I have been trying for over an hour now to update this blog.
I feel like I have plenty of things to say, but two problems keep coming up.
The first is that I don't feel like I'm particularly funny anymore. I used to be able to crank out three or four rants in a sitting, and find them rather clever and well-written, with at least one turn of phrase of which I was particularly proud. But lately I can't even make a joke about infomercials, which is saying something.
The second problem has to do with a promise I made to myself, one I made, if I'm honest, in part to get my therapist off my back. I promised myself I wasn't going to be such a negative person. That I was going to try to lighten up a bit, try to be humorous without being sarcastic.
It's a lot harder than I thought. I'm not sure what it says about me that I can't be funny without being mean. I don't like the thought. I have always thought that I was just generally a rather clever person. I didn't concern myself with the fact that I was overly sarcastic.
I'm starting to wonder if I've ever been funny at all, or if it was just rudeness. If it's the latter, that's sort of an earth-shattering revelation. My sense of humor is an integral part of who I am. I don't like to think that rudeness or nastiness are such a big part of my personality.
Am I a negative person? I've never really thought so, but lately I've started to wonder. I don't want to be a negative person. I want to be clever and funny without risking offense. I wonder if I can.
But I think I've mostly decided that, if I can't be funny sans sarcasm, I simply won't be funny anymore. I want to be a happy person. I want to be the sort of person that my family can be proud of, that others will be drawn to.
One thing I've learned about myself over the years is that I am capable of doing very hard things, of living through hard things and becoming stronger for it. Lately I feel I've had more than my share of hard times, and I do wish God would back off a bit. But if this is the lesson that I need to learn, I'll learn it.
Maybe I won't be funny anymore. But I am going to try to be happy. I am going to try to be positive.
I should probably start by getting up before noon.
Showing posts with label grief. Show all posts
Showing posts with label grief. Show all posts
11 September 2009
30 August 2009
Yesterday
Yesterday was an anniversary of sorts for me.
It marked one year since my father had a massive stroke.
One year ago yesterday morning, he was driving me to the bank. One year ago yesterday afternoon, he would never drive me to the bank again.
He didn't die right away - he lived for another 11 days, first in the neuro ICU at St. Joseph's, then at a hospice in Mesa. But in my mind, he died on the 29th. That was the last day that he was himself. The last day that he was awake.
Yesterday I looked at the clock at 3:45, at 4:30, at 6:15, at 7:20. I could remember clearly what I had been doing a year ago at each time: balancing my checkbook, talking to my mother in hushed tones about what we should do for my dad's headache, calling an ambulance, sitting in the ER at Gilbert Mercy waiting for news.
My mother was waiting for news. I think part of me already knew what the news was. I knew when the paramedics called out his blood pressure - 60 over 40 - that he was gone.
Knowing didn't make it any easier on Monday morning when a doctor, one of my dad's neuro-oncologist's lackeys, told us my dad wasn't going to wake up or recover. Nothing in the world could have made it easier, because they were talking about my father, and telling me he was gone.
I miss him every day.
It marked one year since my father had a massive stroke.
One year ago yesterday morning, he was driving me to the bank. One year ago yesterday afternoon, he would never drive me to the bank again.
He didn't die right away - he lived for another 11 days, first in the neuro ICU at St. Joseph's, then at a hospice in Mesa. But in my mind, he died on the 29th. That was the last day that he was himself. The last day that he was awake.
Yesterday I looked at the clock at 3:45, at 4:30, at 6:15, at 7:20. I could remember clearly what I had been doing a year ago at each time: balancing my checkbook, talking to my mother in hushed tones about what we should do for my dad's headache, calling an ambulance, sitting in the ER at Gilbert Mercy waiting for news.
My mother was waiting for news. I think part of me already knew what the news was. I knew when the paramedics called out his blood pressure - 60 over 40 - that he was gone.
Knowing didn't make it any easier on Monday morning when a doctor, one of my dad's neuro-oncologist's lackeys, told us my dad wasn't going to wake up or recover. Nothing in the world could have made it easier, because they were talking about my father, and telling me he was gone.
I miss him every day.
09 August 2009
Happy? Birthday.
Today is my dad's 53rd birthday.
I remember his 51st birthday. It is, in fact, seared into my memory more clearly than almost any other day of my life. That was the day we found out he had a brain tumor.
I remember his 52nd birthday as well, although not quite so clearly because it was a good day. My mom had made a banana-flavored cake and my dad had finally found a good pair of non-bulky cargo pants at Mervyn's. We talked about the year before and how this birthday - and every birthday after it - were, by default, better than the year before, because what's worse than a cancer diagnosis?
We found out the next day: a terminal cancer diagnosis. They gave him three months. He got three weeks. And suddenly my dad's 51st birthday seemed like a great day, because he had been alive. Now every birthday after his 52nd is, by default, worse, because it means that nearly a year has gone by without him, and there are days when that thought alone is almost too much to bear.
I hate that all these thoughts come up on his birthday. I hate that I can't just take this day to be happy that he was born, happy that I had him as long as I did. I know there are people worse off than I am, people whose fathers died younger and more tragically than did mine.
But he was my daddy, and he is gone, and I miss him, and today is his birthday. It's hard to think of anyone, and anything, else.
I remember his 51st birthday. It is, in fact, seared into my memory more clearly than almost any other day of my life. That was the day we found out he had a brain tumor.
I remember his 52nd birthday as well, although not quite so clearly because it was a good day. My mom had made a banana-flavored cake and my dad had finally found a good pair of non-bulky cargo pants at Mervyn's. We talked about the year before and how this birthday - and every birthday after it - were, by default, better than the year before, because what's worse than a cancer diagnosis?
We found out the next day: a terminal cancer diagnosis. They gave him three months. He got three weeks. And suddenly my dad's 51st birthday seemed like a great day, because he had been alive. Now every birthday after his 52nd is, by default, worse, because it means that nearly a year has gone by without him, and there are days when that thought alone is almost too much to bear.
I hate that all these thoughts come up on his birthday. I hate that I can't just take this day to be happy that he was born, happy that I had him as long as I did. I know there are people worse off than I am, people whose fathers died younger and more tragically than did mine.
But he was my daddy, and he is gone, and I miss him, and today is his birthday. It's hard to think of anyone, and anything, else.
10 June 2009
Nine months
Yesterday (the ninth) marked the nine-month anniversary of my father's death.
I can't believe it's been nine months. Some days it feels like it's been years since he's been gone. Other days it feels like hours. I can still remember everything very clearly - the day he died, and the eleven days before it. The day he lost consciousness (August 29th) is especially clear in my mind. In some ways it feels like he died that day. His brain did, I suppose. He had the stroke on Friday. When my mom and I saw the MRI on Monday, we knew he was gone. The doctor said the white areas were dead spots. The image was blanketed in white spots.
I knew earlier, though. On the 29th, when we couldn't wake him up. We called 911 and the ambulance came, sirens blaring. I met the EMTs in the driveway. They came in. They took his blood pressure. It was 60/40. When I heard those numbers, I knew then and there he wasn't going to wake up.
The EMTs had my dad strapped to a stretcher. They asked if we had a hospital preference. They took him away. That was a Friday. One week later, in the hospital, the nurses took out his breathing tube. Again, an ambulance came. They took him to the hospice we'd visited earlier that week.
On Tuesday, September 9th, another ambulance took him away. They didn't use sirens that time.
How has it been nine months already? Where did the time go? I've done so little with it. I've had so little energy.
I bought my dad a Homer Simpson card for Father's Day last year. I feel the strange compulsion to buy a card this year. Why? What on earth would I do with it? I don't know, but the urge is there just the same. Habit, I suppose. I've bought one every year that I can remember. It seems strange I don't need to buy one this year. That I'll never need to buy one again. I think my dad's birthday will be hard, too, especially since it'll mark two years since the initial diagnosis.
Brain cancer, I'd thought. Who the hell gets brain cancer? It seemed unfair. Why did it have to be my daddy? He thought differently.
"Why not me?" he'd say. "Am I so special that I can't get a brain tumor? I'm no better than anyone else."
