familial afflictions.

i am elated to have returned to our nice, CLEAN, quiet abode where i have my wifey, our furbabies, our fishy, my plants, and the rest of our things. i LOVE, LOVE, LOVE going back home where i come from. but i LOVE, LOVE, LOVE coming home to MY home even more so. my time in Florence was riddled with anxiety, restlessness, family drama, and complete exhaustion in every possible aspect.

first thing's first: my mama. she had to have very serious surgery to correct some horrid conditions she had. it most certainly was not life threatening at the time, but the ramifications of the surgery were if proper medical care was not given for her recovery. the surgery initially took only a couple of hours, but it revealed her condition to be worse than expected. one night in ICU was followed by 3 additional nights on a regular room floor. my mommy was in the hospital ON HER BIRTHDAY. i know that sucked balls worse than a crazy old coot pissin on ya living room floor. it was truly heart breaking seeing my mom in writhing pain. what got to me worse than that was seeing her breakdown when my dad left to go buy himself some supper. he left me in the hospital room to look out for mama. my dad is such a great man to her, but there were a few times during her hospital stay i could have knocked him out a time or two.


with the head of the family being hospitalized, it brought MOST of the family issues/drama from simmering nicely under the surface to boiling, scalding hot in your face. it made me realize even more how lucky i am to have a wonderful mom who never gave up on me, and who somehow had enough strength to win me over from the dark side, that was my biological sperm donor and his sad sack of shit family. (one particular cousin excluded, however.) i guess in growing older, i am becoming more and more acutely aware of just exactly how great my mom was and is to me. one thing i did take note of, particularly, was when i saw her lying in her ICU bed, it scared me. as much as i disliked my biological sperm donor, he was my father. MY genetic donor. MY father. and the hard cold fact is, that the son of a bitch is dead. i only have one biological parent left. and seeing my mama like that just scared me down to my core.

i am happy to report that my mom is recovering very well. she is currently at her M-I-L's for her recovery. (if ya ask me, that is no recovery; its damnation. that's an entirely another story for another time, "but i digress,...") she can begin driving again in a lil over a week, she can't pick up anything over 15lbs, and she may be able to begin school when it starts about midway through august. she was upset by the realization that she would be unable to pick up her favorite grand fur baby, jackson. my "miniature" dachshund is a damn porker, weighing in at approximately 18lbs. (that's all solid too, no fat.)


my sister and i were able to meet in the middle and act like civilized human beings once again. apparently teenagers get mighty pissy when you bust them at a party and tell their parents. gee, who'da thunk it?! she and i worked out a schedule that everyone would be pleased with, as far as it went for staying the week with our rockin awesome grandmother. who, by the way, i found one night i was there, cradling, rocking, petting AND singing a LULLABYE to sophia, my baby girl furbaby. i thought my own mama was bad with jackson, our wiener dog!! noooooo, my grandma has her beat by a country mile!!


and lastly, i found this particular picture at my grandma's. yes, yes. here i am being held by my mother, whilst my bio-pop is giving me beer. freaking LOVELY. now i have heard of children tasting a sip of beer, but they were usually CHILDREN or toddlers, at the youngest. here i was, having MAJOR health issues at barely 15 months old, and he's giving me beer. yeah, that's one HELLUVA father, ain't it, yall?! looking at my mother's face, you can easily see the look of disgust for all to see. (okay well maybe except yall, since i have blurred out their eyes to "protect their identities," so certain people wouldn't come bitching to me about it.) i had not even had my open heart surgery tet when this was taken. i was laughing with my wife, telling her this explained EVERYTHING. everything from my issues, to even a haunting foreshadowing of his death.
but alas, my bloggy blog readers, this is all i have for yall today. i do apologize for the break in between posts. hope yall are doing well!!

update.

i have not forgotten about you, my faithful interwebbers. my mommy had surgery and i have been back home to fulfill familial obligations. as will i also be doing next week. i will update as often as i can. so i leave you with july 4th pictures. :-)

patchwork pieces.

