Keeping Company with Ghosts

Dear Mother,

It's been over a month since you died. The pain of losing you is only just starting to bubble to the surface. It's so deep. It runs through my veins and the heartache props me up at night so I can't sleep. I am a walking zombie. Alive on the outside. Dead on the inside.

I'm doing my best to honor you by taking care of your estate; cleaning up the house and fixing little things. I hope to do a very good job closing accounts properly and filing the mountains of paperwork with this and that agency. I want to make you proud of me one last time, but it's really foolhardy since you'll never know what I'm doing for you now. It's my way of more slowly saying; Goodbye, than the reality of how we last parted company.

You didn't want me to know you were sick. Why you kept me from knowing only now starts to make sense, but I didn't have a chance to really say farewell. You didn't want hospitals. You didn't want help. You didn't want me to hold your hand and watch you die. You just wanted to go to work, one last day, fuss and holler about knowing you're going to die, but not wanting help. You forced your co-workers to make tough choices. You told them not to call me and let me know what was going on, even though I was only a few miles away.

You somehow managed to get home. You walked up a flight of stairs into the house you've hated for 33 years. You put down your tote bag, walked a few steps and died on the floor...with that carpeting you hated...chosen by the husband who left you 7 years earlier with a gunshot to the head.

I rush to you once I knew you might be dead. I was the one who had to break into the house to get to you. I was the one who cried over you. Who kissed you Goodbye. Your cheek was so cold.

I thought I knew you better than anyone else, but now...after sorting through just a scattering of your things I find there was so much you kept from me. The words you could not say to me while you were alive. The truth of your life. It shows in the pieces left behind.

I don't think you wanted me to ever know the truth about some things and I'm pretty sure you left many secrets that will never be known. I do know two things that I wish I had known while you were still alive: I wish I knew you saw my father take his life, instead of tell me you found him after it happened. I wish I knew why you, for some insane reason, felt you needed to photograph him lying on the floor with half of his skull and brains splattered all over his bedroom walls. Why you kept the photos in an album next to your bed. It must have been your way of punishing yourself for not stopping him. I know it haunted you, but if you had talked about it, I know you would have found forgiveness and understanding. I offered you help, found you people to talk to, only thinking you had suffered a terrible shock...not realizing just how bad it was.

Now I have inherited your money and your things and the image that haunted you for 7 years. The blood. The bits. The sad shape of my father as he lay there, gone to us forever. Now I ask myself how will I go on knowing this terrible tragedy...on so many levels. It has broken our family and our hearts forever.

If you only knew how many people LOVED you. If you only knew how many came to your funeral, crying. If it could have touched your heart, I think you would have found a way to live your life with some joy, instead of in your personal Hell.

I'm so sorry you suffered so much. I'm so sorry I couldn't fix it for you. God knows I tried so hard to help you be happy all those years, but ultimately it was up to you-what to accept and what to push away.

As the tears roll down my cheeks, I know my heart will never be full again. I'm going to find someone to help me rid my mind of the ghostly images I've seen...the ones that killed you...the ones that may do the same to me one day.

But the one thing that is different between us is that I do know it doesn't have to be this way. I'm not going to keep silent. I'm not going to let the lies take me down next. I'm going to find a way, but until I do...I'll be keeping company with the ghosts.

Why Relationships are Like Sorting Black Socks

In my ever growing determination to figure things out, something occured to me during a recent laundry sorting session. Relationships are like matching up black socks.

Colored socks, forget it, too easy. Maybe white socks come close. It’s the black socks.

Socks: Upon causual inspection, the 12 or so black socks on the bed looked very easy to match up. I made little stacks of two black socks until I had 6 stacks and, of course, one extra that had no “partner.”

Relationships: You meet someone and they seem to have potential to be a perfect mate. Polite, funny, charming. Maybe they’ve been through the wringer a time or two, but that’s ok. They might be a good fit.

Socks: You look closer. Suddenly you realize that in one stack, a sock has a narrow band around the top and the other does not.

