Grotesque Display

I hate fly paper. I hate it with a passion.

I think it is tacky.  Pun intended.

The nasty brown of the sticky paper hanging from the ceiling grosses me out. Every time.

Then there are the flies and other flying pests that get stuck to it in a grotesque manner with their little arms legs all sticking out in an unnatural warning other flies to steer clear... Like when some places put skulls on posts warning others to stay away.

And when flies first get stuck, they are in denial of their plight.  You think I would be happy when one gets stuck - no more fly pestering me.  But the concentrated buzzing and efforts to free themselves don't make this any better for me. If anything, it makes it worse.

I can almost see how people become vegan, respecting every life.  Right now, as I type this, I hear the sound of a poor, helpless fly stuck and the reverberation of its tiny wings is reminder that I just killed one of God's (albeit annoying) creatures. A slow death.  An agonizing death. But it beats having to chase each one down with a fly swatter.  Ew.  That is gross. The fly guts on the swatter... the futile effort to find where the carcass landed.

I have to keep reminding myself that summer is almost over and there shall be no more flies (or spiders/beetles/grasshoppers/etc) to bug me anymore. Again, pun intended.

No more middle of the night waking up to that dive bombing fly.  No more returning from the bathroom and seeing a fly on my food.  No more waving and flailing my arms about to scare them away.  No more flies.

Yes, I hate fly paper, but I hate flies more.

XXXV

Today would be Adam's 35th birthday.  I wonder what we would have done for him if he were still alive.  I probably would have made him one of his favorite dinners and a German Chocolate cake.  I know we would have some friends over for games.  The girls probably would have bought him "Toy Story 3" for his present.  He was a big kid at heart.  I would have probably bought him some cool Star Wars toy or something.

He has been dead for 7 1/2 years, but I bet he would still be as skinny as a rail.  He probably would have had some gray hairs that I know I would have teased him about.

In memory of their daddy, the girls wore their cowboy necklaces with his birthstone in it.  I hope today will be easy for them.  We usually go buy balloons, write notes for him and tie them to the balloons, then release them into the sky.  This year we don't have any money so we can't do that.  I don't know what we will do instead.  Maybe I will just sit with the girls and talk to them about their daddy and tell them funny stories about his life. They love hearing about him.  I know they don't remember much because they were so young when he died and I think they feel a bit guilty even though it is not their fault.

I kind of numbed myself for today.  I was planning on sleeping all day, but I know he wouldn't want me to do that.  So instead, I am going to go to the gym so I can try to stay healthy so I can live a long, full life and be here for the girls and my family.

May 10, 2003

I just made it through another anniversary of Adam's death. I don't think the work "anniversary" is appropriate for occasions such as these. "Anniversary" is something that is supposed to be a happy time. Either way, this year I think I did ok. I had my moment about a week before and so when the day came, I was either ok or numb.

As for my girlies, they each had their own, separate moment of grief. Rebekah's was a few days before his death date. Every year I never tell my girls what day is getting close - why would I want to torture them? But somehow, like clockwork, they each have their moments around the same time of year. Just a few days before May 10, I tucked the kids into bed and then went to my room to play on the laptop. About ten minutes go by and Rebekah is at my bedroom door, bawling. I scooped her into my arms and we cuddled on the bed. Through her racks of sobs, she said, "I miss daddy." I just held her and let her cry. It was hard on me because there was nothing I could do to make her pain go away.

Then May 10th comes along. Like I said, usually I don't remind the girls what day that is, but we got some flowers in the mail and they wanted to know why my mom sent us some. Plus they wanted to know why I told them to give Mawgers (Patti) extra hugs at school that day. (She works in Lily's classroom) So I finally told them. They seemed ok until bed time. Lily had me hold her while she cried and cried. Rebekah was ok since she had her moment a few days before.

Lily got hit twice though. You see, for about a week before the day, Lily said she was feeling sad but kept saying, "I don't know why I am so sad." I didn't feel like telling her.

Both my girls may not have known before the day why they were feeling down, but their little spirits knew what day was coming up even though their brains didn't.

I still can't believe 7 years have gone by. Thankfully it doesn't hurt as much as it used to. There are those moments when I feel the sting of being reminded that I went through the most difficult thing in my life. But then I feel the relief of knowing that I made it through that time of my life and became a stronger person because of it.

The Morbid Part of Me

When I got remarried, I told myself that being married to me must be so stressful that people only have a certain life expectancy. I know, morbid. Well, I counted up the days of how long Adam and I were married and told myself that if Bill could make it past November 24, 2009, that he would break the "curse." Today is the 25th! The curse is lifted!
I told you I was morbid.