But he was, in so many ways and for so many reasons.
I miss him so much.
I can't believe it's been nine months. Some days it feels like it's been years since he's been gone. Other days it feels like hours. I can still remember everything very clearly - the day he died, and the eleven days before it. The day he lost consciousness (August 29th) is especially clear in my mind. In some ways it feels like he died that day. His brain did, I suppose. He had the stroke on Friday. When my mom and I saw the MRI on Monday, we knew he was gone. The doctor said the white areas were dead spots. The image was blanketed in white spots.
I knew earlier, though. On the 29th, when we couldn't wake him up. We called 911 and the ambulance came, sirens blaring. I met the EMTs in the driveway. They came in. They took his blood pressure. It was 60/40. When I heard those numbers, I knew then and there he wasn't going to wake up.
The EMTs had my dad strapped to a stretcher. They asked if we had a hospital preference. They took him away. That was a Friday. One week later, in the hospital, the nurses took out his breathing tube. Again, an ambulance came. They took him to the hospice we'd visited earlier that week.
On Tuesday, September 9th, another ambulance took him away. They didn't use sirens that time.
How has it been nine months already? Where did the time go? I've done so little with it. I've had so little energy.
I bought my dad a Homer Simpson card for Father's Day last year. I feel the strange compulsion to buy a card this year. Why? What on earth would I do with it? I don't know, but the urge is there just the same. Habit, I suppose. I've bought one every year that I can remember. It seems strange I don't need to buy one this year. That I'll never need to buy one again. I think my dad's birthday will be hard, too, especially since it'll mark two years since the initial diagnosis.
Brain cancer, I'd thought. Who the hell gets brain cancer? It seemed unfair. Why did it have to be my daddy? He thought differently.
"Why not me?" he'd say. "Am I so special that I can't get a brain tumor? I'm no better than anyone else."
But he was, in so many ways and for so many reasons.
I miss him so much.
19 April 2009
Idle Hands
I’m a day early here, but I’m trying to keep to a schedule of an update every 5 days or so despite having nothing useful to say, and no ideas beyond how best to build certain animals out of Legos (which doesn't help my blog much).
A day early for what? you might ask. Which would be too bad, because I can’t hear you. But let’s pretend I can. A day early for my mother’s birthday, certainly. Monday the 20th is her 52nd birthday. Happy birthday, Mum!
Isn’t my mommy pretty?
But that wasn’t what I was referring to. In addition to April 20th being the birthday of my mother, Adolf Hitler and Luther Vandross, and the ten-year anniversary of the shootings at Columbine High School, and the 107th anniversary of the isolation of Radium by the Curies, it marks eight months since I was fired.
It was a Wednesday night, that August 20th. My manager – let’s call her “Bonia” – accused me of about fifty things I never did and then told me I was fired. The paperwork I had to sign was dated more than two weeks earlier, which says to me that one of the reasons she had for firing me – an incident about five days earlier – was just a smokescreen.
It’s just as well they fired me. They were real arses about me missing work while my father was having brain surgery. After he died they’d probably have told me, hey, it’s not like you can see him anymore, so get your duff into work. They weren’t very understanding about his having brain cancer. They seemed to feel that my concern over his illness should take a backseat to things such as sanitizing combs and sweeping floors. I guess my priorities were messed up. Clean floors are important, after all.
I’d never been fired before. I was rather proud of that fact. When I get a job, I keep it. I work hard, I do my job, and when it’s time to move on, I write a neat little letter of resignation and two weeks later I’m gone. But my employer – let’s call the salon “Bool Cuts 4 Kids” – decided, to hell with hard-working, honest people. Let’s fire the most reliable employee we have because she refuses to turn into a bootlicking kiss-arse.
Do I sound bitter? Oh, I’m bitter. I’m beyond bitter. The very thought of Sonia – er, Bonia – makes my blood pressure rise and my fists clench. She said (after accusing me of a lot of bad things, mind you) that I shouldn’t hesitate to list her as a reference, that she’d put in a good word for me. Well, I don’t know if she’s a liar or simply won’t talk on the phone, but I haven’t been able to get a job since then. Anywhere.
So, I’ve been unemployed for eight months. I’ve been a busy girl since I was thirteen years old, when I started washing dishes and clearing tables at my aunt’s restaurant. This is the longest I’ve gone aimless in twelve years. If I wasn’t working, I was going to school full-time, and there were many semesters that I did both. I’ve never enjoyed work. I like slacking off, watching TV, reading. I always thought that unemployment would suit me.
Ladies and gentlemen, let me state now emphatically just how wrong I was. Unemployment does NOT suit me. Unemployment is a rotten thing.
It worked well for me at first. Nine days after I was fired, my dad fell asleep on the couch and he never woke up. Eleven days later he died – a combination of a blood clot, an infection, and massive brain damage from a stroke (caused by the clot). Having a job would have been a complication I didn’t need at that time. I never thought that, at the age of 25, I’d have to plan my father’s funeral and write his obituary. I relished the time I had to grieve and … well, grieve, mostly.
But long about January, I started to get restless again. Bored. The quiet time I used to enjoy had become a burden. I’d wake up in the morning (afternoon, if I’m honest), have sugared cereal for breakfast, spend three hours playing video games, eat dinner, and watch TV and mess around on-line until I couldn’t stay awake any more. If the TV shows didn’t change, I’d never know what day it was. It was excruciating.
Desperate for a change and tired of 24-hour celebrity gossip, I started working on little projects to occupy my time. I started sewing again. I made five dresses and a hat, as well as curtains for my mother’s office. Sewing was fun because it meant I could go shopping (never mind the fact that I had to dip into my pathetic savings to do so). It was something to do, and it was easy to find progress. At the end of the day, I could hold up a dress and say, hey, I made this.
But I somehow lost the manual for my HuskyStar and the buttonholer wasn’t working, so, crabby and bored, I turned to cross-stitching. Again, I could easily see my progress. I went through one, two, three projects. I did more shopping. And again I tired of it. My embroidery floss kept getting tangled up. I lost count of stitches. I couldn’t find patterns I liked.
So I switched to scrapbooking. More shopping. But now the scrapbook I started is, essentially, finished, and I’m bored again. I’m even getting tired of my video games. I find myself longing for the repetitive days of up-at-eight, work-at-nine, off-at-six. While I don’t miss being covered in other people’s hair, I do miss being gainfully employed and feeling like I was contributing something to society. And the boredom is taking its toll on me.
I can’t focus on books – I haven’t read anything in months. I can’t write any more – it feels forced, and the snark that used to come so easily to me is an effort. I can’t focus on TV – only “Lost” and “24” hold my attention. I have no attention span and nothing to do – a deadly combination. I’d go back to school, but who the heck can afford ASU these days? Especially with no job and no income in the foreseeable future.
On the upside, I’ve got plenty of time to learn fascinating things about history. For instance, Tuesday is the 1,256th anniversary of the founding of Rome. People always say that Rome wasn’t built in a day. I think I could do it. It would give me something to do. Maybe I’ll start with Legos.
A day early for what? you might ask. Which would be too bad, because I can’t hear you. But let’s pretend I can. A day early for my mother’s birthday, certainly. Monday the 20th is her 52nd birthday. Happy birthday, Mum!
Isn’t my mommy pretty?
But that wasn’t what I was referring to. In addition to April 20th being the birthday of my mother, Adolf Hitler and Luther Vandross, and the ten-year anniversary of the shootings at Columbine High School, and the 107th anniversary of the isolation of Radium by the Curies, it marks eight months since I was fired.
It was a Wednesday night, that August 20th. My manager – let’s call her “Bonia” – accused me of about fifty things I never did and then told me I was fired. The paperwork I had to sign was dated more than two weeks earlier, which says to me that one of the reasons she had for firing me – an incident about five days earlier – was just a smokescreen.
It’s just as well they fired me. They were real arses about me missing work while my father was having brain surgery. After he died they’d probably have told me, hey, it’s not like you can see him anymore, so get your duff into work. They weren’t very understanding about his having brain cancer. They seemed to feel that my concern over his illness should take a backseat to things such as sanitizing combs and sweeping floors. I guess my priorities were messed up. Clean floors are important, after all.
