happy birthday

today would have been my father's 63rd birthday.  he was a handsome man, a pain in the ass, smart and funny and with a wicked sense of humor.  he liked whiskey and cigarettes and made the best omelettes ever.  he had the skinniest legs i've ever seen on a man, and often wore boots that cost more than my entire wardrobe put together.  he loved dogs, cooed at babied, and would try anything once.  he thought my mother was the hottest woman on earth.  we had a difficult relationship through my teen years, but then we went to college together and i realized he was this person, not just my pop.  while i miss my dad terribly, what i miss more is that awesome guy he was.  tonight i'm going to go have a drink in his honor and be thankful i got to know both guys, the pop he was and the man he was. 

the terror that is unpacking

i'm not sure why unpacking is always such a chore for me.  you would think i would be so excited to move into a new place, to make it my own, that i would just yank everything out of boxes and throw it all any and everywhere.  instead, i'm ridiculously slow at it.  i think too hard about where things should go, about what the ramifications of putting baking items in that cupboard as opposed to this cupboard will be, forgetting all the time that if i don't like the first place i put it, i can move it!  this time i'm also faced with my passive-aggressive mom-ness.  i'm hating that for whatever reason, no one feels like they need to do anything unless i ask.  for some reason, the task of unpacking and making house decisions is all mine, and that feels bogus to me.  i'm not a dictator in an apron, i promise.

instead of unpacking i'm looking at boxes and making plans, and doing some knitting. there is nothing more fun that starting a new project and watching it grow.  it's especially fun to work on something that's going to be a present.  i'm not terribly superstitious (i like to think) but i do subscribe to the idea that thinking good thoughts while working on something translates into the finished project.  that's why a lot of things i was working on when my dad was going through radiation got scrapped in the end.  doing the actual knitting and embroidering while waiting for him at the clinic was good for me in that it kept my hands busy and gave me something else to fuss over, but whenever i finished something i had to get rid of it because all i could think of what them poking and prodding him, his discomfort, the nasty radiation burn across his cheek and neck.  it felt like it would be bad juju to give those items to anyone else, too, so i threw most of them away.

i've been thinking about my dad a lot lately.  the other night while unpacking i ran across a xmas gift list he'd sent me, and it reduced me to tears.  i miss those little lists, how detailed they were, how he'd tell you not just what he'd like to get, but about how much it would cost and where you could find it.  D thought that was a bit fussy, but i explained that for my pop that just made sense.  he bought the things he wanted for himself, but knew we wanted to buy him things for xmas, so he made it easy on us.  he didn't want us to feel like we had no idea what we were doing, and he was open to getting things that weren't on the list.  he also wasn't a dictator in an apron.  it's funny the things that make me think of him, the things i miss.  the sound of his boots on linoleum, the smell of his aftershave, the way he would always announce "bump!" in the car when he saw a sign warning you of the same thing.  the pain of losing him isn't as overwhelming now as it was in the beginning, but it does kind of hide out and wait for me some afternoons.  grief is a strange monster.

a small treatise on the subject of motherhood

i think part of makes me want to talk about mothering and motherhood and being a step-parent is that for me it's so new.  three years ago, this was not what i thought i'd be doing.  at the most, by now i thought i'd be knocked up or with an infant; not with a 12 year old and a 16 year old.  i don't think i was specifically against that, it just wasn't something i thought of as a possibility.   i've been doing some parenting now for about two years, and while i understand that being a step-parent is different from being a bio-parent, i find myself at times balking against the distinctions.  this week i worked with a tech who i hate, and i remembered why when he kept asking about the kids, and only referred to them as "D's kids."  he kept pointing out that we haven't been together that long (personally, i think two years of 24 hours a day, 7 days a week isn't anything to sneeze at), and when i said something about "my" kids, he actually corrected me.  which i guess is his right, but honestly?  if these aren't my kids, then shit.  i've been investing way too much time, energy and love.

