Our family got some sad news today. My aunt, Pauline was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer yesterday. It has already spread to her liver. It is a death sentence. My mother is really sad. She is 69, and the youngest of nine children. She has known her whole life that many, if not all, of her siblings would most likely pass away before her and she has always dreaded being left alone.

I understand how she feels. You have to understand how I view my mom’s family. I HEART them. They are simple, kind, good, salt of the earth southerners. Some of the only love and acceptance I got as a kid came from that family. I affectionatly call them “Ents”. They are all very old, very tall and thin and speak slowly and have huge hearts. The fact that they have all been around my whole life has been very, very comforting. Now we’re looking at losing one of them and it just sucks.

My mom said, “I’m going to start losing them all, now.” I relate to that fear. I am the youngest sibling of six children and I dread the thought of anything happening to my siblings. I was (And still am) freaking terrified when my sister was diagnosed with cancer this year.  I will lose my parents while I am fairly young and I dread that, too. We may be a pretty dysfunctional family, but we are also very close and rely on each other a lot.

I fear being left alone.

I fear things changing.

I fear a lot of things, actually.

It is strange how things progress in life. I didn’t have the easiest childhood. When I was young, I was always scared, anxious, lonely and just hurt a lot. I always thought when I was older I would be able to handle these feelings and the bad things that come with life much better than I did as a child. To an extent, that is true. I handle many things better and am able to roll with the punches better than I used to. I have learned to put up emotional walls so I don’t get hurt to the extent I was in my childhood. Plus, being an adult you just see things differently than a child does.

BUT.

It isn’t how I thought it would be. I didn’t realize that the situations that scared or embarrassed me as a child would continue to do so as an adult. That I wouldn’t have the same resiliency to recover from failures, hurts and tragedy like I did when I was younger. I find that I like people less than I used to. So many characteristics are still the same, too. My initial instincts on dealing with tough situations are the same poor choices I made as I kid. I still loathe confrontation, I also suck up and shove away hurt, anxiety and hide (Or try to) a lot of things out of fear people will leave me because I’m just.too.much. There are days that I wake up and actually fear leaving my house. I’m not an agoraphobic or anything, but the thought of having human interaction with people is scary on those days. More and more I find that life just…SCARES ME.

Weird, no?

I think that some of this is the bravado and optimism of youth wearing off, but I also think that my perception and feeling of saftey in the world were completely shattered when my son died. In that moment it sank in that BAD THINGS happen in life. REALLY bad things. No one is immune.

Being a person with craploads of baggage doesn’t exactly help. It keeps piling and piling up, which adds more and more shame. I have often thought to myself that if I had to move and start my life over, I would probably not attempt to make any new friendships because truly? There is too much baggage that comes with me on top of my overwhelming personality. If I was a person that was capeable of keeping my mouth shut, I may be ok, but I can’t do that very well. Diarrhea of the mouth. That’s me. It’s mortifying. I unleash “TMI” on people all the time and it is usually to my detremint. I did it in an email just yesterday and now I want to stick my head in a big, huge HOLE.

I don’t really know the point of this post. While I am sad, I am not in crisis mode or overwhelmed. We have been prepared for a long time that it would happen to someone in the family.

I am ok.

It is just that getting this news made some anxiety and vulnerabilities that I have in my life magnify. Basically, I thought that I would feel more secure about my life, friends, family and existence “When I grew up”. I guess that isn’t always true. I wanted to look at these feelings, examine them and write them out. I’m not fishing for compliments, just letting my peeps know what is up and doing some writing therapy.

Again, I’m good. I’ll keep updating you on the condition of my aunt.

Ack. It has been so hella-busy up in my neck of the woods. I’m so behind at this point that I think I’m just going to fling captioned photos at you to make sure it’s documented and then I have GOT to do my laundry or I will soon be re-enacting “Lady Godiva’s Ride” the next time I go to the corner gas station to get my Diet Coke fix. *YES* that would be a bad thing.

Memorial Day was, well…Memorial Day. I don’t really know what to say about it because the holiday has sort of changed for me since Matthew died. It just isn’t all about grilling and frisbee and having a long weekend anymore, you know? Let’s just say it’s getting easier. It helped that my family had a big gathering for my parent’s wedding anniversary and so I had everyone around and a lot going on as a distraction.

After a ton of changes on time, day and location, we ended up having lunch on Saturday at…Golden Corral.

I hate Buffet’s. HATE THEM. Everything about them makes me slightly queasy and makes me want to spray myself down with Lysol every few minutes. That whole strategy about designing the atmosphere to get people OUT of the restaurant? IT WORKS.

