's been in a tizzy of anxiety about it, fretting that he won't see the Portland that Matt does, that it won't mean the same thing to him. And I tell him sweetie, he doesn't need to experience this place like you have, he's here because he loves you and wants to create a memory of where his son has gone.
He's not too fond of Flapjack (our horrible cat) and I can't hardly blame him.