I’d never been fired before. I was rather proud of that fact. When I get a job, I keep it. I work hard, I do my job, and when it’s time to move on, I write a neat little letter of resignation and two weeks later I’m gone. But my employer – let’s call the salon “Bool Cuts 4 Kids” – decided, to hell with hard-working, honest people. Let’s fire the most reliable employee we have because she refuses to turn into a bootlicking kiss-arse.
Do I sound bitter? Oh, I’m bitter. I’m beyond bitter. The very thought of Sonia – er, Bonia – makes my blood pressure rise and my fists clench. She said (after accusing me of a lot of bad things, mind you) that I shouldn’t hesitate to list her as a reference, that she’d put in a good word for me. Well, I don’t know if she’s a liar or simply won’t talk on the phone, but I haven’t been able to get a job since then. Anywhere.
So, I’ve been unemployed for eight months. I’ve been a busy girl since I was thirteen years old, when I started washing dishes and clearing tables at my aunt’s restaurant. This is the longest I’ve gone aimless in twelve years. If I wasn’t working, I was going to school full-time, and there were many semesters that I did both. I’ve never enjoyed work. I like slacking off, watching TV, reading. I always thought that unemployment would suit me.
Ladies and gentlemen, let me state now emphatically just how wrong I was. Unemployment does NOT suit me. Unemployment is a rotten thing.
It worked well for me at first. Nine days after I was fired, my dad fell asleep on the couch and he never woke up. Eleven days later he died – a combination of a blood clot, an infection, and massive brain damage from a stroke (caused by the clot). Having a job would have been a complication I didn’t need at that time. I never thought that, at the age of 25, I’d have to plan my father’s funeral and write his obituary. I relished the time I had to grieve and … well, grieve, mostly.
But long about January, I started to get restless again. Bored. The quiet time I used to enjoy had become a burden. I’d wake up in the morning (afternoon, if I’m honest), have sugared cereal for breakfast, spend three hours playing video games, eat dinner, and watch TV and mess around on-line until I couldn’t stay awake any more. If the TV shows didn’t change, I’d never know what day it was. It was excruciating.
Desperate for a change and tired of 24-hour celebrity gossip, I started working on little projects to occupy my time. I started sewing again. I made five dresses and a hat, as well as curtains for my mother’s office. Sewing was fun because it meant I could go shopping (never mind the fact that I had to dip into my pathetic savings to do so). It was something to do, and it was easy to find progress. At the end of the day, I could hold up a dress and say, hey, I made this.
But I somehow lost the manual for my HuskyStar and the buttonholer wasn’t working, so, crabby and bored, I turned to cross-stitching. Again, I could easily see my progress. I went through one, two, three projects. I did more shopping. And again I tired of it. My embroidery floss kept getting tangled up. I lost count of stitches. I couldn’t find patterns I liked.
So I switched to scrapbooking. More shopping. But now the scrapbook I started is, essentially, finished, and I’m bored again. I’m even getting tired of my video games. I find myself longing for the repetitive days of up-at-eight, work-at-nine, off-at-six. While I don’t miss being covered in other people’s hair, I do miss being gainfully employed and feeling like I was contributing something to society. And the boredom is taking its toll on me.
I can’t focus on books – I haven’t read anything in months. I can’t write any more – it feels forced, and the snark that used to come so easily to me is an effort. I can’t focus on TV – only “Lost” and “24” hold my attention. I have no attention span and nothing to do – a deadly combination. I’d go back to school, but who the heck can afford ASU these days? Especially with no job and no income in the foreseeable future.
On the upside, I’ve got plenty of time to learn fascinating things about history. For instance, Tuesday is the 1,256th anniversary of the founding of Rome. People always say that Rome wasn’t built in a day. I think I could do it. It would give me something to do. Maybe I’ll start with Legos.
01 February 2009
Are we done yet? Never!
October 6th (I think it was the sixth) was my three-year anniversary with my therapist.
Three years.
I think it’s safe to say that I’ve made an enormous amount of progress in that time. If you think I’m bitter now, you should have met me three years ago. I was more bitter than Dorothy Zbornak. And I didn’t just have issues. I had … a subscription.
Contrary to what I tell people, therapy is not fun. It’s not easy and most of the time it sucks. It’s hard work. The things I repressed, I repressed for a reason – they’re painful to think about, and even more painful to rehash.
But that’s not my point. My point is that it’s been three years and I still see John every week. There’s no end in sight. Sure, on occasion John will ask me what goals I have, what I want to accomplish from my hour every week. Because I am making progress, and logic dictates that eventually, I’ll work through my problems and not need weekly therapy.
Here’s the problem: in the past three years, I’ve not been living in a bubble. Things continue to happen. And that means that more problems arise.
I was making progress this year. I was doing rather well mid-summer. Then I got dumped. Then I lost my job. Then my dad’s cancer came back, and then he died. Issues galore. For every problem I work through, three more pop up in its place.
I suppose that over the years I’ve learned to deal with my problems better, which means I deal with them more quickly and in a more mentally healthy manner. But the fact remains that problems keep coming, and as long as they do, John’s got job security.
I suppose that a recession is a good time to be a therapist. People realize what utter crap their lives are and seek help. And the longer you’re in therapy, the more problems from your past emerge. No one goes to a therapist for *one* problem. Even if it starts off as one problem, the next thing you know, you’re realizing you had a dysfunctional childhood and that you’re disappointed in your college experience and that you’re been self-medicating with candy … three years pass and you’re still nuts.
But you know that you’re nuts, and so it’s a little easier – which is good, because you’re going to be nuts forever.
Cheers.
Three years.
I think it’s safe to say that I’ve made an enormous amount of progress in that time. If you think I’m bitter now, you should have met me three years ago. I was more bitter than Dorothy Zbornak. And I didn’t just have issues. I had … a subscription.
Contrary to what I tell people, therapy is not fun. It’s not easy and most of the time it sucks. It’s hard work. The things I repressed, I repressed for a reason – they’re painful to think about, and even more painful to rehash.
But that’s not my point. My point is that it’s been three years and I still see John every week. There’s no end in sight. Sure, on occasion John will ask me what goals I have, what I want to accomplish from my hour every week. Because I am making progress, and logic dictates that eventually, I’ll work through my problems and not need weekly therapy.
Here’s the problem: in the past three years, I’ve not been living in a bubble. Things continue to happen. And that means that more problems arise.
I was making progress this year. I was doing rather well mid-summer. Then I got dumped. Then I lost my job. Then my dad’s cancer came back, and then he died. Issues galore. For every problem I work through, three more pop up in its place.
I suppose that over the years I’ve learned to deal with my problems better, which means I deal with them more quickly and in a more mentally healthy manner. But the fact remains that problems keep coming, and as long as they do, John’s got job security.
I suppose that a recession is a good time to be a therapist. People realize what utter crap their lives are and seek help. And the longer you’re in therapy, the more problems from your past emerge. No one goes to a therapist for *one* problem. Even if it starts off as one problem, the next thing you know, you’re realizing you had a dysfunctional childhood and that you’re disappointed in your college experience and that you’re been self-medicating with candy … three years pass and you’re still nuts.
But you know that you’re nuts, and so it’s a little easier – which is good, because you’re going to be nuts forever.
Cheers.
06 January 2009
I need your money!
Two posts in one day, aren't y'all lucky! But I have a good reason. I need your money.
Well, not me specifically, although I'd not say no to a cash gift.
The BC (British Columbia) Cancer Foundation needs your money. I'm not a resident of America's Hat, myself, but any organization that's working against cancer is good in my book.
My brother - no, not that brother, the other one - is participating in the Ride to Conquer Cancer. Apparently he's taken up cycling, don't ask me why. But he's decided to do something with it, so more power to him, I say.
Anyway, here's the link to his donation page. If you've got an extra fiver, give a fiver. Ten, twenty, even better. Every penny helps, seriously. If you don't have any to give, pass the link along to someone who does.
