A Heavy Heart

I've just finished for the night with cleaning this freakin' house. And, well...it's still not done. Nor do I expect that it will be in the near future. Most people if they're not home a lot, they get to come home to a nice clean abode, nothing out of place that they themselves didn't put out of place. Not me. No, no...I have three kids, a dog, a cat and a husband to make damn sure that the little scenario I just painted for you never, ever happens to me.

This house is a hole. Plain and simple. I don't have time to clean it, and God forbid anyone else should get off their duff and do anything about it. There's toys strung from hell to breakfast, clothes in spots clothes just shouldn't be, dust an inch thick (well...maybe not an inch but you know what I'm talking about) and...it's just yucky. Yesterday, I scoured the kitchen, mopped, washed the windows etc. Today, I worked on the dining room and den, and tonight, I conquered the livingroom.

I'm bringing home my cherry desk from the office, and taking this desk and selling it with the rest of the office equipment. I'm making my bedroom into an office-slash-slumber room. It's the only room big enough in my house to accomodate that desk that I can trust my files won't be colored on with multi-colored crayolas. Plus...with the type of case sensitive stuff I work on, it's the only room that I know no one else plays in or anything and I can lock it up and know that it won't be bothered. That little project happens Saturday morning. Yahoo. That desk weighs more than probably all of my readers and me combined. Mr. DK and Charlie (my neighbor) are delighted with being assigned the task of not only moving it, but moving it all the way upstairs and around a bend of the stairs. Ha-ha-ha. That's what they get for going out drinking for two consecutive weekends in a row. Nener-nener-nener!

So, I titled this post a heavy heart. There's a few things on my mind I'm going to write about tonight.

The first is my Gram. My Gram is a pain in the ass from way back. I love her with all my heart and soul, but MAN can that woman piss me off. I call there the night before last and Grandpa answers. He tells me that Gram has been holding back a little information from me. I ask what sort of information he was talking about and he tells me that she's sick. Really sick. For the past 10 years, she's had a heart disease. 10 years ago, they gave her 5 years to live. 5 years ago, she had a triple bypass, and has had several surgeries after that. She seemed to be doing really well. I mean...not like let's go for a 10 mile hike good, but good for what she's been through. Know what I mean? Well...Apparently about 4 months ago, the doctors told her that she's going to go through 4 stages before she actually dies.

Grandpa enlightened me in on what's going on right now. She's in the last part of the third stage. The last stage is total organ shut down. Thursday, they put her on oxygen for good. She's carrying around one of those little oxygen tanks with her all the time, and she's now wheel chair bound.

I'm pissed. Why couldn't she have told me this 4 months ago when she found out about it? Is it just me, or is that completely selfish?! I have three kids who need to know her the way I know her. I need the secret recipes for some of the stuff she makes like peanut brittle and that damn potato salad. I want to go through all of the pictures and hear the stories from her. I have so many things I want to do, and now, she's too tired and too sick to do all of it. We could have gotten a head start on all of this.

I'm further pissed because instead of letting the rest of us in on the little secret that she's about to die, she had full intentions of letting it be sudden. As if we haven't had enough of sudden death in our family. My mother was murdered 8 freakin' years ago, and Gram picked up the slack. Now, she has been planning to just go - just like that.

That, in my world is more than a little bit of bullshit. I'm not complaining about the fact that she has to go. I know how it works. But...her little bit of being noble and suffering quietly makes me want to just kick her decrepit ass.

The next thing I'm schmoopy about I don't think I'm going to go and get all detailed about. What I will say is that I've been lied to by a friend who I truly never thought would lie to me. Hell, there was no reason for this person to lie to me. But it happened, and now just like that, the friend in question is out of my life for good.

How do you deal with that? How are you so close one day, and the next you find out that everyting you've ever known to be true about someone isn't and you have no choice but to pull back and part ways? Has that ever happened to you?

I've known some great people in my life. I cherish my friends and try to give as much as I take in every relationship. But...sometimes it's just not what you thought. And...it hurts.

David: I have 3 steelcase L shaped desks with overhead storage, plus one cherry U shaped desk with two large size file systems in it (I am keeping the matching one). Everything else I've either designated to volunteers or are keeping in the home office. And...thanks! E-mail me an update on what's going on in your world!

Cheryl: The week before New Years is when I'm scheduled to have the surgery. I can't wait to get it over with!!! Thanks for thinking about me!

To everyone who's written to welcome me back...thank you so much for caring enough to come back every day! I'm sorry about the lag in posts, and I'm going to try to be better about it. I love the release I get from emptying my head, and yet it's the thing I've been neglecting the most the last few weeks!

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