what makes all of this extra poignant to me is that my pop didn't get to meet them, or see me parent.  they only know him through stories, and while those are pretty good, they aren't as awesome as he was as a grandparent.  it's the anniversary of his death today (i always want to call it a "deathiversary" but you know, even i understand that's in poor taste), and while every day without him is hard, today always makes me think of him a bit more.  instead of getting all maudlin, i had a drink in his honor (or four), watched a zombie movie with the kids, and made a nice dinner.  i think he would have liked my little family, and i think he would approve of me spending time with them and thinking of him today.

and this part is embarrassing, but he showed up in a dream of mine this week where we just hung out and talked.  we were in class together, and making fun of the teacher, and just chit chatting about every day stuff.   honestly?  while i don't believe in an afterlife, those dreams always make me feel great.  like maybe he's visiting in his own way, from wherever you go after you become worm food.  it might just be my brain's way of dealing with shit, but i don't care.  i'm glad to see him. 

broken record

i was so excited to hear that anne rice was giving up christianity. honestly, i read probably way too much anne rice as a teenage girl, and found her conversion in the late 1990s upsetting, and her writing afterward boring. i liked that she was awesome and crazy and atheist, i liked that she was a different kind of writer and made vampires dangerous and overtly sexy. her books scared and thrilled me, and to this day i don't really take other vampires seriously (i think mr. sparkle-pants vampire is kind of a sappy dope). i heard she was renouncing catholicism and i thought "yay! we get anne rice back!" then i heard an interview she did on NPR and realized, "no, she's just splitting hairs about dogma." so sad.

i drove my pop's truck today. i have never driven a vehicle so large, and when my father was alive, the very idea of me driving his truck would have given him a small stroke. that truck was his baby, it was the first car he ever bought brand new, and when i was learning how to drive a stick shift, the notion of my learning it in his car wasn't even broached. being behind the wheel this afternoon felt awesome, and also left me feeling kind of guilty and giddy. it's got a crazy powerful engine, and is so tall; i felt like such a badass driving it. all i could think was, "man, i wish i could call him and tell him i drove his truck and didn't hit anything or do too badly." i felt ridiculously proud of myself, and wanted him to know that i wasn't even that nervous. my palms were sweaty, but not that sweaty. i hope i don't sound too much like a broken record, but i miss my pop. not because i'm a daddy's girl, or we had some fairy tale relationship, either. there were years upon years when we couldn't even be in the same room together; times when all we did was fight and i wished i had any other man on earth as my father. we didn't have an easy relationship. i couldn't even tell him i loved him over the phone, which is odd considering i end every other phone conversation earth with that. "i'd like a large pepperoni and mushroom pizza, thanks, i love you!" even at our best we were prickly. i loved him, though. when i got older and got to know him better, i found i actually really liked him. nights like tonight i'd do just about anything to have one more complicated day with him.

speed and i are not friends,

but i need the sudafed because whatever is growing in my sinuses has a voracious appetite for pain. the longest i went between doses today was 8 hours, and near the end i didn't want any more, i wanted to sleep (amend that to present tense, dear, i want to sleep), but the pain in my head was too much. i took some, and now i am awake, my heart is jackrabbity, and i actually said the following things out loud today while dosed:

"my brain is all fertile with creative shit!"
"what a nice young juggalo."
"guess who's a landowner, bitches?!"

i went to work today which was good for me a in lot of ways. money being way #1. it wasn't terribly taxing, and now i'm back into my long weekend. for some reason my schedule was wonky, and the other patient coordinator was on deck for tomorrow. i could use the day to recoup; while i didn't die at work, or even pass out, i have hours that feel okay if sleepy, hours of crazy sped-up me after the little red pills, and that ridiculous "i'm too hot!" or "i'm too cold!" argument going on with my body. i discovered that another coworker had this same ailment, and while he was a lot tougher than me and worked right through most of it, the weird body-temp thing and aches stay around for a while. hooray.

