to make sure this blog stays open so that I eventually can retrieve all the good stuff I wrote in it for nearly 3 years!

visit me at my new blog...

www.irishlullabye.blogspot.com.   

There are pictures there!!!

I'm always hesitant to talk about work.  I am deathly afraid of being dooced, given that I bring in nearly half of our income.  But suffice it to say, I am not happy with my new job.  I am happy with my new benefits, I am happy with my new commute, I am happy with my new pay.  But the other 9 hours of the day just blow.

The thing is, it's not that I am just a miserable employee.  I just am not in the right job.  My boss seems like a nice enough guy.  Well, from what I know of him.  Of course, I have been there 2 months and know only this about him.  His name.  Oh and I think he has a kid with ADHD because I saw a link on his Net History when he was showing me something. I work with mostly men, mostly very busy men who have no time for my bullshit. They are way too busy working to want to deal with someone like me who is off the street messing around with their cozy world filled with paper. And lots of paper.  Lots and lots and lots of paper.  Even if it is stored electronically, by freaking golly they are backing it up with paper.  It is enough to drive someone like me who managed IT projects in a past life absolutely up a wall.

Then there is my office. It's a converted closet.  Which means no freaking windows.  And lights as bright as a tanning booth.  I apply SPF 35 everyday before entering.  My back faces the entryway, which has no door.  So people are always sneaking up on my ass which is an uneasy feeling for comeone as claustropobic as I am. Didn't the work space designer ever see the Godfather?  It's so cold where I sit I wear layers every day. Only to have to peel them off when the heat does finally come on and I start to sweat to death.  The only people that talk to me all day are the ones in my computer.  Which for someone like me, is pure torture.  Last year I did a personality assessment called DiSC.  I came out a high I.  Which means that someone like me will wilt and die in an environment where the work is tedious *loving me some excel spreadsheets*, the culture does not allow brainstorming or presenting new ideas *check*, the environment is quiet *Um I talk to the people in my computer all day and have my radio on at all times*, the pace is too slow *have I mentioned the spreadsheets?*    Basic, I am dying a little bit everyday.   This environment is really fucking with my inner chi.  And I do not like it one bit.

High I's generally are people people.  I am a people person.  I like people.  I like talking.  I like being friendly.  I like being social.  I like having parties.  This place is sucking the fucking joy out of me.    And seriously, it's through no fault of anyone I work with.  No one has been mean to me, or demanding  of me.  They are just different from me.  Quiet.  Hardworking.  No time for bullshit.  And I am all about the bullshit. My few attempts to delver humor have been met with glazed over looks.  Didn't they realize when they hired me that this is who I am?....I bring the funny.  It's not my mad skillz that make me an enjoyable colleague. 

So there you have it.  I am really effing homesick for L*incoln.  I miss my co-workers, I miss my CUBICLE(of all things), I miss going to lunch with friends once a month or so, I miss laughing, I miss funny e-mails from co-workers, I miss running meetings(Yeah, it doesn't seem I get to do that much anymore).  I even miss those disgusting pot luck lunches I despised.  I have been so incredibly depressed that it has taken me almost 2 months to even talk on the phone to my former colleagues.  I called my friend Lori the other day and got so sad and nostalgic I had to get off the phone. I don't know if I am just having a hard time with change or if it is the job.  All I know is that I miss my old job.  I miss knowing what I am talking about (after a decade in insurance, it is safe to say I had that skill set)  and I even miss having a commute (it's amazing how much of a destressor that really was). 

I know.  I should shut up and be grateful this is my only problem.  And be thankful for having a job.  Which I am.  But it doesn't mean I have to enjoy it.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17557841/?GT1=9145

 

I was just watching the Oscars.  Al Gore was on withLeo DiCaprio talking about how the Oscars have gone all Green and how I should visit the Oscar site to find out how they did it.  Okay, I went there and all it was was a list of ways that I can go green.  Nothing about what the Academy did to make the awards show eco-friendly. Nice. Basically, it was all a bunch of bullshit to help them kiss up to Al Gore,inventor of the green movement, as well as the internet.

I think it is pretty safe to say that the majority of these major league hypocrites did not fly coach to today's ceremonies.  In fact,  I am willing to bet that LAX was teeming with Lear Jets carrying 2 or 3 people aboard, burning more fossil fuels in a day than my Honda burns in a year.  Sorry Hollywood, I'll start listening to you about the environment the day I see a picture where Brad Pitt doesn't have a Marb hanging out of his mouth.

