Dear Hearts,
So I was gonna post yesterday, but I took G-Pa on a two-hour drive in the country. I only fell asleep once. While driving. But, I guess in the Book of G-Pa falling asleep while driving is not as heinous short-stopping at a stop-sign. He actually said it understood. After two hours I was done. My plan yesterday was to take G-Pa for a drive, then blog a bit, do my Bible study, and go to Mass. Didn’t happen that way.
I don’t regret taking G-Pa on a ride. We got to the nearby “city” on roads I didn’t even know existed. The amazing thing is—they all look the fucking same to me. But, he knows pretty much each and everyone. He has lived here since 1931. What is that like? To live in one place for 86 years? He went from unpasteurized milk to man walking on the moon to a phone-camera-GPS-alarm-music-player-weather forecaster-instant-contact-with-anyone-in-the-world-in-minutes-video-and-sound-recorder-email-internet-television-calendar-home-security-book machine under 5 x 3 inches.
He remembers the asparagus farm where as a child in the orphanage, he and the other boys would get up at 4 a.m. and harvest asparagus before school. Then they might fall asleep in school—but the teachers “understood.”
He doesn’t understand the world he’s living in now. Not really. In his world, men still take their ball caps off inside any place. Women wear dresses and girdles! to church. In his world, things are precise. Dinner is at 6 p.m. every night whether you are hungry or not.
I wonder what he really understands about me. I told him I OD’ed and all that stuff. But, I don’t think he really understands that his 39-year-old granddaughter wanted to die and made the commitment to die.
But he loves me. I buy him cookies. He lets me smoke in the basement. I make sure he eats fruit (if only out of a can). He accepts my Barbies and thinks I should be an artist. He doesn’t understand what I do at Burning Bed—because Burning Bed is on the grounds of the orphanage he grew up in. He still thinks it is an orphanage. But he is glad for me to volunteer there. He loves me. He has allowed me to move in and give me more freedom than any man I ever lived with. Yeah, he gets cranky but so do I.
I feel like I am back to the business of living. I don’t know if I like it. I have appointments, schedules, meetings, dates to take Gram 2 shopping. It’s busy. I don’t like the busyness of life. I feel like I rush to do everything. I remember when I used to work full time and do all this other life stuff in addition—well, not the volunteering or helping Gram 2.
It was a lot easier to not engage the world. Safer too. I still get scared. I still live with those demons, even they are mostly dormant right now. They are tricky motherfuckers though—they can come back full force at any time.
I had to get another IUD put in this week because of my fibroids and it’s easier to do it while I am on the Cadillac Heath Insurance.
Aunt Faerie went with me for the procedure. I remember that Friday afternoon in September five years ago when I got the first IUD. How did five years go by? How did five years of my life slip by so badly?
I digress, but the word “motherfucker” distracted me.
I warned the Gyno—an unassuming, non-threatening-gentle-Indian-American-man that I had a mouth on me and to please not take personally any swearing I did during the procedure. He said that it wouldn’t hurt—he has inserted the IUD into teenagers without pain.
I do have a high threshold for pain. Shit, I married for 10 years and then I was with T. for a year and a half.
But at the first “Motherfucker!” Dr. Gyno heard, he knew it hurt. How the fuck does my uterus tilt itself all the way to the left? WTF? He knew even better that I hurt when I said, “FUCK! That hurts.” I apologized, but he was okay with it.
That’s how I want to live my life. If I am dissatisfied, unhappy, or in pain, someone is going to MOTHERFUCKING HEAR ABOUT IT.
The cute thing was Aunt Faerie on the way home. (This morning after Daylight Savings—they fucking stole an hour from me!—I came out the kitchen late and my hair all medusa-esque. She was said she wasn’t laughing at me, but at the joying of having me around. The same thing happened on the way home from the Gyno.
Aunt Faerie was stopped and checking before she turned right on red.
