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If the Patterson family left, I would stop reading the comic strips and wouldn't need to get the paper. I absolutely loved the song you had April sing for the 24 hr. marathon. It was fabulous!! Thanks too for getting Elizabeth and Anthony back together. Loved how you had it happen. Thanks for a great strip filled with love, life and all the joys that come with it.

Mary Ann C, Lincroft NJ

I was distressed to see Elly peppering Grandpa Jim with so many questions, yesterday! Of course he keeps saying "NO"--it's the easiest way to fight off people's efforts to get him to communicate. They need to TELL him things--share news, sit quietly together, and generally help to "fill his cup". Too often, well-meaning people "empty the cups" of ill and physically challenged people, by prodding them to produce commentry and inforation. That is an huge request! The challenged individuals will communicate if and when they choose. "Listeners" need to be patient!

Mariana T

Kudos to you, Lynn, for creating characters and storylines that we care so very much about! As evidenced by all the Coffee Talk, we often have differing opinions about where you are taking them (or perhaps where they are taking you!) but that is just more proof of how real they have become to us.
When Michael was near the completion of writing his first book, I began wishing it was a real book so I could read it!

Karen, VA

Hmmmmm... Jim has an awful lot of pills in his medicine cabinet, doesn't he? I think I see where you're going with this based on reading some of the articles about your dystonia. What sticks in my mind is tha the fact that you're in a lot less pain after you stopped taking a certain prescription. I'd say that Jim's condition will soon improve after his drug regime is re-evaluated. Just don't make his miracle cure TOO miraculous. That would tend to transform two befuddled but well-meaning women into callous, shiftless ogres to too many pairs of eyes.

Paul J

I am rather amazed at all the negative reactions to Jim and Iris. I have been in a similar situation with my granparents and parents. My grandparents moved in with my parents years ago, while I was still living at home. I can't even begin to tell you how diffucult this was on all involved. Later, my grandparents had to be moved to a resident care facility because we were no longer able to provide adequate care ourselves. Why can't we look at the humorous side of growing old? Isn't laughter the best medicine? If it weren't for finding some things my grandmother did (due to dementia) funny, we'd do nothing but cry all the time. The best story is when my grandmother took out her dentures, for no apparent reason, threw them out the window of the car, and my grandfather (unaware she had done that) backed over them! I'll never forget the day I found bits of grandma's dentures in the driveway! I couldn't keep a straight face when I told my mom that we might want to clean the teeth out of the driveway. We both just about died laughing. I'm grinning right now as I write this. I'm sure there will be those that will think I'm some kind of heartless witch-but warped as it is, it's a memory that I'll always laugh about. I don't think it's disrespectful to portray Jim acting the way he does sometimes. Seems true to life to me. My other grandmother had a stroke too. She did not survive it. As we age we don't stay as sharp as we once were. It's sad. But that's life. Seeing the funnier sides of life helps those of us left behind, or caring for our elderly, carry on. I hope this story makes at least one other person laugh...I'm sure we all have stories like this.

Jessica

This weeks strip about Jim and Iris disturbs me because you have said you will have everything remain in status once you go into hybrid form in September. While this might be great for not having to age everyone, I think this is too much for poor Iris. To never have Jim get better, to be constantly having to deal with that. That is a horrid fate to leave Jim and Iris in. I know you said in interviews that Sept. didin't leave you enough time to wrap up strips, but please, wrap this up.

Laura R, Boulder Creek, CA

In Q & eh?, you state "Canada shares many holidays with the US and the world, however there are some that are unique to Canada and other British colonies." This implies that Canada is currently a British colony.

The last part should read "Canada and other former British colonies." Canada is not a British colony. It has been an independent nation since 1931, when the UK Parliament enacted the Statute of Westminster.

John Paul P, Scottsdale, Arizona, USA

Thanks John Paul - good point! -Steph

Oh my God. Shame on you. First you have Shannon standing on a table to deliver a speech that, in any real high school, would have subjected her to a hail of crinkle-cut french fries ... then you show Elly calling Grandpa Jim a "two-year-old."

Newsflash: those with disabilities are not magically graced with insights and protections not afforded to us mere mortals. Neither are they children, to be condescended to and spoken of in the third person while they're in the room. They are *people,* with the difficulties and failings and graces that the rest of us have.

How about showing that you understand that? For someone with a disabled niece, you don't seem to.

Kate, California

I'm not sure, but I think I have been reading FBorFW since the very beginning. April is my favorite, because Elly and I were pregnant and the same time, and both of our daughters were born on April 1st, 1991! I've often suspected Lynn of having a secret camera in our home -- our daughter cut her own hair the day before April did, and happened to fall out of a canoe the week after Farley died rescuing April -- same parental heart attack! And, I suspect, my daughter and April probably have had similar boy issues . . .:-)

Re: Liz and Anthony. Yah! I'm happy for them both. 'Nuff said.