On a more local level, Mike and I were behind a $50,000 gas guzzling Mercedes yesterday literally covered with bumper stickers letting the world know that the driver did not eat food with a face or eat vegetables that were treated with pesticides. I need to point out that the driver had perfectly foiled hair. I found this amusing considering the fact that for all her self righteous broadcasting of her belief systems, she was probably doing more damage to the animals with her noxious fume burning German machine and her awesomely coifed animal tested dye job than me, who ate farm raised chicken nuggets twice this weekend.

Then, there is that place I go to everyday.  I won't specify what type of place it is.  But they are all about vegan this and sustainability that.  But Sweet Jesus, they kill more effing trees everyday than I have ever seen in my life.  I seriously trip over file cabinets every single day.  In 2007. Oi.

Seriously, the whole world is effing backwards.  They just don't get it. If your going to talk the talk, than you better anti up and walk the walk....

Me...I don't really walk the walk that well...but at least I don't have the audacity to pretend to... 

Just saying, is all....

"A baby is God's opinion that the world should go on. " ~Carl Sandburg

Stubborn baby VZ is being served her eviction papers as I type. Thinking nice pink and blue thoughts for Carrie as she is induced today. Easy Labor vibes and lots of prayers as your new daughter graces the world with her presence, my friend..

"It was the tiniest thing I ever decided to put my whole life into. " ~T. Guillemets

 

 

My friend N*ancy asked us to go to The Dizzznneey with her family.  I
think I have mentioned her before.  She works at the same very liberal
Ivy colored place I do as well as having kids roughly the same age as
mine (a little younger by some months). Anyway, we've gotten to be
pretty good friends.  I told Emily this morning that she is my new
BFF, which makes me feel like a big poser because I hate when people
replace their BFF's all the time. I guess I am forgiven here because I
only ADDED her to my group of BFF's and didn't remove anyone from the
dubious distinction of having to put up with my crazy.

Anyway, I turned her down.  And I bet you all think it's because I am
anti- The Dizzzznneeyyy, huh?  Au contraire. I would love nothing more
than staying for free at someone else's time share and getting drunk
for a week straight while sill having my children around me (you know,
because I like to set a good example early on for them to follow). The
truth is, besides the obvious lack of funds that my husband reminds me
daily about, I fear this:
http://www.wbir.com/news/national/story.aspx?storyid=41509&provider=gnews

I have traveled via air with a toddler before.  As a matter of fact, I
flew by myself with the Mister at about the Sisters current age, give
or take a month or two.  I was 4.5 months pregnant and it was the
worst experience I have ever had besides giving birth to a sunny side
up baby after a 54 hour labor or having a 36 hour gall bladder attack.
It was a 45 minute flight that took 45 hours.  In all fairness to the
Mister, he did have an outbreak of this going on:
http://www.usc.edu/hsc/dental/opath/Cards/GeographicTongue.html.  If
you had big old sores on your tongue and were two years old and
couldn't eat, you'd be pretty miserable as well.  Anyway, on the way
to my destination, I sat next to a lovely gentleman who made the
Mister laugh (he was in a car seat-I heeded some sage advice and
bought him his own seat) and who helped me with the Mister while I
tried to locate my incorrectly routed luggage and rental car.
Sometimes the kindness of strangers is amazing.  Seriously, if it
weren't for this guy, I would have had a nervous breakdown on the trip
there, not on the actual trip, which I subsequently did in the privacy
of my budget hotel room later that night.