Cancer killed my paternal grandfather at 62, my favorite aunt at 58, and my daddy one month after his 52nd birthday. Cancer sucks. Let's do something about it, okay?
Well, not me specifically, although I'd not say no to a cash gift.
The BC (British Columbia) Cancer Foundation needs your money. I'm not a resident of America's Hat, myself, but any organization that's working against cancer is good in my book.
My brother - no, not that brother, the other one - is participating in the Ride to Conquer Cancer. Apparently he's taken up cycling, don't ask me why. But he's decided to do something with it, so more power to him, I say.
Anyway, here's the link to his donation page. If you've got an extra fiver, give a fiver. Ten, twenty, even better. Every penny helps, seriously. If you don't have any to give, pass the link along to someone who does.
Cancer killed my paternal grandfather at 62, my favorite aunt at 58, and my daddy one month after his 52nd birthday. Cancer sucks. Let's do something about it, okay?
28 December 2008
Year in review
Warning: this is a long one.
It’s the end of the year, and we all know what that means: the media – or “the media” if you prefer to be snarky about it – will be counting down lists of the best, dumbest, and most amazing people, animals, natural disasters, and celebrity meltdowns of the past year.
Animal planet, for instance, has a special airing soon about the ten most amazing animal moments of 2008. E!’s “The Soup” will do some sort of soupy countdown as well – a clipdown, I believe they call it, since it’s all TV show clips commentated on by the delightfully snarky Joel McHale. In a recent Entertainment Weekly, Stephen King listed his favorite movies from this year. The list goes on and on.
I actually considered counting down my ten favorite countdowns, and I still may do so. But with all the emphasis on the best of things, I always get confused. I think, hey, wasn’t this in fact a spectacularly crappy year?
So without further ado, I give you my personal top ten suckiest moments/events/whatever of 2008.
10. My car. Period. This was not a good year for my car. Of course, it’s a Chevy, so no year is a good one and every mile I drive causes more and more cash to fly out of the tailpipe like it does in those commercials. I think the bloody thing’s worth maybe a grand now. But even for my bottom-of-the-line, stripped down Cavalier, this was a bad year. The EGR valve croaked. Two of my three A/C control knobs broke. It really started to get that Old Car Smell. The little ashtray-drawer-thingy snapped off. The latch on the boot broke. A tire went flat in the 3rd Avenue parking garage. The paint started peeling off aggressively. My gas mileage tanked. The belt driver (whatever the H that is) had to be replaced. The foam in the steering column hardened, causing my horn to blare randomly, frequently, and without warning – often at 2 or 3 in the morning, for five minutes at a stretch. And more recently, the battery died. A fairly new battery, I might add.
All this is just in the past year. Since I’ve owned it, I’ve also had to have the brakes fixed, a new A/C installed, the starter repaired, and the antenna reattached. And the windshield wipers replaced five times. And like four new batteries. And the stereo replaced.
My next car will be German or Japanese, I promise you that.
9. 2008 was the year that an old friend from my past made a reappearance.
Acne.
I had horrible acne as a teenager, and I was terribly relieved to find that as I entered my twenties, my skin cleared up. I had, oh, three or four good years. My skin looked great. A trifle pale, certainly. But that’s my normal hue. I could use WiteOut as a concealer, I swear it. But every so often I’d get a nice rosy glow in my cheeks, and darned if my face didn’t look fantastic.
But then it happened. Long about … oh, March or maybe April I think, I started noticing blemishes where there once were none. It started out small – a red bump here, a red bump there - one, maybe two at a time. But then a new one would pop up while the others were still out. Three zits, and then four marred my face.
By November, I was back to using a medicated facial cleanser, toner and moisturizer, the kind that peel off a layer or two of the epidermis as they “clean.” And you know what? I’ve still got acne. Five zits on my face, two on the front of my neck, three on the back of my neck, and one or two little guys behind the ears.
I’ve tried concealers and foundation. The blemishes suddenly match my skin … and I end up looking warty instead of zitty.
Sigh. Goodbye, lovely skin of my twenty-second and twenty-third years. I’ll miss you.
8. My favorite antidepressant stopped working. Oh, Zoloft. What happened? We used to work so well together, you and I. Sure, we had our ups and downs – dosages upped and downed, that is – but once we hit the right number of milligrams, it was magic, wasn’t it? I felt normal. You didn’t have many side effects – mostly headaches, and I was used to those. Together we got through beauty school and fibromyalgia, and you kept me from hauling off and hitting people (although in all fairness, most of them deserved to be hit). We were a team, Zoloft! But I flew too close to the sun on wings of serotonin. I took you for too long. And you couldn’t help me anymore.
And I was a miserable harpy again. Dr. Zenner – you remember him, right Zoloft? He said that if I leave you alone for long enough, when I go back to you, you’ll work again. And we’ll be so happy together.
In the meantime? Bupkis.
7. I met another old friend this year, one more crabby and vindictive than acne. I had my tonsils out in 2007, and I enjoyed a good nine months of good otolaryngological health. Not a rhinovirus or a streptococcal amoeba or a sinus infection in sight – and I’d been a walking strep virus for ages.
In March of 2008, I got strep throat. Well, I told myself, removing the tonsils wasn’t a foolproof solution. I did work closely with children (until #3 happened) and germs were germs. I doubled my use of hand sanitizer and turned away when someone coughed. Strep returned again in March, then May. And June. And again in November.
On the upside, that’s only four cases of strep compared to the ten a year I was used to when I had tonsils. On the downside, that’s four more cases of strep than I had in 2007.
I’m not sure what else can be removed to help remedy the problem. As soon as I find out, I’ll schedule a surgery.
6. I bought myself a shiny new Dell laptop computer back in … oh, February, I think. It came with Windows Vista installed, and I was (pathetic as it is) used to Windows 2K. But, I told myself, new is good. And I got used to the little “quirks” (bugs) that came with Vista, and I came to like it well enough.
Until October, that is. I’d installed Service Pack 1 (which was supposed to fix said quirks but brought with it two bugs for every one bug it fixed) and on the advice of Scott, my computer-genius big brother, I had Windows set to check for updates nightly.
Mid-October Windows strongly recommended some sort of antivirus update. And fool that I was, I clicked “Ok.”
That, my friends, was the beginning of the end.
This all-important, Strongly Recommended update caused my computer to commit hara-kiri. It would not start up. Start Up wizard couldn’t fix it. It would not boot manually. I could not access my files. My computer, an integral part of my life, was a $750 paper-weight. And I completely. Freaked. Out.
Fortunately, I had Scotty, my own personal Geek Squad. He employed every tool in his mental arsenal to fix my problem. He tried removing part of the hard drive. He tried hack after hack. Finally, using a CD that booted Ubuntu, he retrieved my files from Windows. And when I had them all backed up, he cleared my hard drive off, cleaned up my computer, and downgraded me to Windows XP. He also did a little research, and apparently hundreds if not thousands of people had also lost hard drives to this Strongly Recommended update.
Scotty, you saved my tuchis. You rock. Thank you for losing hours of sleep to keep number six on my list from ruining the whole dang year.
5. Did you know that people in their twenties can get gum disease? I didn’t until the über-helpful dental hygienist told me that I had it. So do you know what I did for my summer vacation? I got my gums lasered four times (and my insurance only covered three). My poor gums. They ached. They stung. They bled. They … healed. But unless I brush and floss vigilantly at least twice a day for the rest of my mortal life, it will come back. And you know what? After a treatment I couldn’t eat anything crunchy for a week. No potato chips! No movie theater popcorn! No regular popcorn!
It was brutal. Especially considering how many movies I saw this summer.
4. Numbers four and three on my list sort of tie for general suckiness, but after considering my sizeable debt, I ordered them as I did.
At the end of July, my boyfriend of four months dumped me. And he gave me the “it’s not you it’s me” routine, just like they do on television. He encouraged me to get angry with him for it and then got offended when I called him a rude name.
Things only got worse between us but I’d rather not get into that.
