Happy Birthday, Mom

Hi Mom! Happy Birthday. Looking forward to seeing you tomorrow.

And since it is Friday, here is a portrait of Silvio for your viewing pleasure:



Isn't he handsome?

Going Away

I'm off to St. Simons Island on Sunday to have some vacation time with my family. Heading back to the ATL on Wednesday, just in time for the another big family invasion (PDM's brothers + mom) of our home for Turkey Day. About a dozen people here overnight at the peak of all this. Stressing about it just a little bit. Which explains the five-day migraine I had this week. We'll deep clean the house and try to get everything ready on Saturday and hope that it doesn't get too dirty again by Wednesday, when I get here and most everyone else does, too. At the tail end of Thanksgiving weekend we have our big rivalry game after a full day of tailgating. Lots of stuff going on.

I'll probably be off the grid while on the island, and very busy when I get back. If I don't get another chance to say so - have a happy Thanksgiving! And To Hell With Georgia! (It's never too early to get your hate on.)

'Tis the Season...

...for procrastination.

I haven't done much about whittling down the list of gifts I need to buy. Even after deciding to do it mostly online, I am not feeling any sort of inspiration. I want to find unique and original things for people, but I don't even know where to start. Other than a few very cool things I picked up at an arts festival, I have only gotten a couple of other items. There is a long list to work through. I'd like to do a good job and find things that the people I love will really enjoy. This is probably one of those situations where my near total aversion to shopping of any kind is getting me into trouble. If you never set foot in a store, you generally don't ever see things that you think someone else might like. Then you sit in front of your computer like an idiot, wondering where to look and what might be out there. *sigh*

And Christmas cards? Yeah, haven't even started.

Moxy Has Moxie

Unlike Silvio, Moxy took the crowded house in stride last week. She was comfortable in spite of the chaos and friendly with everyone. Plus, she had all the toys to herself and lots of people to play with her. Silvio spent most of the long weekend hiding in the closet and under the bed. Zima was outside sunning herself and chasing critters during those brief intervals when she wasn't napping.

Invasion!

Silvio's about a have a bad week.

We're hosting the big T-Day family gathering this year, and the most of the gang arrives tomorrow... with kids. Thirteen people for dinner, and eleven people sleeping here (including us). Silv was bashful with just PDM's older brother here last night. He'll probably spend the next few days quivering under the bed. Or maybe he'll finally grow a set and get over it. The girl cats do just fine, thankyouverymuch.

I took this week off, so preparations have gone on at a leisurely pace. Having company over forces you to clean things up. Having overnight company means you have to clean up stuff that rarely sees the light of day, such as the bottom shelf of the 'fridge. It's amazing how much expired stuff can accumulate -- and we had already kinda sorta cleaned out the old food last week (or so we thought).

I've done my best to ferret out all the hidden cat hair and other dirt. The linens are clean, and the cobwebs have been removed. The case+ of "two buck chuck" (only the best wine for my family!) has been lovingly selected from Trader Joe's, along with some crackers, cookies, nuts, and cheeses. I've got all the stuff we need to make hot bourbon-laced cider. All we need is a few last minute groceries and a beer run. Let the invasion begin!

Happy T-Day to all, and remember: TO HELL WITH GEORGIA!!!

Backaches and Improbable Statements

The amount of work I get done around the house and yard on a given weekend is directly proportional to the intensity of the backache that inevitably results. I got a lot done this time. There is not enough naproxin sodium in the world to fix this. Now I'm sitting here with a hot pack wrapped around my lower back. I hadn't planned to work in the yard at all on Saturday, but the Tech game was such a crapfest that I went outside to burn off my frustration. For three hours. At top speed. *sigh* I was pretty mad.

At one point, I had to go get PDM and ask "Hey honey, can you move this toilet so I can get to the lawnmower?" Then I cracked up. Never thought I'd have to say something like that. That ranks right up there with the redneck classic: "Can you move this transmission so I can take a bath?" The bathroom construction project is still going on, and we have bath fixtures all over the place. Including the carport storage room, right in front of the lawnmower.

It wasn't all drudgery, although our fun plans for today were scuttled by my waking up with a sore throat -- we were supposed to spend the day on the lake in a friend's boat. That didn't seem like a great idea given the cool temps and my possible cold or whatever this is. We stayed home and painted the wainscoting in the new bathroom instead. But I did get to see my sister. She spent last night with us during an Atlanta layover. We went out to dinner, then watched Clerks II and drank the bottle of Bordeaux she brought back from Paris. Classy, no? Nothing goes with "ass to mouth" dialog like fancy French wine.

Porch Sittin'

The glider is back from the powder coater and looking better than it has in decades. The finish is sleek and glossy and the rust is gone, sand blasted to oblivion. Makes a very nice sittin' spot on the new porch. My mom fondly remembers sitting with her high school dates on this glider on her front porch, circa 1950s. I remember it from Big Daddy and Grandmother's back porch in Stone Mountain, and later in McDonough. Nearly every family gathering ended up on their porch at some point, with the glider in motion and fully occupied.