On the trip back, I was not so lucky.  The Mister wanted no part of
being calm and quiet in his seat.  Given that we were packed in like
cattle, there was just enough room for the Mister's short legs to be
able to reach and kick the guy sitting in front of us.  It was a
commuter flight, so there were lots of business travelers.  I have
been a business traveler.  I appreciate the fact that the everyday
tourist and their load of carry on crap that does not fit in the
overhead bins is annoying to the carry-on only Crackberry user.
However¡K¡KAt this point, I felt no sympathy for anyone other than
myself (and my boy, but that was secondary to my own feelings-sorry,
Bud). Despite my pleadings for my darling devil baby to stop kicking
the man in front of him, the Mister continued to do so.  My solution
was to hold his feet.  And then he started screaming.  He was already
in a pissy mood from his tongue, so he was going to be pissy about
everything. So, the more I held his feet, the more he screamed.  The
more he screamed, the more people stared.  The more that people
stared, the more I wanted to climb under my seat and hide, leaving
this demon child all to his lonesome.  So, like any good mother, I let
him resume the kicking in favor of stopping the screaming.  In front
of me sat "Mister I am so important that I brought my laptop to work
on the plane even though my company cares so little about me that they
stuffed my A$$ in coach with the rest of the trash".  He turned
around, looked at me, looked at my belly (disgusted that such a
terrible mother was procreating AGAIN), looked at the Mister and said
(and I quote) "Can you tell your kid to stop kicking my seat".  I had
enough at this point with EVERY member of the male species.  I whipped
my bloated pregnant head around and said "Listen Mister (okay I called
him A$$hole), it's either my kid kicks your seat or you and the rest
of the plane listen to him scream for the next 43 minutes.  Take your
pick".   If you know me, that is so not like me.  The unneeded and
poor example swearing, yes.  The confrontational nature, no. But for
some reason, I was royally annoyed with this guy.  He knew the BS I
was going through and yet he still had the audacity to confront me. He
is lucky I didn't pick up his ThinkPad and smack him upset his head
with it.  Granted, the first mistake I made was even getting on the
plane with the Mister and his erroneously diagnosed tongue (I believe
they thought it was thrush at the time, I can't remember), but I laid
500.00 out for those tickets.  I would be damned if I was blowing that
amount of money on a wasted trip. In retrospect, I shouldn't have
bothered as I had a terrible time, but hind site is 20/20. The real
mistake I made was even attempting to fly with an unpredictable child
in the first place.

Last year we flew the same route with both kids.  The Mister, at 4,
had grown up enough that he was good on the plane (and even sang
Johnny cash songs on the loudspeaker while we were delayed on the
tarmac).  The sister at 18 months was an effing nightmare. I
apparently did not learn my lesson in 2004.

Fast forward to 2007.  I have an invite to the Dizzzneeey.  That will
require a 2+ hour plane ride.  My 2 year old is a tantrum thrower, a
feisty little minion with lung power that can break glass.  Her moods
are hit or miss.  I hardly want to take her to a restaurant, never
mind keep her cooped up for 1100 miles in an air prison.  So, I am
turning  N*ancy down.  Because while I *think* that she might be okay,
I am not sure that I can trust that my toddler will not make us end up
in the news or her mother in jail.  And I don't care how strict you
are as a parent, to say that your exemplary parenting abilities can
prevent situations like this in every child under age 3 is kind of
silly.  Well, at least if your kids are like mine. Which, from my
experience, half of the population are.  My solution for their
inability to perform like the angels that society requires them to be
is simply not to bring them to venues where there age appropriate
behavior is not tolerated.  And I am sorry, but a 3 year old pitching
a melodramatic fit on a plane-Totally age appropriate.  A year later-
a whole nother bag of chips, but at 3 I will cut the kid and parents
some slack.  Oh hell, even at 4 I'd cut some slack to the parents and
kids-you never know what causes kids to act up.  You have no idea what
is going on in people's lives in the 2 hours you are acquainted with
them.  You wouldn't know until you have walked in their shoes.

I get the feeling that  I am about the only person who could relate to
those parents on that Air Tran flight.  According to People Magazine
(which is where I get  all of my hard news and data ), 90% of the
commenter's to the Boston Globe article were in favor of the airline.
And while I am not sure what the airline did was wrong or right, I do
not think people should be so judgmental of the parents. People (and
people!) thinks (and think) that these parents are the worst parents
since Britney and K-Fed. I see it a little different.

 I know when I was traveling for work a lot last year, it never failed
that I was often seated next to a weary Mom and an even wearier child.
I think it was my punishment for "not keeping my A$$ home where I
belonged".  The truth is, I enjoyed entertaining children other than
my own and giving their mom a break.  I generally made every effort to
make the kid laugh. I wonder if anyone did that for Elly Kulesza?  I
wonder if her worn out parents just ran out of ideas for keeping her
amused and calm?  I wonder if they had previously traveled with her
under good circumstances and never anticipated this happening?

You have no idea what was going on with that kid that day.  She could
have slept terribly.  She could have had some sort of sensory issue
going on where being confined in a small space made her flip out. I
know my Mister does not do well in settings where there are a ton of
people in a small space.  He really acts up and becomes almost like
another kid.  We call that kid "The Anti-D*aniel" Come to think of it,
I am ready to crawl out of my skin myself when I am with lots of
people I tight quarters.  I need my space people. I would imagine that
would be hard for a 3 year old to articulate?  Maybe Elly Kulezsa
needed hers, too?