“BEEP”
“FUCK YOU!” “BEEP!” “I MEAN IT! FUCK YOU. YOU ARE AN ASSHOLE (POINTS AT DRIVER FROM REARVIEW MIRROR) AND I MEAN IT. I DO! ASSHOLE. FUCK!”
It was just so damn cute coming from my prim Aunt Faerie who is a perfectionist, practices her clarinet every day so she won’t lose her om-bush-chey? And takes a lot of shit from a lot of different people.
It was awesome to see her lose it. I think she needs to do that more often. It’s good for her.
FUCK that IUD did hurt. And Dr. Gyno wasn’t the one washing the bathroom rug and cleaning up blood clots at 9 p.m. that night. Let’s give him an IUD and see how it feels. “You’re cleaning up, scraping my cervix?! What!? I can fucking feel that! And hear it!”
I guess I am easing back into life—not through working necessarily, but I don’t have four days in a row where I don’t leave the house. I would if I were in Henry.
(And the whole me looking down the barrel of 40 and being peri-menopausal is a whole other blog.)
I would not be going to The Café with Aunt Faerie today, then for a walk, and out for pizza if I were in Henry.
Dynamic Catholic has a Lenten reflection I am participating in. Matt Kelley, the author/founder, said we should know four things.
Who am I?
Why am I here?
What is most important?
What is least important?
It’s the first two I have issue with. I can’t answer those.
Most Important
1. Taking G-Pa for a long fucking car ride in the redundant Illinois country
2. Getting up early to help Gram 2 shop for groceries.
3. Family, health, love, drawing, writing, Angel
4. God
Least Important
1. Another Barbie
2. Blogging without delay
3. Cleaning
4. Silly Quora (Facebookesque) verbal matches
I am starting to live again and it’s tiring and scary. Like at any moment I may fall off the balance beam.
WHOEVER THE FUCK DECIDED TO FUCKING ROB ME OF AN HOUR TO SLEEP LAST NIGHT NEEDS TO BE PUT DOWN WITH A BULLET BETWEEN THE EYES.
It’s 2 p.m. and I have to leave soon to meet Aunt Faerie at The Café.
Oh, I ate meat Friday on purpose. That is right. I, a Catholic, purposely saved the last of Mom’s Buffalo Meatloaf to eat on Friday while G-Pa and Aunt Faerie were at the Fish Fry. Yuck. I don’t feel guilty. I ate that meat in honor of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. In Remembrance…It was fucking fantastic!
Note: Father, um, that story about the fences, the empty pool (so predictable), the two wayward kids, the one being paralyzed for life…Not necessary.
God does give us “fences” and rules and most of them make sense. But, I am not going to be paralyzed for life if I cross one of his fences. God doesn’t work that way. Natural law and such…but I doubt the veracity of your story. How does a kid jump off a diving board and land on his feet in an empty pool? He doesn’t. I almost walked out on you last night. Jesus, Moses, and Elijah being on the mountaintop—the point was not to LISTEN TO GOD OR ELSE. The point was that Christ came to fulfill a long foretold prophecy and who is more bad-ass to show up with than Charlton Heston and Elijah? Christ’s point was “Hey, I am not fleecing you guys. Moses and Elijah are my references. Trust me. It’s okay.” There was nothing about paralyzing a small boy in an empty pool.
I hope your homily is better next week, because I really do like you. You inspired me to cut my tethers.
I didn’t know I still had those feelings for T. But, I know what a lie everything he said was. I was living in a demented fairytale, because I was too afraid to really live. I still am, but I am working on it.
Smoke ‘em if ya’ got ‘em. God Bless
In the name of The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit; Mother Mary, Saint Brigid; Saint Jude; Saint Therese Lisieux; Saint Peter; Archangel Michael, and my Guardian Angel, Jed.
Grateful For:
Amish Pumpkin Spice Danish
Buffaloaf
Angel
Old Movies
Health
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