This photo is desaturated and sepia-toned. I wanted it to look vintage, like the glider. (A more abstract/artistic view can be seen here.) The glider's true new color is a dark blueish green. The original color was seafoam green with white squares on the seats and seatbacks, but the only color I ever remember it was hand-painted white with generous amounts of rust showing through the brush marks, and a black base. We won't see any rust for a very long time now...

The Inconsiderate Holidays

'Tis the season that I do not enjoy - daily email "promotions" and "don't forgets" arrive to draw my attention to a holiday that is a painful reminder of what I no longer have. In the past, I still had Big Daddy to celebrate. That tempered the empty feeling somewhat. No sense being morose when I had a grandfather to be with. But now I don't. For PDM, it is worse, having lost both of his parents and all of his grandparents. He gets a double dose of depression in May and June. Maybe it would feel different if we were parents ourselves... but that isn't looking very likely.

So I am thinking we need to find something distinctly different to do on Sunday. I still think about my Dad every day, even after fifteen years. I could do without the endless reminders of yet another Father's Day without him. Any ideas? I'm thinking maybe a movie. We still haven't seen "Iron Man". But maybe a comedy is in order.

The Stuff We Leave Behind

The family spent yesterday at Big Daddy's house, going through his stuff and dividing it up. It is not your normal family outing, that is for sure.

The first time I ever had to do such a thing, it was my Dad's stuff after he died in 1993. He was the first of my immediate family to go, and it was shocking because of his age - 57. It hit me so hard. Here was all of his stuff - ALL of it - and yet he was gone and not coming back. Very strange experience, and difficult to navigate.

This time there were a few tears, but a lot more laughter. There were old photos seeing the light of day for the first time in decades. There was a newspaper from July 21, 1969 - all about the first man on the moon. He also had two newspapers from the day his one and only great grandson was born. We read Big Daddy's draft notice from 1945. Letters from his brother Johnny before he was killed in WWII, along with a Nazi flag he took from the Germans. A box of memories of his mother. Lots of correspondence from his days as "Fortner the Merry Magician". All kinds of magic paraphernalia, books and media. His old license tag "K4PKQ" reflecting his ham radio days. There was an old chest from his days in the Civilian Conservation Corps, working in Oregon. There was an anatomically correct (sort of) frog, and some other off-color doodads. The box labeled "wide ties" was a source of amusement. The "narrow ties" weren't much better. The bolo ties were cool.

Today I read his "life story" that he began writing in longhand, bit by bit. His story covered his earliest memories and unfortunately, ends just as he met his wife-to-be, Ruby, and discovered his love of magic and ventriloquism. It is a damn shame he didn't get to finish it - it is a compelling read. He describes a hardscrabble existence in Atlanta during the depression -- no indoor plumbing or electricity; transportation involved walking, a bicycle or a horse and buggy; he had a father who drank too much; the family moved around a lot; and he had to leave school during the ninth grade to work and help support the family because times were so hard. He took correspondence school at night to get enough education to take the police exam. He met my grandmother at a wake. He had so many stories from his long career as an Atlanta policeman, and a second career as in investigator for the Public Defender's Office. During this entire time, he also did magic, ventriloquism, and mentalist performances. I wish he had had the chance to write all of those stories down, too. He knew so much about old Atlanta, much of which is gone forever.

I didn't take that much from his house. A few sentimental items, and some things that we can truly use - mostly kitchen things and some linens - ordinary wares I know that he and Grandmother used daily. It will take a while for it to seem normal for this stuff to be in my home and not his.

As has been the case throughout much of this, the weather seems to echo my state of mind. Saturday the air was heavy and sticky. There was the threat of distant thunder, but nothing in a hurry to get here. Finally, late overnight thunderstorms ushered in a shift in the weather. Today was changeable and windy. Unsettling. The wind chimes are frantically active and loud; the yard already full of sticks and leaves. But this will pass. I am counting on better days ahead.

Dawn

It has been a strange weekend. I feel sad, but I'm OK. The tornado that ravaged downtown Atlanta did not affect us here on the outskirts, twelve miles away. We're fine.

Normally, there would have been a lot going on this weekend into Monday with a wake and funeral, but Big Daddy is to be cremated and we'll have a celebration of his life in a few weeks. But it seemed wrong to just go about my business like nothing happened. So I didn't.

I was getting ready for work Friday when Mom called. It could only mean one thing. I sent word in to work, so they'd know not to expect me, and to let the people know who treated Big Daddy when he was our patient. Arranged to pick my sister up at the airport - she'd been about to work a trip (she is a flight attendant) from Atlanta to Hawaii. Called Mom to let her know we were on our way.

There wasn't an official wake planned, but I am glad that Big Daddy had one anyway. The old fashioned kind that doesn't involve embalming or funeral homes. Just the body and people who loved the dead. I kept fighting the temptation to stop the clock in the room, an old tradition. Its ticking seemed intrusive, distracting, unnecessary. I was there with my sister, my mother, and Big Daddy's "sweetcake", Jean. His priest came and went before I got there, to perform last rites. It is an experience I will never forget. After they came for the body, we went over to Big Daddy's house to console one another and make some phone calls. Jean and I sat for hours on Big Daddy's porch and watched the birds and the intermittent rain while voicing our memories. He was larger than life, and his absence leaves a big hole.