3. I was fired from my job of nearly two years. I hated management, but I was starting to build up a clientele and I loved working with little kids. I was good at what I did. I had seniority. I was responsible. I filled in at other salons as they needed me. I kept my trap shut when they transferred me to a salon I didn’t want to work at.
But my manager, Sonia, was (pardon my French) an absolute horse’s ass, and she played favorites like one would play a piano. And I was not one of her favorites. So she made up stories about me stealing and messing with the computers, refused to believe me when I told her the stories weren’t true, and canned me. Five days after my dad had brain surgery. Then, after she fired me – in front of a co-worker she insisted sit in on the firing – she said to me offhandedly, “Oh, sorry about your dad.”
I have no qualms about saying that if God is just, this woman will roast in hell for eternity. She treated me like manure and fired me because she could. I hate her like poison.
2. My father’s brain surgery – his third in a year – was because – I believe it was a year to the day from his initial diagnosis – we discovered that his cancer had come back with a vengeance. One month, his MRI was clear. But after he went to the ER because he was having trouble speaking and writing, they did a scan and discovered a huge tumor had popped up out of nowhere. It was aggressive, and it was going to kill him. We were told he had a few months to live, they weren’t sure exactly. They did surgery to remove what they could, and to insert chemotherapy wafers in his brain.
The surgery was on Friday. He came home on Monday night. Eleven days later he lost consciousness and never woke up.
1. Eleven days after he passed out, he died. My father. My daddy. My friend. The best, smartest, kindest, most insightful man I’ve ever known. I miss him so much that it hurts – it’s a physical ache that won’t go away. His death devastated me and I’m not sure I’ll ever completely recover. I’d give the world for five more minutes with him. One more minute. Anything.
I miss him. I don’t know what to do without him. But I have no choice. It sucks. It hurts. And it’s why 2008 will live in my memory as one of the worst years of my life.
It’s the end of the year, and we all know what that means: the media – or “the media” if you prefer to be snarky about it – will be counting down lists of the best, dumbest, and most amazing people, animals, natural disasters, and celebrity meltdowns of the past year.
Animal planet, for instance, has a special airing soon about the ten most amazing animal moments of 2008. E!’s “The Soup” will do some sort of soupy countdown as well – a clipdown, I believe they call it, since it’s all TV show clips commentated on by the delightfully snarky Joel McHale. In a recent Entertainment Weekly, Stephen King listed his favorite movies from this year. The list goes on and on.
I actually considered counting down my ten favorite countdowns, and I still may do so. But with all the emphasis on the best of things, I always get confused. I think, hey, wasn’t this in fact a spectacularly crappy year?
So without further ado, I give you my personal top ten suckiest moments/events/whatever of 2008.
10. My car. Period. This was not a good year for my car. Of course, it’s a Chevy, so no year is a good one and every mile I drive causes more and more cash to fly out of the tailpipe like it does in those commercials. I think the bloody thing’s worth maybe a grand now. But even for my bottom-of-the-line, stripped down Cavalier, this was a bad year. The EGR valve croaked. Two of my three A/C control knobs broke. It really started to get that Old Car Smell. The little ashtray-drawer-thingy snapped off. The latch on the boot broke. A tire went flat in the 3rd Avenue parking garage. The paint started peeling off aggressively. My gas mileage tanked. The belt driver (whatever the H that is) had to be replaced. The foam in the steering column hardened, causing my horn to blare randomly, frequently, and without warning – often at 2 or 3 in the morning, for five minutes at a stretch. And more recently, the battery died. A fairly new battery, I might add.
All this is just in the past year. Since I’ve owned it, I’ve also had to have the brakes fixed, a new A/C installed, the starter repaired, and the antenna reattached. And the windshield wipers replaced five times. And like four new batteries. And the stereo replaced.
My next car will be German or Japanese, I promise you that.
9. 2008 was the year that an old friend from my past made a reappearance.
Acne.
I had horrible acne as a teenager, and I was terribly relieved to find that as I entered my twenties, my skin cleared up. I had, oh, three or four good years. My skin looked great. A trifle pale, certainly. But that’s my normal hue. I could use WiteOut as a concealer, I swear it. But every so often I’d get a nice rosy glow in my cheeks, and darned if my face didn’t look fantastic.
But then it happened. Long about … oh, March or maybe April I think, I started noticing blemishes where there once were none. It started out small – a red bump here, a red bump there - one, maybe two at a time. But then a new one would pop up while the others were still out. Three zits, and then four marred my face.
By November, I was back to using a medicated facial cleanser, toner and moisturizer, the kind that peel off a layer or two of the epidermis as they “clean.” And you know what? I’ve still got acne. Five zits on my face, two on the front of my neck, three on the back of my neck, and one or two little guys behind the ears.
I’ve tried concealers and foundation. The blemishes suddenly match my skin … and I end up looking warty instead of zitty.
Sigh. Goodbye, lovely skin of my twenty-second and twenty-third years. I’ll miss you.
8. My favorite antidepressant stopped working. Oh, Zoloft. What happened? We used to work so well together, you and I. Sure, we had our ups and downs – dosages upped and downed, that is – but once we hit the right number of milligrams, it was magic, wasn’t it? I felt normal. You didn’t have many side effects – mostly headaches, and I was used to those. Together we got through beauty school and fibromyalgia, and you kept me from hauling off and hitting people (although in all fairness, most of them deserved to be hit). We were a team, Zoloft! But I flew too close to the sun on wings of serotonin. I took you for too long. And you couldn’t help me anymore.
And I was a miserable harpy again. Dr. Zenner – you remember him, right Zoloft? He said that if I leave you alone for long enough, when I go back to you, you’ll work again. And we’ll be so happy together.
In the meantime? Bupkis.
7. I met another old friend this year, one more crabby and vindictive than acne. I had my tonsils out in 2007, and I enjoyed a good nine months of good otolaryngological health. Not a rhinovirus or a streptococcal amoeba or a sinus infection in sight – and I’d been a walking strep virus for ages.
In March of 2008, I got strep throat. Well, I told myself, removing the tonsils wasn’t a foolproof solution. I did work closely with children (until #3 happened) and germs were germs. I doubled my use of hand sanitizer and turned away when someone coughed. Strep returned again in March, then May. And June. And again in November.
On the upside, that’s only four cases of strep compared to the ten a year I was used to when I had tonsils. On the downside, that’s four more cases of strep than I had in 2007.
I’m not sure what else can be removed to help remedy the problem. As soon as I find out, I’ll schedule a surgery.
6. I bought myself a shiny new Dell laptop computer back in … oh, February, I think. It came with Windows Vista installed, and I was (pathetic as it is) used to Windows 2K. But, I told myself, new is good. And I got used to the little “quirks” (bugs) that came with Vista, and I came to like it well enough.
Until October, that is. I’d installed Service Pack 1 (which was supposed to fix said quirks but brought with it two bugs for every one bug it fixed) and on the advice of Scott, my computer-genius big brother, I had Windows set to check for updates nightly.
Mid-October Windows strongly recommended some sort of antivirus update. And fool that I was, I clicked “Ok.”
That, my friends, was the beginning of the end.
This all-important, Strongly Recommended update caused my computer to commit hara-kiri. It would not start up. Start Up wizard couldn’t fix it. It would not boot manually. I could not access my files. My computer, an integral part of my life, was a $750 paper-weight. And I completely. Freaked. Out.
Fortunately, I had Scotty, my own personal Geek Squad. He employed every tool in his mental arsenal to fix my problem. He tried removing part of the hard drive. He tried hack after hack. Finally, using a CD that booted Ubuntu, he retrieved my files from Windows. And when I had them all backed up, he cleared my hard drive off, cleaned up my computer, and downgraded me to Windows XP. He also did a little research, and apparently hundreds if not thousands of people had also lost hard drives to this Strongly Recommended update.
Scotty, you saved my tuchis. You rock. Thank you for losing hours of sleep to keep number six on my list from ruining the whole dang year.
