You're goddamned right!

A couple weeks ago, when the new windows were being installed, I asked Dad if I could paint.  I mean, we have to change some things.  He said that I could.  I got super excited and went out right away - got my colors, my brushes and pans, everything.

I still haven't painted.

Today, I finally got off my ass and started doing some of the prep work.  You know, before you paint you have to clean the walls, make sure you get any cobwebs, etc.  Especially if you have dogs.  This also meant general cleaning.  Which meant that I had to deal with the bags of clothes that have been sitting behind the couch since about a week after Mom died.  Hrm.... I'm pretty dense sometimes, but that might be why I haven't painted.

Tacky, right?  You would think that since they were RIGHT THERE that either Dad or I would have just dealt with them already.  Nope.  I am a master of ignoring something if I choose to.  So I walked past those bags, every day, multiple times a day for a couple of months.

I managed to ignore them for the first part of the day.  I've been attempting to push myself into doing things by thinking, "You *have* to do this" but that doesn't work, because immediately the other half of my brain is like, "Eff you, I do what I want!"  It's a goddamned circus up in my head sometimes.  Anyway, I worked around them.  The washer was fixed, so I took the couch blankets down and started washing them.  Which meant that the couches needed to be vacuumed, etc.  I sorted a lot of my craft stuff that I had left laying about.  Put the couch blankets in the dryer, came back upstairs.

First thing I see are those fucking bags.  Well.  I guess it's time to do this.  I got a trash bag, and started going through everything.  Saved a few fuzzy socks that I'll wear, and a couple of old t-shirts that I know either myself or my sisters will want later.  Ran across several shirts with tags still on them - and so many pairs of sleeping pants.  I mean, an insane amount of sleeping pants - at least as compared to the number of shirts.

See, when Mom first got sick, she would wear lounge clothes around the house.  And if we got her anything to wear, we would get those cute sets.  You know what I'm talking about - the ones with the matchy matchy tops and bottoms.  As she started getting worse, she started losing movement.  Further down the line, she had muscle contracture in both her arms and her legs.  Dressing her in those pants was painful for her.  With her legs bent all the time, they made her sweaty and uncomfortable.  She hated them.  Therefore, she did not wear them.

I had a fight about it once with a nurse.  She copped an attitude with me about the fact that Mom didn't wear "diapers" (fuck you lady, we call them underwear, she can still hear you) regularly and that we didn't put pants on her.  I had to remind her again that Mom wasn't stupid, deaf, or dumb.  That the only reason Mom didn't talk to her is because she didn't like her.  That Mom said she didn't want to wear the freaking pants, and we were NOT going to make her.  I mean good christ on a crutch - leave the woman alone!

I know - sounds stupid and depressing - but a good memory came out of that one.  I finished my somewhat polite rant, the nurse had this look on her face, and Mom says, a little slurred, but very clear, "Damn right!"

I'm still grinning from that memory.  So now they're sorted.  I'll drop off these bags, and as it's just getting cold someone who needs them will have some warm fuzzy sleeping pants. And a few Eddie Bauer shirts that still have the tags on them haha.

You're goddamned right!!

Thank you, and fuck off.

This shit is bananas.  Just for the record - in case anyone was wondering, anywhere in the world.  Fuck. This. Noise.

The holidays are fast approaching.  This will be the first Thanksgiving in years that I haven't cooked.  We won't be at our house, we're going to my best friend's house.  Which is best in the end.  I don't know that Dad could handle being home.  Hell, I don't think I could handle being home.  Not without a giant bottle of wine. Or you know, vodka.  But that's just one hurtle.  Then we have to find a way to get through Christmas.  Then New Year's. Then then then.  It's never ending.

People ask me how I'm doing.  I tell them I'm fine.  I mean, I am really - as fine as I can be.  Though some days?  Some days I want to scream at them that my feelings are none of their business.  That I don't owe them any of my emotions.  I don't though because I can at least recognize that is an irrational reaction.  Then something else comes up, and I calm down.  And we start over.

There really have been many more good days than bad.  It's just this time of year.  "BE THANKFUL!"   How about fuck you?  I'm not feeling very thankful at the moment.  Probably not gonna happen tomorrow either.  Yeah, I'm sure I could wax poetic on the fact that I have my father, my sisters, and my friends.  And I do.  I don't ignore that.  I just can't be thankful.

Thankful for what?  The ONLY thing I am thankful for right now is that mom isn't in pain anymore.  Other than that?  I say again, Fuck You, Universe.  I am not thankful that one of the best women in the world was utterly destroyed by a freaking disease.  I'm not thankful that myself, and my family, spent the last 13 years watching her waste away.  I am not thankful that we had to watch her die. I refuse to be thankful for any of it.  I don't give a damn about your cliche's - or your religious platitudes.  I don't want to hear about god.  I don't want to hear about how I should look at the positive things and BE FUCKING THANKFUL.  I'm not thankful.  I am angry, sad, and perhaps - a little belligerent.