The rest of the weekend was, for me, rather low-key. I did not know about the tornado that hit downtown on Friday night until we got Saturday's paper. It was just a thunderstorm here, and we were spending a quiet evening at home once I got back from Big Daddy's. No TV or radio on, so we didn't hear about the havoc. PDM and I turned off the carport lights and stood in the darkness there to more fully experience the storm that came through. Other than one very close lightning hit, it was (to us) a normal thunderstorm. There were several more storms Friday night through Saturday. The unsettled weather fit my unsettled mood.

Yes, life will go on, but it will feel unsettled until we have one last gathering for Big Daddy. I miss him.

Twilight

I've gone back and forth about whether to post anything about this. I'm still not entirely sure, but for the most part this blog is read mostly by friends, whether I've "met you" in real life or not. And friends are there for you when things are not always the best.

Big Daddy is dying.

He has been in hospice care for about three weeks. This was after months of outpatient and inpatient care related to his metastatic prostate cancer and other health conditions. For a while, it looked like he could re-hab his leg and get back to a normal life, but his other health conditions decided otherwise - mostly his lungs, even though he quite smoking in the 1940s, apparently the damage never quite goes away. Big Daddy's quality of life has deteriorated significantly, and he finally decided that he's had enough of hospitals, doctors, medicines, tube and wires, tests, and interventions. The longer I see him in this condition, the easier I think it will be to finally let go. He has had 90 years, and been hale and healthy through most of them. We have been fabulously lucky to have had that time with him. And I am grateful.

Here is a video of him from last summer, in better days: Big Daddy and Sam.

Zzzzzzzzzz.

Ahhh, cat naps. Some of what I hope to do this weekend. Zima has had nearly 14 years of practice and she is very good at it.

There is still a lot of real life stuff going down that is not the greatest. Some of it downright sucks. I will write about it later, but for now prefer to keep it private. We will be fine and it is not anything that was unexpected. Just sad. More to come...

Out of the Woods

Big Daddy is on the mend. He had a scary weekend in ICU, and is still hospitalized, but he has been getting a little better every day. He should be able to transfer to a rehab facility soon and begin his long road to recovery and full use of his new-and-improved leg. Here is a BIG HUGE thank you to all of you who took the time to write encouraging comments. Your collective thoughts and wishes are appreciated!

Exhausted.

I'm not keeping up with reading your blogs or posting as often as I would like. It turns out that treating a family member, even palliatively, is very stressful. I'm not sleeping well, and feel all glassy-eyed and distracted when I am awake. I hope to get back to normal soon, although I am not confident enough to make promises about it. And aside from treating a family member, all four of our machines are due for annual testing and that is also taking up a lot of my time. Then on top of it all lies the slowly creeping crisis situation with Atlanta's water supply, leading to a further feeling of unease. Oh yeah, and our department is getting a new chairman in January. Who knows what changes that will bring? More unease and uncertainty. I wish I were one of those serene people who don't let things bother them. Unfortunately I am not that type. I am restless and tense. Not a patient person who can wait calmly to see how things turn out.

But this weekend, I have just the thing to help keep my mind off the turmoil: a home project! There are no Tech football games this Saturday or next, so I'll be stripping the yucky wallpaper off of the bathroom walls. The other bathroom needs to be scraped and sanded and have some drywall repair. We also have a new front door to pick up and install, and we want to take out the old glass shower doors. The next weekend after this one, I will paint the bathrooms and we will re-caulk the tub. Projects are good. They keep you busy and give you a sense of accomplishment, and make it a little easier to forget all the problems swirling around outside your door.

The War

I'm a little behind on posts, but I definitely wanted to get to this one. PDM and I started watching the new Ken Burns documentary The War on Sunday night. The series focuses on four American towns and how they experienced WWII. Early on in Part I, the narrator says something to the effect that this war touched every family in America. My first thought was something like "Wow. That's quite a statement." And then the more I thought about it, the more I thought it was probably true.

My family certainly changed as a result of the war. Big Daddy's brother Johnny was killed. (Big Daddy is my grandfather on my mother's side.) From family lore, Uncle Johnny was reputed to be funnier than Big Daddy and his other brother Warren put together, and that is really saying something! Uncle Johnny looks so kind and handsome and down-to-earth in the photo of him in uniform. I wish I could have met him. My Dad's father came back a changed man, which eventually led to his divorce from my grandmother and estrangement from Dad, who never forgave him for deserting his family. He returned from the war with some very bad habits. An alcoholic, he died alone, of cirrhosis of the liver. I never met the man, even though he lived nearby when I was growing up. Such a waste, and so much sadness all around. Other family members served as well. I have vintage photos and mementos from my Uncle Robert's time in Europe, including a photo of Bob Hope performing for the troops.

It really does seem like no one could have lived through that time and come out unscathed. Surely everyone would have had a family member or friend who was dramatically changed by that war. It was such a defining moment for our country and the world. Events so enormous as to be nearly beyond comprehension, while at the same time, the effects were so intensely personal.