HONEST SCRAP

(doesn't the title "Honest Scrap" look like (and sounds like) "Honest Crap" ??)

Ok, Jana, since you know that I love to talk, especially about myself, I will do this. Plus I love you, so here I go...
I have to list 10 honest things about myself then tag 9 other people.

1) I have purchased my own headstone. It was really weird buying it and having my name engraved on it. But seeing the death date blank makes it a little less weird.

2) I have never been stung by a bee or ever dyed my hair. I know those two things have nothing to do with each other, but they are just two things that most adults have had happen or done in their lives.

3) I can be quite shy. Yes, believe it or not, I CAN be shy (shut up, Jana LOL). I spent almost my entire Senior year of high school eating lunch in the library.

4) When I was 8 or 9 years old, I had a crush on Jim Lange. I remember we went to a taping of "Name that Tune" because my uncle was a camera man and he got me an autographed photo of Jim Lange. I still have it, somewhere in a box.

5) I have over 150 board/card games. Yes, I cannot help myself. I do have a couple different varieties of Monopolies, but I do have a good selection of games. I have a problem, I can't pass up a game. Another pathetic thing is that I actually have a few duplicates.

6) I absolutely LOVE to bake. I would much rather bake than cook any day of the week. My favorite things to bake are: cookies, pies, cakes, and pizza.

7) I would love to be a contestant on "Survivor" or "The Amazing Race." And even though I LOVE "The Biggest Loser" I just hope I never need to be a contestant on that show. Although, my mom and I say, "I'm training to be on The Biggest Loser" when we eat things we shouldn't. :-)

8) I LOVE to take pictures of anyone or anything. I love it so much that I have been known to lay down on the grass in a stranger's yard and take pictures of their flower bed. I also love to take pictures of my kids and my friends' kids. I just wish that my camera wasn't broken. I am having withdrawals.

9) I stole a car before. 'nuff said.

10) I paid someone a lot of money to break my jaw. Ok, so it isn't as bad as that sounds. I had cosmetic jaw surgery a couple of summers ago. I had my lower jaw broken, brought forwards, and had pins put in. Even though I love my profile very much, I am not sure I would go through that hell again if I could go back in time.

Bonus: I peed my pants in college.

So here are my 9 people that I'm going to tag (per the rules):

Steve http://fantasmini.blogspot.com/

Kristen http://nathanandkristenb.blogspot.com/
Kathy http://jimsclan.blogspot.com
Desiree http://menjiness.blogspot.com/
Alecia http://colonkids.blogspot.com/
Melissa http://jimmyandmel.blogspot.com/
Darcy http://busycollegemomma.blogspot.com/

Heather http://charlesheather4.blogspot.com/
Xina http://thecrawfordcrier.blogspot.com/

Here are the rules:
1.) Say thanks and give a link to the presenter of the award.
2.) Share "10 Honest Things" about yourself.
3.) Present this award to 9 others whose blogs you find brilliant in content and/or design, or those who have encouraged you.
4.) Tell those 9 people they've been awarded HONEST SCRAP and inform them of these guidelines in receiving.

Grandpa Anderson

Wow, so many things have happened since I last blogged about my life. My grandfather left this mortal life the end of May. He was truly an awesome man. I know that people generally speak saintly of the deceased, but he was a one-of-a-kind person. I have some fond memories of him. We lived in a huge house in Corona, CA and I remember how he used to sleep in the basement (yes, a house in CA with a basement) and he befriended all the spiders. Instead of just squishing them like most of us would have liked, he would carefully scoop them up into the palm of his hand and pet it. He would often name them Hairy or Hervey (I think the last one is correct – my brother said he remembered that name but I remember Hairy).

At that same house lived some of my cousins; ones that I regard like siblings. We would squelch the balmy southern CA summers by water fights. Not your regular kind of water fights, but ones that involved tipping over the picnic table and benches for shelters (I would like to blame TV shoot outs for this idea); dumping out trash cans and using the hose to fill them up (where we would dunk our prisoners); palm frawns strewn all over the yard; oh and the hose as the weapon of choice and was desperately fought for. Our watery fights went on for kid hours. Now one thing I feel I should mention is that my grandpa took great care and pride in his yard. As an adult I tried to figure out why our parents let us run a muck soggifying the lawn; the answer came when I had kids: anything to get them out of the house and giving them a moment’s respite. We could be in the middle of attacking and defending ourselves and the words shouted out the back door of, “Grandpa is on his way home!!” would momentarily freeze us as if someone hit the pause button of our own rendition of WWIII. That is when pandemonium broke loose; we had to get the yard picked up and then run to the backyard where we would pretend we have been playing on the swing set the whole time. Even though our ruse probably didn’t work, grandpa never yelled at us kids. Now whether he yelled at our parents is another story – I have no clue and figure the way our parents would freak out and alert us of his impending homecoming is enough of an answer; ‘nuff said.