5. Did you know that people in their twenties can get gum disease? I didn’t until the über-helpful dental hygienist told me that I had it. So do you know what I did for my summer vacation? I got my gums lasered four times (and my insurance only covered three). My poor gums. They ached. They stung. They bled. They … healed. But unless I brush and floss vigilantly at least twice a day for the rest of my mortal life, it will come back. And you know what? After a treatment I couldn’t eat anything crunchy for a week. No potato chips! No movie theater popcorn! No regular popcorn!
It was brutal. Especially considering how many movies I saw this summer.
4. Numbers four and three on my list sort of tie for general suckiness, but after considering my sizeable debt, I ordered them as I did.
At the end of July, my boyfriend of four months dumped me. And he gave me the “it’s not you it’s me” routine, just like they do on television. He encouraged me to get angry with him for it and then got offended when I called him a rude name.
Things only got worse between us but I’d rather not get into that.
3. I was fired from my job of nearly two years. I hated management, but I was starting to build up a clientele and I loved working with little kids. I was good at what I did. I had seniority. I was responsible. I filled in at other salons as they needed me. I kept my trap shut when they transferred me to a salon I didn’t want to work at.
But my manager, Sonia, was (pardon my French) an absolute horse’s ass, and she played favorites like one would play a piano. And I was not one of her favorites. So she made up stories about me stealing and messing with the computers, refused to believe me when I told her the stories weren’t true, and canned me. Five days after my dad had brain surgery. Then, after she fired me – in front of a co-worker she insisted sit in on the firing – she said to me offhandedly, “Oh, sorry about your dad.”
I have no qualms about saying that if God is just, this woman will roast in hell for eternity. She treated me like manure and fired me because she could. I hate her like poison.
2. My father’s brain surgery – his third in a year – was because – I believe it was a year to the day from his initial diagnosis – we discovered that his cancer had come back with a vengeance. One month, his MRI was clear. But after he went to the ER because he was having trouble speaking and writing, they did a scan and discovered a huge tumor had popped up out of nowhere. It was aggressive, and it was going to kill him. We were told he had a few months to live, they weren’t sure exactly. They did surgery to remove what they could, and to insert chemotherapy wafers in his brain.
The surgery was on Friday. He came home on Monday night. Eleven days later he lost consciousness and never woke up.
1. Eleven days after he passed out, he died. My father. My daddy. My friend. The best, smartest, kindest, most insightful man I’ve ever known. I miss him so much that it hurts – it’s a physical ache that won’t go away. His death devastated me and I’m not sure I’ll ever completely recover. I’d give the world for five more minutes with him. One more minute. Anything.
I miss him. I don’t know what to do without him. But I have no choice. It sucks. It hurts. And it’s why 2008 will live in my memory as one of the worst years of my life.
06 December 2008
I think it's been up for more than 30 days
My father died on September 9th and we buried him a week later. September 16th, for the slow among you. That's very nearly three months, which amazes the hell out of me (although I'm not sure how long I feel like it's been. Days and years, I suppose, depending on my mood).
I digress.
My mother is a world-champion procrastinator, particularly if the task at hand is unpleasant. Unpleasant tasks, for her, include washing dishes, clearing off the kitchen table, finishing her school work, and ordering a marker for my father's grave.
I can't say that I blame her for putting off the latter. I don't think that's anyone's idea of fun. Also, when we made arrangements for my dad, we set it up so that when Mum kicks it, she'll be buried in the same plot. So the stone is going to have her name on it too. Which I can't imagine. It's hard enough coming to terms with your own mortality in the face of a loved one's death. It must be even harder to order a grave stone with your name on it.
But yesterday - or rather, Thursday, as it's after midnight as I write this - I nagged just long and hard enough that my mother drove us down to Mountain View Memorial Gardens and we picked something out. It'll be very ... well, not pretty, but nice. Granite base and everything. I had to sort of hold her hand through the whole thing (figuratively, although once she started crying I did put an arm around her).
After we got it ordered, we went for a little walk to the grave site. We could have driven but a Mr. Frankenstein (seriously) was being buried a little ways off and I didn't want to disturb the solemnity of the occasion. Beside which it was a lovely day for a walk.
I remembered exactly where to go. Mum didn't, which I thought was kind of funny. If my grave was picked out already, I think I'd know EXACTLY where to find it. But I digress again. When we got there, we found a temporary marker (which I sort of expected, and appreciate - it's important to keep track of the dead in a place like that).
They remembered the "D" in Rodger; that pleased me immensely. I'd held up remarkably well, I must say, until I got a good look at the marker. Nothing about the marker specifically set me off so much as the cold realization that my father's body was about eight feet below my shoes. I lost it then. Mum did too, and we cried for a bit.
Then we went on our way.
The good news is that in six to eight weeks we'll be the proud owners of a gravestone. I think Mum's lucky in that respect. How many people get to see their gravestones before they die? Now she knows she won't (many many many years from now mind you) be buried beneath the inscription, "I'm sorry, what did you say?" or perhaps something more creative like, "Here lies Peggy, 'cause she's dead/never was right in the head."
Instead, it says BARBER in capital letters in the middle, with my dad's name on the left, hers on the right, dates below names, Mesa temple in the left corner, and "Together Forever/10-9-1976" in the right. Although I think that might be a little confusing because my parents were sealed in the St. George temple, not the one in Mesa. But Mum wanted the Mesa temple and in any case St. George wasn't in the book.
Did you know you can get a Salvation Army logo on your grave stone? Also a Boy Scout Beaver. Or a Bingo card. Or any number of tasteless emblems that reminded me more of tattoos than anything else. I suggested the hunting rifle to Mum but she refused.
Maybe I'll pre-arrange my own funeral and grave. Order a stone with a hunting rifle and the phrase, "I told you I was sick." Add a sportscar and call myself "Jill the Great."
On the walk back to the car I saw a stone that had a picture of a Ferrari and "Mr. D" and that was it. I'm not sure if Mr. D was a Ferrari. Heaven only knows what's buried there, or who.
And now, if you'll excuse me, it's my bedtime and I'm looking forward to a number of unsettling dreams.
I digress.
My mother is a world-champion procrastinator, particularly if the task at hand is unpleasant. Unpleasant tasks, for her, include washing dishes, clearing off the kitchen table, finishing her school work, and ordering a marker for my father's grave.
I can't say that I blame her for putting off the latter. I don't think that's anyone's idea of fun. Also, when we made arrangements for my dad, we set it up so that when Mum kicks it, she'll be buried in the same plot. So the stone is going to have her name on it too. Which I can't imagine. It's hard enough coming to terms with your own mortality in the face of a loved one's death. It must be even harder to order a grave stone with your name on it.
But yesterday - or rather, Thursday, as it's after midnight as I write this - I nagged just long and hard enough that my mother drove us down to Mountain View Memorial Gardens and we picked something out. It'll be very ... well, not pretty, but nice. Granite base and everything. I had to sort of hold her hand through the whole thing (figuratively, although once she started crying I did put an arm around her).
After we got it ordered, we went for a little walk to the grave site. We could have driven but a Mr. Frankenstein (seriously) was being buried a little ways off and I didn't want to disturb the solemnity of the occasion. Beside which it was a lovely day for a walk.
I remembered exactly where to go. Mum didn't, which I thought was kind of funny. If my grave was picked out already, I think I'd know EXACTLY where to find it. But I digress again. When we got there, we found a temporary marker (which I sort of expected, and appreciate - it's important to keep track of the dead in a place like that).
They remembered the "D" in Rodger; that pleased me immensely. I'd held up remarkably well, I must say, until I got a good look at the marker. Nothing about the marker specifically set me off so much as the cold realization that my father's body was about eight feet below my shoes. I lost it then. Mum did too, and we cried for a bit.
Then we went on our way.
The good news is that in six to eight weeks we'll be the proud owners of a gravestone. I think Mum's lucky in that respect. How many people get to see their gravestones before they die? Now she knows she won't (many many many years from now mind you) be buried beneath the inscription, "I'm sorry, what did you say?" or perhaps something more creative like, "Here lies Peggy, 'cause she's dead/never was right in the head."