Relationships: You go out for a second date and at dinner you notice they talk about themselves and never seem to have any interest in you. Maybe they forgot their wallet, oops! What is going on with that mole on their cheek? Is it cancerous? Maybe you should tell them to get it checked. You decide to go to the bathroom and sneak out of the restaurant.

Socks: You look at the other stacks, they look like they are good matches! Why can’t you find the one that has a band around the top of it? Wait..you see another sock with a band.

Relationships: Your best friend’s boyfriend is really sweet. She treats him like shit. You think he deserves better, frankly you. You call him to come over to help you “fix” your computer. He’s so nice, he comes over. You are dressed like a slut!

Socks: Ok, you break up the pair and move the banded sock over to the first pair. You realize although it has a band, it is far more worn than it’s mate. It must be older and therefore not a good mate potential.

Relationships: You make out with your best friend’s boyfriend, then realize he has really bad breath and kisses badly. You pretend to take the high moral road and kick him out, back to your best friend! How dare he come on to you! After all!!

Socks: Ok, so now you have two messed up potential sock pairs. You have compared bands on top/no bands, if they are faded a lot or a little, now you see some have tight ribbing and others are really wide and loose.

Relationships: You go online and check out match.com, salon.com, jdate.com, farmersonly.com, eharmony.com and post different profiles about yourself to attract different kinds of guys.

Socks: Maybe you’re tired and decide the Hell with it and just put any two black socks together. So what if they don’t match perfectly?

Relationships: You do speed dating and go home with some guy because you are lonely and bored. Then you find out he has a thing for slapstick comedy and ESPN reruns of baseball games. You wish you had just stayed home.

Socks: You gather up all the black socks..the ones with the band, the worn out ones, the snug newish ones and the delicate frayed ones and put them away in a lump, even with one extra..you never know it might show up on your door some day.

Relationships: You want to just give up and forget the whole thing. Your ex calls and says he is getting married. Not to you.

Socks: You take the socks back out of the drawer, put them together in pairs, to your best ability and move on.

Relationships: You gave up. You forgot about it. You’re not looking. Of course what happens next? You find him.

New Way to Keep People Driving Safely

Yesterday I drove my mum and myself up to the land of YARN PORN: http://www.morehousefarm.com. Sounds normal enough, but there was an added twist to our journey. One that may have changed my life, FOREVER.

You see, it started earlier that morning, while dressing. I decided to wear a bright orange, Blogger-orange actually, shirt to acknowledge the lovely colors of autumn. In my contiunal graphic-designer-compulsion to color coordinate, I decided to wear my bright ORANGE, but accidently LARGE underwear.

I don't often wear this underwear. It's the gotta-wear-them-cause-I-am-too-lazy-to-do-the-laundry-and-it's-the-last-clean-pair underwear. I meant to buy hi-cut ORANGE underwear, but got (Granny) panties by accident. Each time I wear them, I think they grow higher on my torso. Last time they almost reached my bra if I gave them a ladylike yank.

I fear someone will discover I'm wearing them. Just thinking about it causes me a great deal of embarrassment, shame, humilation and angst!

It didn't take long for me to realize the grim fact: if I had a car accident, the ER doctor would surely cut my clothes off to attend to my wounded body. Even if my underwear remained intact, he/she would surely see them! Then the news would get out and my frighteningly large undies would be on display, for all the WORLD to see! How could I move beyond that? Even with all my Buddhist training, knowing that there really IS NO UNDERWEAR, I'd have to step back and declare that perhaps, in this one instance, Buddha was WRONG and that there ARE BRIGHT ORANGE GRANNY PANTIES COVERING MY PRIVATES AND NO ONE LIVING OR DEAD should see them.

That's how I learned a new way to insure more people drive safely. Make them all wear embarrasingly large or small (depending on the humor value) underwear and remind them that if they are yakking on the cell phone, not paying attention and get into an accident that they, too, could become the next inductees of Underwear Hall of Shame!

Think about it.