Okay, I 'll shut up¡Kand just think¡KIt could be worse¡K.I could be
writing about this¡K¡K. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16773617/
And that would be a whole other can of worms that we need not open up.

 

Oh and one other thing...

This NASA thing?  OMG-The DIAPERS.  Hey, that gave me an idea...maybe when I do finally go on a plane with the Girl, to avoid having to bring her to the potty with me, maybe I should just.........Ah, never mind....

"A Thousand Miles"

Making my way downtown
Walking fast
Faces pass
And I'm home bound

Staring blankly ahead
Just making my way
Making a way
Through the crowd

And I need you
And I miss you
And now I wonder....

If I could fall
Into the sky
Do you think time
Would pass me by
'Cause you know I'd walk
A thousand miles
If I could
Just see you
Tonight

It's always times like these
When I think of you
And I wonder
If you ever
Think of me

'Cause everything's so wrong
And I don't belong
Living in your
Precious memories

'Cause I need you
And I miss you
And now I wonder....

If I could fall
Into the sky
Do you think time
Would pass me by
'Cause you know I'd walk
A thousand miles
If I could
Just see you
Tonight

And I, I
Don't want to let you know
I, I
Drown in your memory
I, I
Don't want to let this go
I, I
Don't....

Making my way downtown
Walking fast
Faces pass
And I'm home bound

Staring blankly ahead
Just making my way
Making a way
Through the crowd

And I still need you
And I still miss you
And now I wonder....

If I could fall
Into the sky
Do you think time
Would pass us by
'Cause you know I'd walk
A thousand miles
If I could
Just see you...

If I could fall
Into the sky
Do you think time
Would pass me by
'Cause you know I'd walk
A thousand miles
If I could
Just see you
If I could
Just hold you
Tonight

 

 

Whenever I hear this song, I think of my Mister.  The first time I ever heard this song was March 25^th, 2002.  Mike had just left my hospital room to go home and catch some rest after a very long few days of labor and subsequent stressful delivery of our first born, sunny side up son.  My in-laws had left, my parents had left, it was a few hours before the first round of visitors came to see the new heir to the McFamily fortune (ha ha). I was all alone for the first time with my baby.  And I was completely and totally shell shocked.

 

 I couldn’t sleep (I got a massive adrenaline rush after each baby, rendering me unable to sleep at all for a few days after they were born without medication), so I was watching the hospital run TV channel, where they showed music videos.  Frankly, I was surprised they even still made music videos since, as an avid watcher of Cribs and Pimp my Ride, I was under the assumption that since MTV never showed music videos anymore, than they were no longer being made.

 

Anyway, the music video for this song came on the hospital run channel.  I’m a sucker for pop music with a full orchestra playing in between sub standard lyrics, so I was glued to the TV.  While I found the whole traveling piano thing with the girl in braids staring intently into the camera while she zoomed at light speed through the continent, unaware that she was breaking the sound barrier from the comfort of her upright Baldwin slightly bizarre, I fell in love with the song.  And in my head, decided that whenever I heard that sound, I would think of my son and the day he was born.

 

In the months following his birth, the song would make me cry.   There were a myriad of reasons why I would start crying when that song came on.  And I cried a lot.  I couldn’t help but cry as they played that song about 400,000 times a day in the summer of 2002.  “A Thousand Miles” was Train’s “Drops of Jupiter”.  The summer song that was great until the pop stations beat it to a miserable death and you no longer could stand to listen to it ever again.  Until of course, you distanced yourself from it for a few years.  I am just now able to hear the Goo Goo Dolls “Black Balloon” and not want to put my fist through the radio to put the song out of its pain.  Sorry, side tracked there a bit.    The crying that was incited by this piece of pop garbage was actually made worse by the terrible PPD I was silently suffering from.  What should have been the happiest time in my life was actually the saddest.  I can’t really describe the feelings I had to the general public without feeling as though there will be people that will never understand it.  Suffice it to say, if you have been through PPD, you’ll know how I felt in 2002.  And you’ll know how sad I felt every time I heard “A Thousand Miles”.

 

A few years passed and occasionally I would hear “A Thousand Miles” and think …the words are so completely irrelevant to the feelings I have for my son.  I mean, it was a song about unrequited love, how could that be applicable to the unconditional love that my son and I share?