Instead, it says BARBER in capital letters in the middle, with my dad's name on the left, hers on the right, dates below names, Mesa temple in the left corner, and "Together Forever/10-9-1976" in the right. Although I think that might be a little confusing because my parents were sealed in the St. George temple, not the one in Mesa. But Mum wanted the Mesa temple and in any case St. George wasn't in the book.
Did you know you can get a Salvation Army logo on your grave stone? Also a Boy Scout Beaver. Or a Bingo card. Or any number of tasteless emblems that reminded me more of tattoos than anything else. I suggested the hunting rifle to Mum but she refused.
Maybe I'll pre-arrange my own funeral and grave. Order a stone with a hunting rifle and the phrase, "I told you I was sick." Add a sportscar and call myself "Jill the Great."
On the walk back to the car I saw a stone that had a picture of a Ferrari and "Mr. D" and that was it. I'm not sure if Mr. D was a Ferrari. Heaven only knows what's buried there, or who.
And now, if you'll excuse me, it's my bedtime and I'm looking forward to a number of unsettling dreams.
23 October 2008
Birthday Brat
So.
Today's my birthday.
I'm 25. There's nothing really exciting about 25, except that my car insurance is a lot cheaper because my prefrontal cortex is finished growing so I'm less apt to make poor decisions, if I recall my psychology classes correctly. But I think that's it. Birthdays get less exciting as you get older. I remember years ago I'd make lists of things I wanted for my birthday and/or Christmas, and my birthday would be an Event ... not so much anymore. Now ... now I pretty much figure I have an excuse to be obnoxious for twenty-four hours and that's about it. There will be cake, and maybe takeout from a restaurant I like, and family will come over. Nothing exciting.
I was hoping to watch the Dodgers play in the world series on my birthday this year, but as usual they messed that up. I swear, it's like they beat the Cubs and then just gave up. Honestly. "Okay, we won the NLDS, that's as far as we can go." Didn't they kind of want to go to the world series? Did they forget they haven't won the NLCS in twenty years? Didn't they realize they had to beat the Phillies more than ONCE to do it? I digress.
I'm sure I'm getting a few presents. My mother took me to the mall last week and bought me a few skirts and a dress from White House Black Market, since most of my closet looked like it belonged to a teenager (which I suppose makes sense considering last time I was a size 12, I was nineteen). And Mum likes to make sure I've got a few things to unwrap as well. But it's not really important to me anymore. In fact, I've been watching so many episodes of "What Not To Wear" and "Tim Gunn's Guide to Style" lately that far from getting greedy for more, I actually got rid of 2/3 of the contents of my closet a few days ago.
But the other reason that my birthday isn't a big deal this year is that my dad is gone. He never made a huge deal out of my birthday or anything, but the fact is that I don't feel much like celebrating without him. I can only imagine how bad Christmas is going to be. Everything's going to suck for a while. I'll probably end up crying.
But that's okay. Today is my day to be the birthday brat. And as that annoying song goes, it's my party and I'll cry if I want to. Once it's midnight I have to behave myself again. I might as well milk this for all it's worth.
Today's my birthday.
I'm 25. There's nothing really exciting about 25, except that my car insurance is a lot cheaper because my prefrontal cortex is finished growing so I'm less apt to make poor decisions, if I recall my psychology classes correctly. But I think that's it. Birthdays get less exciting as you get older. I remember years ago I'd make lists of things I wanted for my birthday and/or Christmas, and my birthday would be an Event ... not so much anymore. Now ... now I pretty much figure I have an excuse to be obnoxious for twenty-four hours and that's about it. There will be cake, and maybe takeout from a restaurant I like, and family will come over. Nothing exciting.
I was hoping to watch the Dodgers play in the world series on my birthday this year, but as usual they messed that up. I swear, it's like they beat the Cubs and then just gave up. Honestly. "Okay, we won the NLDS, that's as far as we can go." Didn't they kind of want to go to the world series? Did they forget they haven't won the NLCS in twenty years? Didn't they realize they had to beat the Phillies more than ONCE to do it? I digress.
I'm sure I'm getting a few presents. My mother took me to the mall last week and bought me a few skirts and a dress from White House Black Market, since most of my closet looked like it belonged to a teenager (which I suppose makes sense considering last time I was a size 12, I was nineteen). And Mum likes to make sure I've got a few things to unwrap as well. But it's not really important to me anymore. In fact, I've been watching so many episodes of "What Not To Wear" and "Tim Gunn's Guide to Style" lately that far from getting greedy for more, I actually got rid of 2/3 of the contents of my closet a few days ago.
But the other reason that my birthday isn't a big deal this year is that my dad is gone. He never made a huge deal out of my birthday or anything, but the fact is that I don't feel much like celebrating without him. I can only imagine how bad Christmas is going to be. Everything's going to suck for a while. I'll probably end up crying.
But that's okay. Today is my day to be the birthday brat. And as that annoying song goes, it's my party and I'll cry if I want to. Once it's midnight I have to behave myself again. I might as well milk this for all it's worth.
10 October 2008
Good Grief
I’m not exactly a stranger to death. In my relatively short life, I’ve had to deal with the deaths of three grandparents, two aunts and a father. But it wasn’t until my father’s death a month ago that certain nuances of the grieving process became a bit clearer to me. There are things about the way Americans “do” death that bother me, and as is my SOP, I’m going to share them under the principle that misery loves company, and if it’s bothering me it’s for darned sure going to bother you as well.
Someone said to me last week, “I was so sorry to hear that you lost your father.” And I thought what a funny thing to say. I didn’t lose him; I know exactly where he is. But that’s how it’s always put, isn’t it? A loss. I lost my father. He lost both his sisters. It sounds so careless. And while I appreciate the sentiment, it sort of bothers me. It’s another way that we distance ourselves from the reality of death. We don’t call it death; we call it loss. I’ve read that the more uncomfortable a society is with something, the more euphemisms there are for it. I believe it. Think of how many different ways we have of referring to the two big ones: sex and death. But no one will say the words, “your father died.” He did! He died. He is dead. We got a death certificate, not a “loss” certificate or a “passing” certificate. Let’s not mince words, ok? He’s dead, and saying it pretty won’t make it any less painful.
Of course, the person who accused me of misplacing a family member then moved as if attracted by magnet and hugged me much tighter than I’d allow even my mother to do. I am like my father in many ways, one of which being that I can’t abide by strangers touching me. I barely know this woman. I can’t even remember her name, and that didn’t stop her from mauling me. Yes, I’m grieving. That doesn’t mean I want random strangers turning into affectionate barnacles. Especially not during flu season (and as far as I’m concerned, it’s always flu season). Don’t pat my shoulder, my arm, or my knee, and please don’t hug me tight enough that you can glean both my cup and band size from your own body fat displacement. Some things just need to stay private, capisce? And FYI, I carry pepper spray for the specific reason that I’d rather not be molested. Thank you.
My sister said something funny when we were bringing seven vases of flowers in the house after the funeral. She said that it’s funny how people give live flowers when someone has died. “It’s like saying, here, these are pretty, but soon they’re going to die, just like your husband did!” We had a good laugh about it, but when you think about it, giving flowers is an odd thing to do. I’m sure it’s a tradition rooted in the middle ages when a dead body would stink up the house or something equally unpalatable like that. But really, what good are flowers to a grieving widow or child? The best thing that we got after my dad died was a big basket full of paper plates, bowls and cups, plastic spoons and forks, napkins, paper towels, Kleenex, toilet paper, trail mix, cookies, and bottled water. We didn’t have to wash dishes or run out to the store, and we had pick-me-up snacks and drinks at hand. I went on-line and, in a fit of morbid curiosity, looked up some of the bouquets we were sent. People spent a LOT of money on flowers. I wish they’d have given it to the hospice or to Barrow instead, where it could do good instead of wilting and shedding on the carpet.
