Once again

Need I reiterate how very much I hate snow?

I hate snow.

For anyone who missed the past several years of ranting, here it is.
I think I'll make it bigger.

I hate snow.

Some things are worse than dying

A virus creeped into my body, possibly at the same time I was watching the new Star Wars movie. Three days later I feel like crap and have actually lost six pounds.

I leave it up to the reader to figure out why.

 

Wretchedly miserable, I am.

Since Yesterday

Yesterday I got the results from the CT-scan I had a month ago. I had asked the oncologist to wait until January to tell me the results because I didn't want the holiday spoiled. In 2008, I spent New Year's Eve in the hospital cancer ward, getting my first chemo treatment over to the next day as it took 13 hours. I really didn't want to even think about that over Christmas.

 

This Christmas wasn't too cool, either, because the house is a mess, all the living room furniture is in the dining room and stashed in inconvenient places. I have to sleep either on the sofa bed where the springs stick into my body or the futon which is hard as a rock. Needless to say, I don't get much sleep and what I do get is painful.

But it's okay. I can live with that.

 

But this time of year, thinking of the chemo and how awful it was and losing my hair and being unable to get around...not fun. And perhaps some of the reason why I couldn't sleep was because I was remembering how close I was to dying and how utterly inconvenient that would be.

And how it would feel to leave my sweet husband and daughters and my whole family...everybody. To be a nothing.

To be dead.

Not fun.

 

Well, anyway, the results weren't bad at all. No cancer...not at this time. It has been seven years of worrying about it returning and that won't stop, but for a little while, I'll not think about it too hard.

There are other things wrong--the sugar, the lack of sleep, the lack of breathing when I sleep, some kind of emphysema in my lungs, diverticulosis, spinal degeneration, being overweight...and the beloved gallstones. It is enough to make me feel doomed, but not as badly or as desperately as it would be if the diagnosis had been for cancer. Strike three, you're out!

 

It just isn't something you can shake off. Like PTSD...you can't "get over it". Maybe you could actually call it PTSD, as I have fought two battles and come out alive. There are so many people, some little kids, who haven't made it. And I wonder...why me? What have I done to deserve to live when so many others, so many nice people, honest and religious and happy and parents and little kids, perished in such an ugly way?

 

Maybe I have something else to do, something that only I can do to contribute to the greater good.

 

If you believe in fairies, clap your hands and Tinkerbell will live.

The coming year

Monday I will get the results of the CT-scan I had a month ago.

I hope I am not dying any more than usual...you know, the "everybody is dying a little every day" bit.

 

Dying would suck.

 

 

Is it wrong to want Deviled Eggs at Christmas time?

Didn't sleep well last night. Watching the Christmas Light program for two hours while wedged into the love seat with daughter #2 left me with a strained back and pain in every joint of my body. Getting old stinks. Feeling pain stinks more.
Anyway, I was up half the night trying to find a comfortable place anywhere in the house for my aching body.
And thinking about deviled eggs.

I could make them easily enough. Right now, actually.
Hard boiled eggs, mayo, two kinds of mustard, sometimes horseradish...done.
But that would require me to go downstairs and start the process.
I'm still sore and miserable.

So, I guess there will not be deviled eggs today.

But why am I even thinking about that?
And since this is the time of good cheer and love and all that, and the birth of Jesus, how come I'm even thinking of something with the word "devil" in it?

Bring me back to the 1950s.
My mom getting ready for one of the few big parties they ever held.
Trying to make hors d'oerves (I can't ever spell that word) with Ritz crackers and assorted gooey things to put on them.

My mom, I do love her so, but she really wasn't an imaginative cook. Or a really good one. So, for her, Ritz crackers had Kraft pimento cheese spread thinly on them, or caponata from a can of Progresso stuff, or some of that deviled ham spread with the little red devil rampant on the paper cover.
Ah-hah!
This fits right in with the deviled eggs I have been craving!

It's not the devil bedeviling me into coming over to the Dark Side, it's a fond memory. I learned how to make deviled eggs at her side.

People partied differently back then. There were lots of mixed drinks going around in appropriately shaped glasses. Hi Balls came in tall glasses with little sleeves on them so the hand could grip the icy glass better. Every house had a cocktail shaker. Vermouth was popular, I don't know why. Four Roses was in every house for parties. I don't even know what kind of whisky that is, but my parents did. Beer flowed gently. People dressed to the nines. Men in suits and women in dresses with wide skirts and small waistlines. Nobody wore blue jeans. There was a sort of elegance, but not really. Not compared to the parties rich people had.

Ritz crackers, Kraft pimento cheese spread in a little glass container, caponata and deviled ham. Not even a cheese plate and most certainly, no veggie platters because nobody had ever heard the word crudites. God forbid!

But deviled eggs were just fine.

Doggone

If you have ever seen the movie Old Yeller, you will understand.
Spoiler alert: the dog dies and everybody cries.

I don't know how old I was when the movie came out, but we saw it at the Brook Theater in Bound Brook, NJ. Showing with it was some sort of Disney life in the desert movie. I remember running up to the candy stand to avoid seeing the snakes...and there were lots of snakes. So many, they almost made me forget the end of Old Yeller.

But not really.
Here, so many years later, dwelling in the shadow of this movie and hearing all sorts of publicity about the current Star Wars movie, I guess I draw a parallel.

But I won't spoil it for those who have not seen the movie. I haven't even seen the movie, but I know what happens and Old Yeller flashes before my eyes.

Dogs cannot die in a book or a movie without getting a very negative reaction. About the worst thing, next to the protagonist in a story biting the dust, is to have the beloved dog die. Cats never die in books or movies, but dogs die horrid deaths frequently. I can rattle off at least five important dog deaths in books/movies that tore our hearts out. But no cats.  They never reach the end of their nine lives.

We've had a few dogs. Not as many as other people, and we haven't had one in about fifteen years, but last night I remembered the demise of those beloved pets and it hurt all over again. More than the lost babies I never really got to see, the dogs had been with us a long time and loved us as much as we loved them.

No, they are not more important than people. Lots of lovely people I know have passed away and their deaths hurt me terribly. But in a weird way, not like Old Yeller. I can view the dog romping through the fields with Tommy Kirk and Moochie over and over. The loved ones who are gone, though, I can't flip a switch and see them laughing and singing and hugging me any time I want.

There's something oh so sad about this, but you can't make something happen that didn't happen when it should have.

Tell the people you love how much you love them. Do it now! Don't wait. Don't put it off! Do it now.
You need to do this for your own sake.

Old Yeller was a good dog, until the end.
Remember that.
Think of the good times, not the bad.
Tell people you love them today!

Enough

Things I am sick and tired of and have absolutely no way of fixing:

This gun shit.
This shooting shit.
War.
Stupid people.
Not sleeping enough.
Cluttered house.
Cluttered counters in kitchen.
Dirt and dust.
The never ending cavalcade of bullshit which I am subjected to all day long, every day.
The insipid use of 24/7. the word "icon" when you refer to somebody famous, Beach Front Bargain Hunt and the ilk where people put three kids of opposite sex (well, two of them) in one cheapass bedroom.
Worrying.