BUT!

I LOVED IT. Know why? Because 1: It is my Dad’s favorite place to eat, so therefore he was happy and 2: It meant that there was NO KARAOKE, OR LINE DANCING!!!!! Therefore, I heart Golden Coral. I probably would have married it if it had asked me that day. (And just think of the interesting News Blurb THAT would have made. As if Utah wasn’t already weird enough in that respect.)

Although there was no line dancing or Karaoke, we did have to listen to musical selections by my twin sister.  Still, it wasn’t too bad seeing her. (We have a touchy relationship. Nuff said.)

Everyone but Brad, who lives in St.Paul, was able to come. Except for my mom freaking out and getting huffy over seating arrangements it was a pretty ok day.

Tuesday was my parent’s actual anniversary. May 29, 1957. They were married in Nauvoo, Illinois in The John Taylor Home. Actually, if you are up on your Mormon history, they were the first LDS couple to be married in Nauvoo since the exodus (You’ll have to just look it up, people). At least, that is what the officiator told them. Who knows? Nice story, though.

In addition to the family gathering on Saturday, my parents had an open house with a buffet for family and friends at their house on Tuesday. My parents coped with the planning fairly amicably and it eased even more when we found out that their crazy dog would be kenneled for the week. YAY.

They have been planning this for a long time and really got every little detail exactly how they wanted it. They even had their buffet table, china and serving dishes laid out weeks before. Then they had little slips of paper with what was going to be served out of them written down and placed in each dish. HOW THE FREAK DID I COME FROM THESE PEOPLE AND WHY DIDN’T I GET THOSE GENES?!!! Seriously, my parents are highly organized and “Just so”. You could say I am not.

Ehem. As my mother told me when I bitched about being so random and chaotic, “You were always this way, even as a tiny child. You would go to get a washcloth from the linen closet and there would be a nicely folded stack of them and you would take one you wanted, regardless of where it was placed. You’d just pull it out from the middle, half the stack would fall over and you’d just leave them there and merrily go hop in the tub. I don’t understand behavior like that.”

Sucks.

Back on topic!

My brother, Rhett came up to help out and participate.

So did my sister, Melanie. Poor Melly. She had her hands full keeping me and Rhett (Aka “The strangest person on the planet”) in line.

My wonderful friend, “M.E.” came and helped slug it out in the trenches, too. We spent a lot of time in my parent’s laundry room which served as an awesome butler’s pantry. We called it “Servants Quarters”. She’s such a great sport and really helped out with great advice and hard work. She was also willing to take home loads of leftovers so that me and my siblings weren’t all drowning in them, too. It all went well. In fact, I think the only real ‘Mishap’ is that my mom thought I used too much filling in my lemon bars (Whatever).

Lots of people came and had a great time. My awesome aunt, Leotha, made the trip even though she has been in really bad health the last several years.

I was happy some of my friends were there, too. Brian J. and his family came by as well. This photo sucks. Blame Jonathan. :)

My parent’s cut their wedding cake while there were still people around and actually made lip contact. I’m just glad my mother is still speaking to me when I proclaimed that I finally had film documentation that we were not all left by the stork. (Hey, it was funny!).

Over all, it was a much nicer, and more pleasant day than I thought that it would be. Everyone had a great time, the food was awesome and my no one bickered even once. They had a REALLY good time and after 50 freaking years, I think it was not only very deserved, but a very nice memory for everyone.

To my big sister, Melly, who was more like a mom:

You’re 46. I only say that because I just KNEW being so much younger than everyone would HAVE to pay off someday. Remember how sad and lonely I used to get for you when I was little and you lived so far away? I used to sit on my windowsill at night and look at the moon and wonder if you were looking at the same moon as me at the same time. It made me cry for you a little less. Sad, isn’t it? Even worse is when YOU would punish me and I would want YOU to comfort me. “I. Want. MELLY! SNIFF!!!! SOB!!!! WAH!!!!”. (I was a complex soul even at five)

I can’t believe you bought me tiny ladybug earrings on YOUR birthday. I promise when there is no more frost threat, your gift will be flowers and the labor involved in planting them.

Thanks for being there and for being the only soul in the universe that likes going fishing with me. Frankly, I feel that you owe your success as a fish-catching, flower picking WOW monk (Or cleric, or priest or whatever the hell it is that you are) to so many hours practicing the real-life version with Moi!
Happy Birthday, Melly.

**BTW-

If anyone can help me figure out what in THE hell is wrong with my photo spacing when I upload, I will like you. A lot.