Diane B, Sandy Springs GA

Lyn, I don't know if you have a lot of male readers, but I've been reading your strip since I was in college. About the same time that Michael was breaking up with his first serious girlfriend, I was breaking up with my first serious girlfriend, and it stuck a chord with me that brings me back to your strip over and over. You've always done such a good job of "keeping it real" with your characters and their life situations.

I haven't enjoyed the last few weeks much though. I know the strip is undergoing some changes and that all takes time as things settle down into their new routines and all, so I'm eagerly awaiting the future of the strip.

What bugs me are two things: the unrealistic storyline with Liz and Anthony and the way Jim's character has become unidimensional. Jim used to be such a rich character, full of peace and love for his family, he was an integrated part of the Patterson family. I remember when Elly's mother died, how realistic and natural his reactions seemed. I felt like I was grieving with him. And when he found love again with Iris, I was actually happy for him, as if he was a real person.

Now, he seems like the butt of bad jokes. Lyn, even profoundly disabled people can have meaningful storylines that aren't smarmy or plucky. With Jim and Shannon, I really wish you would make them more real and their lives more realistic. My son is profoundly deaf, but his life is just like everyone else's except he can't hear. He grows, he learns, he loves, he works, everything just like everyone else. Soon he will graduate from college. We are very proud. I would be great if the disabled characters in the strip could be drawn not just with pity or admiration, but with love and compassion.

The Liz and Anthony thing, well, if my daughter was as needy and "unlucky at love" as Liz is, I would want her to get counselling before getting into another relationship. And if she wanted to bring home a guy like Anthony who let his first marriage die out without trying to fix it, who wasn't divorced yet before trying to start a relationship with her and who didn't seem to care at all for his first wife, I would seriously try to talk her out of seeing him.

Neither character is stable enough for a serious relationship at this point in their lives.

And I worry that April is moving in the same direction as Liz. She lets her boyfriend do the meanest and most disrespectful things and she still likes him? Both of the Patterson girls need therapy.

Mark, Youngstown Ohio

I've always loved your comic and have every book that has come out! Since I don't have a husband or kids of my own, I don't identify with Ellie per se, but probably more with Elizabeth (we've both had tortured love lives!) I was so happy when you brought Liz and Anthony back together, I had tears in my eyes -- then I was embarassed, because I thought, "geez, get a grip, it's a cartoon!" But, I can't help it! I want to see them happy.
On a side note, I recently did a TV interview for my arts program on Jan Eliot of "Stone Soup" and she had lovely things to say about you!

Karen C, Portland OR

Thanks Karen - we love Jan too! Stone Soup is a great strip.

I just wanted to tell you how much I have enjoyed the strip over the years. As to the way you have handled the stroke - that's just the way it is. I don't think people realize how families don't know and don't see what happens to a person when they have a stroke. As a nurse I have seen this over and over. Just because a stroke victim can't speak doesn't mean they can't hear or think. Such a frustration it is to have - as my friend calls it - "stroke brain". As to your other subjects about families and kids, you do it all well. I was sorely disappointed to hear about you cutting back, but for your sake it is probably a good thing. Go - enjoy life - and share with us as much as you can. Perhaps something about retirement?? After all, John and Ellie can now participate in that part of life with you! Thanks again!

Verlaine C

Dear Lyn and friends,
This is huge for me to be able to talk to the creator of the mirror of my life. a bit religious really.
I have lived and reflected the reality of our joint lives as 70's novitiates, 80's grinding experts, 90's confrontations with our own realities, and naughties with god only knows next. My name is peterson and my life is patterson.
But Lynne, it is not just the twee situation between elizabeth and anthony which grinds (like surprise surprise - guess who was always gonna take the safe road home with Lizzie) Lynne PLease shift the holier than thou -wordy-I-am-such-an -intellectual of Michael from the pathway forward in carrying the cartoon. That is hardest to take. This is the little rotter that was a beast to Mum and a wonderful lively challenge to the world of parenthood. Why hve you dampened him and more importantly why is this dampened state the one that finishes the cartoon. Please please please do not leave us to this boring mediocre under 30 year old sharing his memoirs...

Carol, Australia

Jim and Iris's story reminds me so much of my own family. My maternal grandmother suffered from dementia and my mother was her primary caretaker. Both Grammy's sisters suffered from Alzheimer's Disease, which also runs on my father's side of the family.

This past February we lost my beloved Aunt, my dad's sister, to Alzheimer's. She was only 68. Through the three short years we knew she had the disease, we learned that humor is a great way to deal. There would be times when someone, and she, would get so frustrated that we would just laugh. She would begin to laugh too, and it always resulted in a hug.

Tears as well. There was a strip recently where Jim was swearing at Iris, and she retreated to the living room to look up something in the book, finding that his reaction was normal and it even had a name. Her tears were my tears...sometimes just having a name for something makes it easier to deal with.

The hardest thing in the world to deal with is to have someone who was so vital and alive suddenly become helpless, complicated and frustrated with the world. Sometimes we say things we don't really mean, so do they.

Lynn, you've done so well portraying all of the varied emotions that come with the changes in life. Keep up the good work.

Right now, I need to go and wipe some tears.

Wendy, Pennsylvania