Thank God, I'm Funny (or so I'm told)

[Thanks to Jenny Turpish Slapped Me]
20 Questions to a Better Sense of Humor

Sunny/Dark: 5/10
drY/Gross: 6/10
Traditional/Offbeat: 6/10
Active/Passive: 8/10

You are a SGO--Sunny Gross Offbeat. This makes you a Wild One.

You have a laid-back approach to life, and your humor reflects that. What you think is funny is so broad and appealing that you can get a chuckle out of almost anybody. You're never offensive -- until you want to be.

It takes someone a while to get to know you and appreciate your point-of-view, but when you make friends they tend to be for life. You're the type of person who doesn't lose touch with friends after you get married. Rare. Rarely rare rare.

You might have some kind of semi-serious chronic health problem, or had an intense illness in the past. This experience has made sure you don't take life too seriously, and it's given you a down-to-earth perspective about your body.

You like porn. Kind of a lot. Not in a bad way, but yeah.

You might like Farrelly Brothers movies, Jim Carrey movies and stuff. You haven't liked what Ben Stiller's been doing for a lo-o-ong time.

Of the 21280 people who have taken this quiz, 5.9 % are this type.

Your Active humor score of 8/10 means you are a comic house on fire. You are Def Comedy Jam (for the first five minutes, before it becomes repetitive and degrading). You are a library of witty rejoinders, in-jokes, ad-libs and meatballs. Yeah, I said meatballs. They're underrated.

The trick for you is to ease yourself into a situation, since you have the capacity to dominate. If you're socially well-adjusted, you're awesome. If you're kind of nervous and twitchy like Daniel Radcliff in the Prisoner of Azkaban special features, then there can be trouble.

Cock Soup is Nuts

Soup Mix?
Originally uploaded by KitschKat.

I've posted over 600 photos on Flickr as of today. And this ONE image..of something I had lying around in my cupboard, is the most viewed...over 540 times! Why? WHY!!! It certainly ain't the quality of the image, that's for sure. Maybe it's the SWELL illustration? Maybe not.

Lost Love

I'm old. Face it. 43. That's a life-lived already. Lots of folks don't even get to my age. I'm not overly thrilled with aging, but I'm also not paying much attention to it. The one thing I *DO* have a hard time with is the pain of my past mistakes, mis-adventures and mis-directed attentions. I know I can't change it or get a "do-over." I know I need to move on. In most ways, how can I not?

That said, I feel so much misery about it. I want to go back and realize that I was missing out on some great things. I was too distracted or neurotic or both to really FEEL or listen to what other people were saying to me. Just yesterday while I was cleaning out my office, I came across some old letters. It struck me that not only did I miss a chance at love, but that my life has been filled with love. I've never paid it any attention. I've never thought it was "real." That they didn't really mean it.

There is one particular person I wish I could contact again, but I know he would not welcome it. He is a great artist (though when I knew him he was "starving"). He was handsome and funny. For some reason his weakness brought out a nastiness in me. He could not face me or stand up to me and there were times I needed that. He was not strong, emotionally, and was somewhat immature, too. After we broke up, he was inspired to get out there and find someone and the next person he met, he married. I met her a few times. She seemed to be like me, but unlike me, she wanted to be his "mother" and I wanted none of that.

So why does it still pain me? I think it's because of the love I felt from him and the creativity we shared. I think I miss that the most-being creative with someone, wildly and passionately creative. I don't have that now and lately I'm noticing it.

What is important? Being with someone who is creative, as I am? Or being with someone who will go up on the roof and fix the leak, even though he doesn't want to do it, is scared to do it and isn't even sure HOW to do it (which Sam just did yesterday). I can count on Sam and he stands up to me and he's a "grown-up," he LOVES me, damn it...but I can't help feel that I want more. God, I feel like I'm a jerk for feeling this way.

I think it's me. I'm missing being as creative as I can possibly be. Why am I waiting for something? I don't need to. I need to dig in and do it. I feel it burning inside me. Time to let it out.

Which Absurd Cat are You?

I think it's important to know things about yourself. This is certainly one of them.

Which Absurd Cat Are You?