i do have all sorts of creative ideas a' brewing up in my head. i can't get the new broken bell's song out of my head, so at night after everyone else is in bed and i'm still up, i listen to it on repeat on youtube and work on stuff. most of what i'm working on at the moment is just planning stages stuff, and to be honest, most of it is wedding stuff. working out what we need to get, what i want to do, time lines and lists and sketches! such fun stuff. the house is too full of unorganized things that are right in the way and threatening to trip, maim or infect us for me to do much at the moment; i'm hoping tomorrow i can at least get boxes into the garage, and start the giant "garage sale" pile.

late tonight D and i snuck out to jack in the box for chicken tenders, to go with our wing sauce (of course), and the nice young man who helped us had a name tag on that said "juggalo." part of the reason we like that jack in the box so much is that the night crew is ridiculous and funny and genuinely seem to enjoy that weird shift, and you see the most interesting kids there. D and i argued about whether or not our fine young juggalo looked like a little steve perry or no, and while i say the world would be a better place with a little more steve perry in general, D didn't see it. then i told him about this extremely NSFW clip on the youtubes concerning juggalos just today that sort of made our being served by Mr. Juggalo seem like fate.

before the high wears off, i did indeed become a landowner today as i inherited some land on the rez from my pop. actually, it's on more than one rez, but all in one state. pop said there was maybe enough there for him to be buried standing up, but evidently my half is almost 300 acres. way to undersell it pop! no word yet on whether it's inhabitable, valuable, or what our options are. i know he didn't make money on it, but i also don't recall him having to pay taxes on it. being that i am not a very good indian, i honestly don't know much more than that at this point, i just like bragging about how much land i own. even if it's swamp land or a parcel of hell, it's mine, and it's got an impressive number on it. more research needs to be done!

i'm going to go lie wide awake next to D now for a while until his snoring drives me to the couch. normally the snoring doesn't bug me, but while on cold medication i find it unbearable. mainly because it's like his nose bragging that he can't sleep and i can't. sleep tight my darling juggalos. (and you too!)

holiday highs and lows

as one can imagine, i am kind of dreading the holiday season, as well as looking forward to it. the fucked up part of all that is how literally one moment i'm excited about cooking stuff and seeing my family and having drinks and delicious nibbles, and the next i'm weeping and worried about how the hell we're going to have thanksgiving without pop. as for christmas, well, i can't even begin to consider how we're going to handle that. i figure i'll start with this holiday and then see how it goes. maybe once you get one under your belt the next is easier? maybe i'll know how much booze to stock up on (or to avoid)? perhaps santa will put some valium in my stocking? i just don't know. happy times just seem extra bittersweet now, which is the best way to explain how i'm feeling. i don't expect to make it through the next few days without some tears, but hopefully i can make it to a quiet corner or bathroom in time, and hopefully i won't bum anyone out.

the way i see it, if it all crashes and burns and i start to fail at all this holiday stuff, then i will just go all scrooge/grinch on everyone's ass and that will be it. i'm so glad pop culture has created and archtype just for me! (sarcasm, of course. a little.)

edited to add:
i called my mom tonight, and had a tiny, itsy-bitsy freak out on her. hearing that i'm not the only one feeling this way, while i knew that in the rational part of my brain, made all the difference. i'll probably still be more emotional than i'd like for the rest of the week, but i'm not nearly as anxious as i was before i called. i had some time, i did some cooking, i had a good talk with mom and my man, and i feel ready to handle the holiday. or rather, more ready. i'll still miss my pop, and have a moment or two of melancholy (or five or six) but i'm a lot less worried about ruining the holiday or freaking anyone out. this holiday will be different, of course, but i'll still be with my family and we'll still eat crazy amounts of fowl and wave at santa at the end of the macy's parade.

we have a reservation

my mom is on her way to the rez today. she's going to visit my aunties and my pop's cousins. about a year ago she and my dad went back together, and had a good time. i think she misses my dad enough to want to just be near his people. i wish i could have gone with her, but i just can't take two weeks off work. it would be nice to be with my pop's family, my family, to hear the stories about him and spend some time with people who loved him as much as i did. i hope mom has a good time, and calls me a lot from the road.