tomorrow is the big day. my mom arrives to help paint our new house. seems unbelievably surreal. i am 26 years old. i have a wife and two dogs. and on top of it all, i'm still my Grandma's girl. try as i may, no matter how hard i dig my feet into the sand, time still washes ashore with the tide. you can't stop the tide.

i like where i am at, in my life. of course, i still want to change a few things. a little tweak here, a little tweak there...but who doesn't want to tweak their life up a little bit? all things that are meant to be, will be eventually. you can't stop the tide.

i am so thankful for what i have in my life. the people in my life are my
everything. each person that i love has a specific place inside of me; inside my soul. its funny if you think about it...my heart and soul are like a patchwork quilt of everybody i've loved. when i was born, i had a hole in my heart. to repair it, essentially, they patched it up. i was born a patchwork piece. how about that.

i've been looking at books on amazon.com tonight. like a fiend, i've been making my wishlist. on it, i have books on abusive fathers, grieving for them, memoirs of estranged father-daughter relationships, and of course, books belonging to my favorite genre, southern memoirs/comedies. i am wanting those books on fathers because he has been on my mind lately. i think its because the holidays are imminent. i have also been in contact with his other daughter. i don't really know what to call her. i don't know what title to label her with. and for somebody with a slight tendency towards OCD, thats annoying.

she says she finds herself comparing our lives. i think in comparison, our lives are vastly different, yet strikingly similar. how odd that we can be such a classic paradox. but it is what it is. what will be, will be. i am unsure if we will ever be in contact more than we are now. we weren't raised as sisters, so i think the undefined bond between us leaves us hanging in limbo. i believe we both only have good intentions at heart. to overcome all that hate, all of the lies,...would be a miracle of herculean magnitude. i cannot speak for her, but on my side, i feel my part is breaking the cycle. erradicating that anger, that hate for the next generation. i so hate the thought of passing down his DNA to my child. if i could somehow erase that out of my own DNA profile, i'd do it in a heartbeat. the ties that bind are not made of blood, but with love...not hate. hate can restrict. but that's all it can do. it'll only do what you allow it. and now that he is gone, i am not the only one who can breathe a sigh of relief. (i do not speak for J when i say this.)

his weapon of choice was hate. like a python, he used his hatred to suffocate his victims. a slow, painful agonizing death. he took aim at your greatest weakness, and dove in headfirst to assure his victory. he, like the anaconda, is now nothing more than a legendary monster. at least, from my perspective that is. what still saddens me, in the most odd way, is that he hated me as much as he so passionately did- and he didn't even know me. how does one hate their enemy so without knowing them? that isn't very smart if you ask me. seems to me the best strategy is to get to know your enemy inside out, so you could strike with one, simple and delicate blow. it scares me. it scares me that i have the capability to think like that. that i have the potential within me to be as evil as him. who thinks like that? bad people think like that. i mean, its just messed up.

he was all about fluffing up, like a cobra. but killing like the anaconda. that is the coward's way. he just made a mockery of himself for all to see. i laid in wait. i stalked to know his every move. scrutinized him. i knew his actions and reactions to any and everything in this world. then, i let the prey come to me. and there i sat, in the second row at his funeral with my wife in plain sight, for all of his cohorts to see. his disabled dyke daughter in full view of all of his friends. the thing that mattered most- his precious reputation. well, he mucked that up himself, but i... i reaped the rewards by desecrating his memory. and truth be told, i did so quite happily. somewhere in all of this is definately a therapy session or two.

my sanity, or the remainder of it, that is, was tied down to ground level, to reality by my wife. she tied it up like a boat to a dock. i thank buddha everyday for that. i really don't know where i would be right now, if she hadn't have been there for me. she hung in there. she didn't give up on me. neither did my family and friends. its hard to rip apart a tightly knit patchwork quilt. the ties that bind the quilt together are made of love- the most durable fiber there is. with that- i am stronger than i ever was.