An Evening in the Graveyard

Last night my old friend from High school happened to come to town. He purposely got a layover here on his flight to somewhere else. It was so nice to see him. He and I and a couple guys we used to be good friends with right after he & I had graduated all met up for dinner. My old friend gave a cute little speech about us all being at different stages of our lives. Then afterwards he said we had to come with him for 20 minutes to do something important, but didn’t tell us what. So, we start driving and we pull up next to a cemetery. It was the one I used to go past every day on my way to and from school. My girlfriends and I used to walk through it if we were going to our one friend's house after school. We had a friend who died in a car accident when he was about 21 or so who was buried there. So, about 11:00pm, we stopped the car and parked outside the gates. We all walked in and then congregated around our dead friend’s grave. We talked about him and looked at all the stuff people had put there for him. It was weird, but at the same time… I had this little crooked smile on my face the whole time b/c it felt good to be there. It was like we were visiting him and hanging out with him again. There was a picture of him on the headstone and he looked so happy. I think my old friend had taken us there because he knew I am mourning my grandma this week and I needed this to help me understand what the grieving process is all about. I don't usually cry or show much emotion because I never understood what happens when someone dies...Why people go look at the dead body and why they put you in the ground and all that. But now, it kinda makes a little more sense.

We All Have Them

PostSecret Mini-Movie

| More Videos

The Queens and I

Last night my Grandma passed away. As my mom describes it, she sat beside Grandma holding her arm as "she gave a few last gasps for air. Her pulse slowed to a stop and her skin went cold." It meant so much to me that she called me her "special girl". Out of the first 4 grandchildren born into our family, I was the 4th and the very first girl. Both my grandparents held me in the hospital and were so proud, as it was the first time they had ever been able to hold a newborn. Back in the days when they had their children you weren't allowed to do that... I should have been close to her. I should have taken the time to get to know her more, but I didn't and I feel bad for that.

I'm saddened about her death but my general demeanor is unchanged as is the usual when we have a death in the family. I no longer question that. Its just the way I am and how my brain reacts to it initally. It made me think about my mom though. She said the experience of sitting with Grandma as she died was surreal and that it was messing with her head a little bit. I worry about my mom so much. Sometimes she seems so unstable from my perspective. I worry that she'll lose her job again due to her mental instability, as has happened in the past. If anything happens to her I am not even close to being financially stable enough to support her, and her husband never has been. Thank god they had her pension and 401k to draw from when she was unemployed before. ...All I want is for her to be happy and not have to struggle through life. I wish I could provide that for her.

Naturally Spun

Ok, so there definitely might be something unbalanced about me this week, or even this whole month. When I went to my psychiatrist last Monday I surprised myself by telling her that I was doing very well and life was going great. When I thought about it I was like, "wow, life is great? That's awesome!" Then this week I was totally lethargic all week until today, when I made a point to get a triple shot of espresso in my coffee in hopes of being more productive (only 1 shot more than usual). So, not only am I feeling more productive today, but I'm also feeling pretty damn good physically after that morning buzz. And I mean buzz literally. My body is buzzing, my foot is tapping, and I'm generally feeling really good inside. You know that feeling when you wake up in the morning after a good nights sleep and you give yourself a nice big morning stretch and wake up with a smile. That's how I feel. Its as if I just sniffed a fat line of...like Elvira Hancock in Scarface, which makes me think, why don't I just do that stuff every day? Screw the coffee! If I can be this productive and feel this good, why did I ever stop messing with that stuff? Alright, lets not get into that. I know the answer to that question. Its because I started waking up in the morning feeling like I'd lost 1000 brain cells the night before and I couldn't even formulate a sentence without pausing for 2 minutes. That's a damn good reason to stop. But it sure does have its temporary perks. I guess I'll just have to stick to my caffiene addiction and up my intake of espresso every morning. Thank you, Starbucks!!!!

Focus Shmokus

I am at work, where I usually do most of my blogging and I'm having the hardest time focusing. I haven't been able to get anything done all week. All I've done is surf the net, chatting on wedding boards and--my new obsession--building my family tree on Ancestry. I have stacks of papers that should've been mailed out Monday, a delivery in the back that should've been unloaded and put away on Monday, and...well pretty much everything should've been done by Monday. But now it's Wednesday and I'm still slackin'. Of course, it doesn't help that the tornado sirens keep going off, we're supposed to take cover, and I'm sitting here at my desk which faces 2 windows. Am I scared? No, not really. We go through this a couple times a year. But I am a little freaked out by the fact that I'm facing 2 huge planes of glass which would shatter and fly at me if a tornado did hit our location. So, that's just another thing to distract me from getting anything done. I don't know what my problem is this week. I feel lazy beyond my own control. Its weird. Not to mention, I'm completely fed up with answering the phones here. Its my job; I'm a receptionist. But I want to reach my hand through the phone and slap every person that calls. I have no patience for this job anymore. Everyone needs to talk to their rep immediately. They have no regard for if they're at lunch, or on another line. The callers consider everything a fricken emergency! Its ridiculous. I want to yell at them, "she's at lunch! Figure it out on your own dumbass!" But of course I can't because I need to keep my job for now. I hope no one has noticed that I'm not getting anything done. Maybe tomorrow I'll double up on my morning Starbucks and hope that will help give me the extra motivation I need. ...I better start looking for a new job.

Its not that bad... is it?

I wish my mother and I weren't so close at times. Then she wouldn't feel comfortable enough with me to wake me up after our engagement party and say, "I think your husband might be an alcoholic." It's those words and the little "talk" she gave me that have been welling up inside me and making me analyze everything my fiance does. So what that he woke up the morning after the party, popped open a beer, then later opened the champagne and drank it out of the bottle. So what if he buys a 6 pk of beer every couple days and ends up drinking 5 out of the 6 that same night. My mother claims he is in denial--a truth I found to be rather evident when I was observing and analyzing him.

I went ahead and brought it up and he got mad at me. He told me something about how alcoholics polish off a fifth of vodka every night and fall asleep with their kids under one arm and a bottle under the other. Since he's not doing that, I guess he thinks he's not an alcoholic. I don't really know the answer. All I know is that I never considered him an alcoholic before and I was perfectly happy. Then my mom had to go and mess it all up by bringin her goody-2 -shoes morals into it. Now I'm all confused. We are at the age to drink by the way. Early, mid-twenties... that's when people drink and have fun and party. Most of the time its a phase anyway. Hell, she thought I was an alcoholic for a while because I was going out to bars so much. So, yeah! What does she know anyway? Sometimes I just think she needs to get out more. She's so anal about these kind of things. It drives me crazy sometimes. Oh well... what can you do, right?

I guess I'll just raise up my glass and toast to the few years I have left to take advantage of that good old elixer we call.... a-l-c-o-h-o-l.

My Skin is Peeling!

Ever since I was little I had this weird fascination with peeling skin. When I'd get sunburn I couldn't wait to peel the skin off bit by bit. My cousin and I used to sit on the edge of our beds in our Summer cabin and peel it off in big sheets. Then we'd lay them out on the nightstand to compare who was able to tear off the biggest sheet of skin. It's very weird and a little gross, I know. But it just looks so cool when you do it, and I get a weird sensation--obsession maybe--with the process of peeling back a layer of your own skin. Now that I'm older and I was blissfully ignorant about putting sunscreen on this past vacation, I still get the same thrill from it. I think this is the worst sunburn I've ever had. It didn't even look like sunburn at first. It looked like I had rope burns across my chest! A couple weeks have passed and its starting to break down, the skin is flaking and peeling.... and the personal contest begins. How large of a sheet of skin can I peel off at one time? I am so weird.