sun spots

this was a really fun, family-packed, busy-bee, sunny weekend. on saturday i took M out to D's folk's house for a big barbeque. D had to work all day, and the boy had just gotten home from his epic camping trip and opted to stay home and relax. after 12 days in the woods, no one could blame him. D's dad grilled a prime rib (!) which was seriously delicious. there were a lot of cousins, aunts and uncles, and more food than i thought was possible. we had a great time. i won't lie; going by myself to these sorts of family functions is a little nerve-wracking, but M really wanted to go and i wasn't going to keep her home because i was feeling a bit shy. whenever i actually hang out with D's family, though, i remember that they are awesome and fun and easy to get along with. i talked about gardening with D's dad, the kids with his mom, and a million other things with everyone else. later in the afternoon D was lucky enough to get out of work early and meet up with us. we've both been working a lot, at totally opposite hours, which made spending an afternoon together that much better.

the next day we ventured out to whidbey to see my mom, as well as my favorite evil niece. all four of us headed out there, and my sister's mother-in-law and ex were also there. i'm fairly sure my mother's new favorite thing in life is feeding the boychild. the joy she gets in stuffing him is contagious! maggie and M had a great time together. i love to hear maggie talk about her, she's always asking about her "friend" and wanting us to come over to her house, or to come visit us. they play well together, and both kids are patient and indulgent with her. she always takes a while to warm up to the boychild, i think because he's so tall, but by the end of the day she's always throwing herself at him and climbing him like a jungle gym. it was so nice to see my mom. it feels good to have my little family all together, and to see them all eating and laughing and enjoying each other. it's still a little bittersweet, given that the only time they ever got to meet my pop was in a costco parking lot, but i'll take it.

while we were home we found a box of photos we didn't know existed. mom and i pored through them, passing around the good ones and showing maggie endless pictures of her mom. she still gets a big kick out of seeing her mom as a baby, and we found some great old photos of pop. have i told you before how handsome he was? i might be biased, but it hasn't only been family members to point that out about him, honest! seeing photos of he and i when i was little, photos of him and mom being all young and dopey and in love, pictures of he and my sister (which look a lot like photos of him and maggie), it was great. i still spend part of my drive back from my mom's crying, but it's getting better. we talk about him easier now, and while i still miss him, i find more that i'm crying for my mom, and worrying about her. we're all going to be okay, and i'm thankful we have each other, but it is still difficult.

to end our weekend, we spent the afternoon inner-tubing down the nooksack river. when D was explaining it to me i wasn't so sure, but it was seriously relaxing to float on the river all day and come home sun-addled and hungry. we ate hot dogs and pasta salad, and now i'm doing laundry and getting ready for the week. the boys are watching a best-of UFC thing on tv, and the girlchild is watching coraline in the computer room (a.k.a. our room). we're settling in for the night, happy and sleepy and getting ready for another week. i'm certainly glad we all have mondays off together this summer. this saturday we head down to oregon for a nice, long-ish camping trip, and we're all looking forward to that too. i need to start making lists of dinners and stuff we need to pack and buy. i'll do that after i finish the laundry, honest...you know, if i don't get sidetracked by beer and ultimate, no-holds-barred, octagon cage fights.

it's my folk's anniversary today. if my father were alive, they'd have been married 33 years today!

the past week has been hard in terms of missing him. i keep having dreams about him. one was the two of us having lunch together; we had chinese food and talked about MP3 players. at one point i asked him how he was doing, and he told me he missed my mom, he didn't know what to do without her. i told her she said the same thing. i woke up glad i had seen him, missing our stupid little talks, and feeling ridiculously sad. it was just a dream, after all, but to see him like that; healthier than he had been in years, with his long hair and dark face, relaxed and easy, sad about my mom, it was a bit much. i don't think i can ever say it enough or in such a way that anyone will understand, but i miss him. i miss the sound of his voice, the smell of his cologne, the way his boots clicked on pavement and linoleum. i miss knowing he was home with mom, that i always had two parents to go home to. i feel so inadequate at being a grown-up; losing him means having to step up, having to act my age and get my shit together, and while i'm not completely failing at that, i miss the security of him. of knowing he was there to help out, a safety net if i should need one.