I’ve noticed something else. Before the funeral, people are all phone calls and dinners and visits and flowers and sympathy. After the funeral? Nothing. It’s like, okay, he’s in the ground, that’s it. Back to your life. And the thing is, after the funeral is when we need the attention the most. Before the funeral, we had the funeral to get ready for. After the funeral, there’s nothing, just a lot of emptiness. Phone calls and flowers and visits would be nice around now, but everyone else has moved on. We got so many flowers the week of. I sort of wish they’d been spaced out a bit more. I could do with a pretty bouquet about now.
Death is a sticky situation; I think we’ve established that. So people tend not to know what to say. And so they say the wrong thing. Many wrong things. I would like to suggest here and now that we adopt some sort of official words of condolence and mourning. Something along the lines of, “I heard what happened. I’m so sorry.” Nothing else needs to be said. I don’t need clichés or platitudes or half-witted advice or, worst of all, “I know what you’re going through.” Because no one, not even my siblings, knows what I personally am going through. I’m the only me out there and I’m the only one who had the relationship with my father that I did. So no one can rightly claim to know anything. Other people have said to me, when I have expressed the slightest bit of unhappiness or remorse, “Well, do you think your dad would want you to feel/act this way?” Sorry, I don’t know how he would want me to feel or act just now, and since he’s dead and I can’t very well ask him, can I. Thanks though.
There are other things that no one should, under any circumstances, say to someone who has just experienced the death of a family member, and I’ve decided to pepper-spray the next person who says any one of them to me:
-“It was for the best.” (Best for whom, exactly?)
-“God needed him more.” (I’m sorry, but God doesn’t need any of us.)
-“It was his time to go.” (Even if this is true in a fatalistic or religious sense, he was only fifty-two so frankly “his time” sucks for all involved.)
-Anything beginning with, “You probably don’t want to hear this now …” (Well then do me a favor and can it.)
-“He’s not in any pain any more.” (He wasn’t in any pain before he died, either. His tumor wasn’t painful, and in the hospital after the stroke he was unconscious and sedated. But thanks for playing.)
-“Everything will get back to normal before too long.” (Really? Will my father be less dead in a few months?)
-“This Christmas will probably be hard for you.” (Gee, ya think?)
-“Put your trust in God.” (I did that already, and God took my father away.)
-“The best way to get over your grief is to step outside yourself and do something for someone else.” (K, first off, you never “get over” grief. You learn to live with it. Second of all, I can barely get out of bed in the afternoon and choke down 700 Calories a day, on top of which my father just died. What good am I to anyone else when I can’t even take care of myself at the moment? I think I should probably start brushing my hair regularly before I start any big service projects, just so I don’t scare the less fortunate.)
I know that people mean well, and I appreciate that. But we mustn’t forget that the road to hell is paved with good intentions. A simple, “I’m sorry,” means so much more to me than a lot of flowery words or proverbs. And if you step away after you say it you’ll be out of my pepper-spray range a lot faster.
Someone said to me last week, “I was so sorry to hear that you lost your father.” And I thought what a funny thing to say. I didn’t lose him; I know exactly where he is. But that’s how it’s always put, isn’t it? A loss. I lost my father. He lost both his sisters. It sounds so careless. And while I appreciate the sentiment, it sort of bothers me. It’s another way that we distance ourselves from the reality of death. We don’t call it death; we call it loss. I’ve read that the more uncomfortable a society is with something, the more euphemisms there are for it. I believe it. Think of how many different ways we have of referring to the two big ones: sex and death. But no one will say the words, “your father died.” He did! He died. He is dead. We got a death certificate, not a “loss” certificate or a “passing” certificate. Let’s not mince words, ok? He’s dead, and saying it pretty won’t make it any less painful.
Of course, the person who accused me of misplacing a family member then moved as if attracted by magnet and hugged me much tighter than I’d allow even my mother to do. I am like my father in many ways, one of which being that I can’t abide by strangers touching me. I barely know this woman. I can’t even remember her name, and that didn’t stop her from mauling me. Yes, I’m grieving. That doesn’t mean I want random strangers turning into affectionate barnacles. Especially not during flu season (and as far as I’m concerned, it’s always flu season). Don’t pat my shoulder, my arm, or my knee, and please don’t hug me tight enough that you can glean both my cup and band size from your own body fat displacement. Some things just need to stay private, capisce? And FYI, I carry pepper spray for the specific reason that I’d rather not be molested. Thank you.
My sister said something funny when we were bringing seven vases of flowers in the house after the funeral. She said that it’s funny how people give live flowers when someone has died. “It’s like saying, here, these are pretty, but soon they’re going to die, just like your husband did!” We had a good laugh about it, but when you think about it, giving flowers is an odd thing to do. I’m sure it’s a tradition rooted in the middle ages when a dead body would stink up the house or something equally unpalatable like that. But really, what good are flowers to a grieving widow or child? The best thing that we got after my dad died was a big basket full of paper plates, bowls and cups, plastic spoons and forks, napkins, paper towels, Kleenex, toilet paper, trail mix, cookies, and bottled water. We didn’t have to wash dishes or run out to the store, and we had pick-me-up snacks and drinks at hand. I went on-line and, in a fit of morbid curiosity, looked up some of the bouquets we were sent. People spent a LOT of money on flowers. I wish they’d have given it to the hospice or to Barrow instead, where it could do good instead of wilting and shedding on the carpet.
I’ve noticed something else. Before the funeral, people are all phone calls and dinners and visits and flowers and sympathy. After the funeral? Nothing. It’s like, okay, he’s in the ground, that’s it. Back to your life. And the thing is, after the funeral is when we need the attention the most. Before the funeral, we had the funeral to get ready for. After the funeral, there’s nothing, just a lot of emptiness. Phone calls and flowers and visits would be nice around now, but everyone else has moved on. We got so many flowers the week of. I sort of wish they’d been spaced out a bit more. I could do with a pretty bouquet about now.
Death is a sticky situation; I think we’ve established that. So people tend not to know what to say. And so they say the wrong thing. Many wrong things. I would like to suggest here and now that we adopt some sort of official words of condolence and mourning. Something along the lines of, “I heard what happened. I’m so sorry.” Nothing else needs to be said. I don’t need clichés or platitudes or half-witted advice or, worst of all, “I know what you’re going through.” Because no one, not even my siblings, knows what I personally am going through. I’m the only me out there and I’m the only one who had the relationship with my father that I did. So no one can rightly claim to know anything. Other people have said to me, when I have expressed the slightest bit of unhappiness or remorse, “Well, do you think your dad would want you to feel/act this way?” Sorry, I don’t know how he would want me to feel or act just now, and since he’s dead and I can’t very well ask him, can I. Thanks though.
There are other things that no one should, under any circumstances, say to someone who has just experienced the death of a family member, and I’ve decided to pepper-spray the next person who says any one of them to me:
-“It was for the best.” (Best for whom, exactly?)
-“God needed him more.” (I’m sorry, but God doesn’t need any of us.)
-“It was his time to go.” (Even if this is true in a fatalistic or religious sense, he was only fifty-two so frankly “his time” sucks for all involved.)
-Anything beginning with, “You probably don’t want to hear this now …” (Well then do me a favor and can it.)
-“He’s not in any pain any more.” (He wasn’t in any pain before he died, either. His tumor wasn’t painful, and in the hospital after the stroke he was unconscious and sedated. But thanks for playing.)
-“Everything will get back to normal before too long.” (Really? Will my father be less dead in a few months?)
-“This Christmas will probably be hard for you.” (Gee, ya think?)
-“Put your trust in God.” (I did that already, and God took my father away.)
-“The best way to get over your grief is to step outside yourself and do something for someone else.” (K, first off, you never “get over” grief. You learn to live with it. Second of all, I can barely get out of bed in the afternoon and choke down 700 Calories a day, on top of which my father just died. What good am I to anyone else when I can’t even take care of myself at the moment? I think I should probably start brushing my hair regularly before I start any big service projects, just so I don’t scare the less fortunate.)
I know that people mean well, and I appreciate that. But we mustn’t forget that the road to hell is paved with good intentions. A simple, “I’m sorry,” means so much more to me than a lot of flowery words or proverbs. And if you step away after you say it you’ll be out of my pepper-spray range a lot faster.
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