 

And then he hit 4.  And suddenly, the words seemed apropos. This has been a rough year for my Mister and me.  He is not the same kid he was a year ago.  The innocence of babyhood was replaced by a sullenness that I can only describe as positively a sign of what I have ahead of me for his teenage years.  He gets mad at me a lot.  Mostly because I am a nag.  I am not the fun parent at times.  I make him brush his teeth twice a day.  I make him take a bath everyday.  I make him get dressed by himself.  I take stuff away from him that he loves as punishment.  I enforce rules that he doesn’t think he needs.  He challenges me whenever he has the chance.  Basically, I am no longer just his caretaker.  I am his parent. And he hates me for it at times. And as you know, he is not afraid to tell me so.  I feel like there really are a thousand miles between us at times.  And there are times that I would give anything to go back to a time and place where there wasn’t this distance between us, where life was simpler.  You know, when he was “little”.

 

I know it’s just going to get harder as he gets older. What I am getting now is just a preview. People always said to me “Little people, little problems. Big people, Big problems” and I blew it off. Foolish me.  Remind me to go back 5 years and slap myself.   As physically exhausting as it is to have a baby or toddler, what you lose in the physically exhausting category is more than made up by the fact that as they get older, it just gets more emotionally exhausting.  The only consolation I have is that he is, at his core, a beautiful soul with a beautiful heart and a very strong sense of empathy and obligation towards his fellow man.  That will get him through much of what life has to throw at him and me through the years that are sure to make me worry.   It still sucks when he sasses me or says mean things to me or won’t hug me, but I know that I am doing the very best I can with him, so we’ll be alright in the long run.  I'm am not a perfect parent.  But he does have lots of love. Unconditionally. And I am sure he will sometimes find his way home to me if I just give him some space at times.

But my God, this parenting thing is really effing HARD.     

so that I was not home at 4:00 to watch this episode...http://www2.oprah.com/tows/slide/200701/20070123/slide_20070123_284_101.jhtml

I have to admit-after nearly five years of being a work outside the home mom, I am so over this. I am as over this as I am the Breast/Bottle/CIO/Co-Sleep/HomeSchool/BorderingSchool/Spank/NoSpank/Pesticide/No-Pesticide/AP/Non-AP/Christian/Non-Christian/War/No War/Vanilla Ice Cream/Strawberry Ice Cream debates.  In a nutshell, I simply no longer give a shit of what people think of me, my family,my choices or my circumstances.  We are doing what is best for us.  Not what is best for other people.

Seriously, with the WOHM vs. SAHM Bullshit, the only debate that exists is when other people think that their way is the only way.  WOHM's that think that SAHM's are wasting their lives.  SAHM's that think that WOHMS should "keep their asses home and raise their own children".  I am hardly a diehard feminist (I believe I have uttered the phrase somewhat kiddingly  a time or two "If it wasn't for women's lib, I wouldn't have to effing work") but I truly believe that the single biggest challenge women have in today's society isn't "The Man" beating them down, but contrarily, other women.  Seriously, we are really freaking rotten to our sisters. We judge them based on their looks, their choices, their economic status, the food they eat  or don't eat, the way they raise their kids, the car they drive, the clothes they wear, the people they associate with.  I could go on and on.  But seriously, we're BITCHES. No wonder why men think we're all freaking nuts. And I think that is the route of the debates that rage amongst women.  It's not because we are so impassioned by our causes.  It's just that we want everyone and everything to be JUST LIKE US.  Either that or we are trying to prove our superiority.  I don't know what I find more disturbing.  The fact that women want to create a homegenous society where we all act like Stepford wives, or the fact that we take great joy in beating our fellow sister down.  It's effed up.

I guess to sum up, I don't really care what your choices are.  If they are really effed up, I won't hang out with you, enough said.

The new job.  Different.  Let's leave it at that.  Shout out to Missie Parker in SC with her crappy health insurance.

Oh and my son has told me not once, not twice, but three times in the past 3 days that he hates me. Oh and that he thinks I am the Worst Mother ever.  Is there a Trade Mark for that?  He's had plenty of time to think about how much he hates me from the comfort of his bedroom. 

 

 

 

 

And I have no idea how to feel.  I wasn't especially close to her.  She wasn't a particularly describable woman.  Beautiful, yes.  Vain.  Definitely.  Outspoken.  Oh yeah. Hurtful.  At times. Sad. Recently.  Lonely.  More than I care to think about.