mom is still adjusting to her new life, trying to remember to make smaller dinners, keeping busy, working. for all of us, life without him is something we're still getting used to. we're still a bit wary to talk too much about him, but we're getting a lot better. i think we're closer now than we were, and i know for a fact we're a bit more honest. it's not an easy adjustment, by any means, but we're not the first family to go through it. in the end, i'm glad i have my mom and sister, no matter how hard this all is. i always thought i was "serious" about family, but now i think i actually know what that means. seeing her alone is just another barb, another pain. i'll call her tonight just to tell her i love her, but i suppose today won't ever be the same for her.

it's been a little over a month since my pop passed away. i went home this weekend to see my mom and my niece, and on my way out of town i stopped to see dad as well. you'd think some grass would have grown on his grave by now, but it hasn't. not wet enough, i suppose. there were some other people in the cemetery, which annoyed me, but it was nice to sit with him for a while. he was never much for flowers (he had allergies and swore up and down we were trying to kill him whenever we brought any home!) so i brought him a smoke and some whiskey. technically, this is a traditional indian thing, plus, i think it would crack him up. he always favored old granddad whiskey, but i couldn't find a tiny bottle of that, so he got some good old jack. the headstone won't show up for a few more months, so for now there's an awful aluminum marker. i will say, though, that while his grave isn't on the slope of the hill (the most popular spot and with the best view), he's got a nice view. lots of farmland, a pretty big red barn, and you can see the town from where he is. i can understand better now why he wanted to be buried; being able to go and see him, such as it is, is a comfort. he always wanted coupeville to be our home, and now we'll always have a place there.

while nothing is ever going to be the same again, i think my family and i are settling in as best we can. pop was a bigger buffer between my sister and mother and i than i realized; every little bump along the way this past month has been harder to navigate. there were quite a few weeks when i couldn't even talk to them. not in an angry sort of way, but our nerves were definitely raw and we had a hard time expressing ourselves. on the one hand, all i want to do is talk about him with them, but it's so hard to bring it up, and i don't want to make anyone else cry or feel bad. i can also only take so much. it's still way too new, way too sharp a feeling. i can't believe everyone goes through this; that seems completely, crazily unfair. it's simply a matter of whether you have gone through it, or you will. honestly, that thought blows me away. that we can go on after this, that in a sense it's a normal part of life, is amazing to me. it doesn't make me miss him any less, but it does comfort me in a odd way.

i know i say it all the time, but i do really miss him. he wasn't always easy to get along with, either. i want you to know that i'm not idealizing him or my relationship with him, but for all his jerky qualities, i still miss him. i'd take all the lousy stuff about our relationship if it meant i got to have him back. i just wish i'd had longer with him.

okay, enough of this for today. i spent all weekend thinking about and dealing with this stuff. today i'm going to do laundry, run some errands, make the house tidy and wait for my little family to come home. i love having one day to myself, but i love it when they come home from school and tell me about their days, and we sit and talk and listen to the radio. i also need to dye my hair all one color; right now it's kind of a hot mess and i'm going to chicago in less than 2 weeks time! i want to be foxy for that trip, and i'm pretty sure foxy doesn't have streaky, ridiculous hair.

ouch

this post over at boing boing made me teary eyed. my pop's cell phone is still on, for now at least, and while i wouldn't send him a text message, i do find myself talking to him a lot lately.

i promise at some point the blog will go back to being about my life, but right now, this is my life. sometimes it feels awful, but sometimes, not so much. i like being able to talk about him, i like remembering him. he's my pop and i love him, and for a while he's just going to be at the forefront of stuff i'm thinking about.

well, that and how awesome the movie step brothers is. seriously. i could watch it like three times a day and always pee a little at the sleepwalking/tree house/catalina wine mixer scene. grief is a strange thing, my friends. suddenly the comedic timing of john c. reilly is just amazing to me.