Nope.  Thanksgiving can suck it.  The universe can suck it.  This whole fucking season can suck it. At least for right now.

Plans

I've touched on the weird freedom issue I've been having.  It's really hard to explain to other people.  For so long it was imperative that I be close to home, so that if something happened I could be there in a trice.  When I got out of work, I would immediately go home.  I needed to relieve my Dad, who had been there all day.  On the weekends, we had to take turns.  If one was out, the other had to be home.  One of us was always there with Mom, B.M.D.  April helped us out as well - if Dad had appointments during the day, etc.  She was a godsend.  Still is really.

That was the norm.  I would get frustrated by it, and then feel guilty for being frustrated by it.  I would get into a mood where I was chafing at the bit - I was ready to be away from there.  I had moments where all I could think was, "I don't want to take care of anyone, anymore".  Then I would feel guilty about that.  I would see the way my Dad cared for my Mom.  I would remember the way she cared for us.  That would be all it took.  Now?  I remember those feelings and get overwhelmingly sad, because I would do it all over again for another thirteen years to have her back.

When I get out of work... I nearly always immediately go home.  Oh, I've not gone home right away a couple of times, to spend time with important folks.  But my routine is almost the same.  I want to change it, but I don't really have it in me to just go sit somewhere with a bunch of strangers.  I don't want to go spend money at a bar.  I don't want to be surrounded by a bunch of people even if I do know them, because my head and heart are still shaky, and my mood swings can be fairly epic.

There has to be some middle ground.  Something I feel like I can work towards, but doesn't make me so extremely uncomfortable.  Don't get all self-righteous on me either - I'm not planning on hermiting for the rest of my life, I promise.  I just have to do this my own way.

My thought is this... I have *always* wanted to travel.  Mom and I would talk about the places we wanted to go, see, and touch - but we never had the money for it.  Of course she thought I was crazy for wanting to see some of the places on my lists, but it didn't matter.  I think this will be what I work toward.  I mean, I don't have piles of money just laying about to start spending on travel.  I can start saving though, a little bit at a time, so that when my head and my heart are a little less shaky - I can go.

After the holidays, I may get a second job - I have time now.  And that little bit of money can go right into my travel savings.  I think Mom would approve. She may not physically be able to see and experience things with me, but she'll be there.  I'm going to update my passport this month - that will be my first concrete step.

Speaking of lists - these are a few of the places I want to see

Russia
Czech Republic
England
Scotland
Norway
Finland
Iceland
Croatia
Hungary
Syria
Iran
Morocco
Namibia
Columbia
South Africa
Alaska
The Black Hills
Wisconsin - shush, House on the Rock and the Dells
The west coast
Arizona again
New Mexico
Vancouver
New Zealand

So many more.  Maybe I'll just work as much as I can in order to travel for the rest of my life.

One, singular sensation...

I'm already bad at keeping up with this. Go figure. We're having some improvements made to the house. New windows in front, new fans, and I'll be painting. Which is all awesome, and it needs it. I just hate how we got here.

Part of that required my Dad to clear out his room. Particularly the stuff right by the windows. I helped him move the organ, polished it up, went through the music books. That was hard. So so many memories of Mom playing that organ, and singing old show tunes or old time songs. My Aunts joining in, lyrics being changed just because.

Six foot two, eyes of blue
Oh what that six foot could do!
Has anybody seen my guy?

That will always be the way I remember that song. Never in its original state. Or Mom randomly belting out at the top of her lungs in the store with:

ONE! Singular sensation, every little step she takes!
ONE! Thrilling combination, every move that she makes
One smile and suddenly no-body else will do...

I need to learn to play that organ. Those books, the ridiculous songs, all of it were so much a part of a happier time for us.

My house needs music again. I think I'll be on a silly music binge for a while. If you dig that kind of thing, belt out a tune sometime in public. Do it for the memory of a true show stopper, the one, the only, Barbara Lynn Gerke Longamore!

Liza had jack on my Mom. Anything from Cabaret to Oklahoma to Guys and Dolls.

Or singing competitions on base, with 8 year old me, in front of the PX on St. Patty's Day. We did "When Irish Eyes Are Smiling". We won something, I couldn't tell you what. I just remember her looking at me with a big grin and saying, "Let them hear you munchkin, we're gonna have a blast!"

"Mom! People are going to stare at us!"

"Munchkin, they're going to look anyway, may as well give them a show!"

So we did.