He’s not dead, he died. This, from my daughter with special needs. When I talk about my dad being dead she reminds me he isn’t but he did die. It goes on for minutes and it’s daily. I try to re-explain that they are one in the same but it took her 17 years to walk down stairs right. Like one foot on each stair not her foot meeting on each stair. It has been driving me bonkers. Now she can do it with the precision of a perfectionist. She has mastered stairs. She can do it with a cup of juice. With her arms behind her back. With her enormous laugh echoing the halls at 6:00 a.m. she is so proud of herself and I so am proud of me for not losing my shit for the last 17 years while we master stairs. Death mastering may take some time and it may not even be necessary to even correct simple grammar. He died and he is dead. He also is dead and he died. She argues it like it’s a thing to argue but she is half me and half her dad and we liked to argue. She is a master arguer.
If you aren’t a parent with a child with really different needs you can’t grasp the enormous emotion around the stairs mastering. It’s why I live in a second floor building. I needed stairs. I want her to be able to do stairs. I have goals she doesn’t know about for her and stairs is one. I can’t have her in some building some day that she catches on fire from her lack of cooking mastering and not be able to hussle her booty out that building. I may not have the option or be around to say. We need lower level. She walks down stairs like a brand new toddler. I want to be able to say. Sure we will take the second floor she can get down stairs faster than, than what? A brand new toddler. Or, I want to be able to say nothing if I am also dead and also have died.
If you look back you will note I said she will catch a building on fire. It’s not an excessive fear or worry of just your typical mom. It’s an excessive worry or fear from experience of an atypical mom. She likes the kitchen. She loves food. She is curious about the microwave. She likes very specific foods and sometimes she wants them when she wants them in the microwave. Again, I don’t think microwaves should be allowed to cook to the point something could explode or catch fire. I need a microwave with the option for 2 minutes. Tops. Like an easy bake oven. She can heat her spaghetti Os with a light bulb. It’s safer. She knows in the kitchen is the place that I make food. She is not a good cook. We have talked about this. She knows she isn’t a good cook. She says, im not a good cook. I say. No sweety, not yet.
I focus on the things she is good at like dishes and laundry as relates to domestic duties. She may need a good cook someday. Luckily they need the skills of a typical teenager cooking skills. Basic microwave 101 and scrambled eggs. And a stock in ketchup. This is not a goal. I don’t know how to make it one safely yet. Things in the kitchen contain flammables and fire and power and these are just all reasons she needs to be great at stairs for now. To save herself. Someone can help her feed herself.
I can use cool words. My son and people talk around me in such cool ways. They say cool things and use words that say cool but aren’t the actual word cool. I’ve googled them. I want to talk cool like cool kids but coming out of my mouth they sound like someone saying a word for the first time. Sick, tight, swassy, apparently saying Jeff Bridges is cool. You can say that is deck. Or mantasmagorical. Too big. I can’t even say it fast enough to sound deck. I love the urban dictionary. It is full of things to say for words that aren’t the right words to say. In fact I could make up my own. I can say something is cool in any way I want. Or I can just say cool.
I have had 3 nights of sleep. Today I don’t feel groggy or hung over. Which I shouldn’t since I didn’t drink to have a hang over. I just felt that way. My daughter could be up in the night doing things. But I’ve slept hard enough I don’t know. She unplugged the turtle tank filter and all the TVs before bed. She likely thinks this is something we do. She sees me unplug the microwavee and stove and thinks we just unplug things. She doesn’t like the noise from the turtle tank filter and she won’t sleep if she knows the tiny little tv light is on even though the tv is off. Why do we have to have a tiny little red light on when the tv is off? It’s a huge issue for my life. I took a tv apart to see if it could be something I just remove. Then I needed a new tv….my son did not think this was very Walnut Creek. That doesn’t even make sense, why would Walnut Creek be slang for cool? It’s not that cool? Or not that damp? I need to just stick with cool. I could maybe get away with tight. But for now I am using cool or drippin.
I worried my new hiking friend won’t want to hike with me anymore. Hang with me? That’s what we are doing, right? I asked. He said of course. Which means we are just hanging out? But I don’t think he will. He might. He needs to hike. I need to hike. I need engaged and he needs engaged. In nature. To deal with our not being engaged out of nature. So why do I think it? Because people also need to do other things. Things that don’t have anything to do with hanging with me? I can hang by myself which is what I know. Are we just hanging out? Like two cool kids? Just hanging? No. We are not just hanging out. For me it’s more. Thats why I ask .
I feel like I am not quite needed there sometimes. I don’t need to be needed. Not quite thought of as even there. I dont need to be thought of as there. Is that a reason to hang back. Not hang? I could do other things? The things I used to do before I had someone to hang out with. I just like having a hiking hanging out partner. It’s new and uncomfortable which is why I do it. Because I’m afraid to. The more comfortable I am on my own the more comfortable I will be when I am on my own. The more uncomfortable I am with new things the more comfortable I will be being uncomfortable. Is that possible. Wouldn’t I just be comfortable then? Some people just can’t be without someone. I can’t be with someone as easily as some can not be without. Or with? My ex was just someone kind of in the vicinity of me. He did things that were just around me, we didn’t share a life we shared a space where he had no room for my life. Then he needed more and didn’t feel like telling me but telling others. It had nothing to do with me and who I am or am not. I am just who I am. And I think I am pretty cool. Or pretty baller. Or pretty str8 out the washa. The possibilities of cool words is just so cool.
I can finally eat again. I’ve had grief unresolved, Lyme disease and then a river parasite. I haven’t wanted to eat and haven’t been able to eat. This has not been cool. I have lost a lot of weight that I don’t have to lose. But I lost a lot, then bugs kept giving me things. I have yet to get coronavirus. I feel like I will and so will everyone else no matter what we are all doing or not doing.
Today I googled the coronavirus news. And I did it before I got out of bed. A solid rule of mine broke. No googling while horizontal. I can’t digest news while waking or not waking for sleep or not sleep. I have to be upright and ready with feet on the ground. Grounded. Locally they are back to giving specific tally’s of deaths. No names just whether you are male or female and how old you were. I remember when we knew all the things. Each individual that died and is also dead had a story to be told now we don’t have the time to tell them. There are too many. Coronavirus impacted my life. Someone said it would. Someone said we will all eventually know someone who died from it. Not just impacted but I have felt a loss. I knew someone with a story. He is gone. Coronavirus is so uncool. So unballer. So not str8 out of the washa. So impactful.
It doesn’t change how I feel. Someone told me I should be more careful since I know someone who died from it. That I should take more precautions. I can’t do anymore than I am. And am not. He died doing exactly what we say to do plus some and he still got it. It makes me feel even more like we don’t know what we are doing and we can’t control a single thing so we need to live life to the fullest before it is over. I don’t feel like an asshole or like I am selfish. I have lost a lot. I still have a lot I could. So could anyone. I know someone, my friend, who keeps losing people. From no coronavirus. We are both grieving. But not. Just still living. For now.
Aspenleaf 