I woke up this morning and knew she was going to die.  I knew it because last night I watched The Quiet Man, which was on for no reason (afterall it wasn't St. Pat's Day when it is usually shown) and it was her favorite movie.  I also knew it was the 13th and 13 was a significant number for her. My grandfather's birthday was February 13th.  Their anniversary was April 13th. So I was surprised when Mike came in the bathroom during my shower and told me at 9:30 that she died a half an hour before.  Alone in the hospital. I went Tuesday to see her. It was the first time I have seen her since May.  She was failing fast.  It's amazing what happens when you are dying. You become like an infant, except the worst part is that unlike an infant, you are acutely aware of what is going wrong.  There is no dignity in death. You are reduced to an ignored patient, a nuisance to the nurses, someone who lies in your own excrement waiting for someone to remove it while you just wish God would take you from your pain.  I can only hope that when my number is up, I am on a plane coming back from a beautiful vacation.  Sudden.  Instantaneous. Dignified.

Everyone keeps telling me how sorry they are about my grandmother and it gives me the heebie jeebies.  I feel like an imposter.  I wasn't close to her.  I hardly called her.  I hardly visited her.  I was a terrible granddaughter. I knew this day would come all too soon and that I would feel as terrible about myself as I do right now. I should have done more.  I should have visited more.  I should have cared more.  I feel terribly guilty today.  I feel like my heart is made of stone. My sister called me and said "Have you spent the day crying, too?".  I was like "Um, no, I haven't.  Am I supposed to ?".  It just feels that I don't have a right to carry on like I was a treasured family member. Or that she was.  

My grandmother wasn't the easiest person in the world.  She complained alot. I bought my father a silly statue last year that said "The older she gets, the more Irish she becomes." That sizes her up. She complained constantly about her health, even when it wasn't bad.  She liked to ask me how my diet was going.  Every. single. time. she. talked. to. me.  I often thought that she felt that my big ass was a bad reflection on her.  I overheard her whispering to my late great aunt at my baby shower "Suzie has always been a BIGGGGGG girl".  I went home and cried.

The truth is, she was hard to talk to.  Hard to visit.  I dreaded every phone call.  Every visit.  Mike and I were having a fight one day and she called in the middle of it.  I heard him say "Sure Grandma, Suzie is right here.  She would love to talk to you". I gave him the finger for the next half hour as I heard all about her latest medical ailment. The last time she called was for my anniversary.  D* aniel picked up the phone.  Mike and I generally dive on top of him when we see the number on the caller ID to keep this from happening.  But I am so glad he got there first.  I told her that I was planning to come down with the kids 2 days later. 2 days later she entered the hospital and never came home.   

Tonight we were sitting in the middle of dinner and D*aniel asked if I saw her before she died.  I told him yes, I did on Tuesday.  He looked me straight in the eyes and said "You should have brought me to see McMary (that's what the great grandkids called her)  Tuesday.  Now I have to wait till I go to God to see her".  And you know what, he was fucking right.  I should have brought her great grandkids to see her.  At the very least she deserved to see them before she died. But I didn't want to be bothered. Out of the mouths of babes, I guess.

Right now I am thinking alot about when I was a kid and we used to spend weeks in the summer at her house.  My grandfather was a retired NYC homocide detective.  He was larger than life.  He was so handsome.  And she was so beautiful.  She looked like Maureen O'Hara.  He looked like John Wayne. Maybe that is why they loved The Quiet Man so much.  She used to play checkers with me and took us to the town pool, which they only belonged to for the sake of us kids. My grandfather, in his sixties, used to jump from the high board at the pool.  He was a beautiful diver.  He was an excellent swimmer. This is the way I like to remember him.  Young.  Athletic.  Strong.  And my grandmother...I'll remember sitting on her front porch, collecting fireflies and watching the fireworks.  I'll remember going to Friendly's for an ice cream or that time 9 years ago when we went for Pizza together when my grandfather was in the hospital.  She was taking cabs to the hospital.  It made me sad.  I drove down to NY (they lived in Westchester County) to take her to the hospital so she wouldn't have to take a cab. Old people shouldn't have to take cabs.    

I need to end this post right now because for the first time since I heard the news, I am crying.  All of this nostalgia has made me wish that I could just get one more of her annoying phone calls, hear her call me Suzie Bella Jane, smell her Chantilly perfume.