Another comical memory I have of grandpa just so happens to include the same cousin cohorts; albeit, many years later and in a different house and state. I was living with my cousins for a few months and my uncle and aunt decided they needed a rendezvous to some sort of Anniversary Inn type place so they put me in charge, with the explicit instructions that at night, grandpa would come over and sleep in the house, just in case. After all, I was only 15 and couldn’t drive. Even though we all adored my grandpa, we loved him as a nighttime babysitter since he was hard of hearing. Six kids + one almost deaf babysitter = mischief. We took advantage of when he wasn’t there and some sort of wild-dog syndrome broke out. I made chicken, gravy and rice for dinner. I declared it was barbaric night and no silverware was to be used. The kids really enjoyed this; gravy and all. That caused a ripple effect of even more crazy behavior. Pretty soon we were playing a game that I made up called “Name That Tune – Gargle Style.” We took turns gargling our drinks one at a time as the others tried to guess what song we were pathetically trying to imitate. Amidst all the merriment, someone got the idea to start a food fight. Rice and chunks of chicken now spotted the carpet. RING. We went to answer the phone and it was grandpa letting us know he was on his way over. Panic-stricken faces, we scrambled to pick up the proof of our messy festivities. Unfortunaltey, my aunt’s dining room was down a small flight of about about six stairs from the kitchen. We skipped up and down those steps trying to clear the table and I can’t remember if someone attempted to vacuum up wet grains of rice. I blame the haste for the foggy memories of this evening. One thing though, didn’t haze over time: the A-1 Sauce incident. For whatever reason, we had A-1 Sauce with us on the table and whomever closed the lid did a sorry job and the poor schmuck who was trotting up the stairs carrying it tripped and the bottle hit the floor at the top of the stairs, spilling a good portion of its tangy sauce. Everyone froze, again with the pause button, and in that split second of limbo, we all came to the same conclusion and like robots in unison, we began scooping it up and sponging the murderous scene. It looked pretty good when we got through with it. Grandpa got there shortly thereafter and we all tried to look innocent. Being the awesome grandpa he was he didn’t question of guilty faces. I guess he figured the house wasn’t burned down, everyone was clothed and fed, so all was well with him.

As I mentioned, Grandpa was hard of hearing and had been all of my life that I can remember. My mom, aunt and grandpa went to ASL classes at Riverside Community College so he would be able to communicate as he got older. He went but I don’t think he got much out of that because in the decades since the class I never saw him sign. I always felt bad for my grandpa because he would sit around our loud and oft time boisterous family gatherings and tried to understand what we were all talking about or laughing at. He would just sit there and smile. I used to feel awkward when he would ask me questions because I would have to speak louder than I normally do (for those that know me, I am not a quiet person). I often had to repeat myself several times and once in a while I could tell that he got tired of trying to decipher what I was saying and would settle for smiling and bobbing his head, as if he could hear what I said. Now with that said, it was quite comical trying to talk to him on the phone. I don’t recall very many personal conversations of him an I on the phone, but I remember hearing my mom trying to talk to him on the phone. She would have to yell loudly into the receiver and if it was something not really desirable to keep repeated, it was embarrassing, so my mom would never fill up the conversations with trifle things – just meaty important ones.

Even with all the yelling to get him to hear us, he was a very silent man. Opposed to the person with headphones on and can’t hear someone talking to them and increase their own output without realizing they that loud, my grandfather always spoke softly. He was genuinely concerned with his family and loved us very much.

I remember that when he came down to CA for Adam’s funeral, he had a knowing look in his eye; he knew the agony I was going through and wished he could take it from me. His first wife died when their child was only 4. From then on, we shared a common generation-slashing sort of bond.

I had the chance to drive up to SLC when I heard he was in the hospital so I could be in the room when they took him off the machines, but something inside me, something deep, wouldn’t let me. I feel it is two reasons deep: One, I have a very difficult time seeing people dying. I am afraid it will dig too deep in my carefully medicated wounds and cause them to bleed. The second reason is that I wanted to remember him as a live and happy person. My last memory of him was probably one of the best ones I have from these recent years. I was up in SLC last summer and swung by his new home to visit before I continued my trip to WA like I do every summer. I sat down in the basement (where he lived with my grandma; minus spiders – this was a new house) next to him and although I can’t recall the specifics of our conversation, I am sure he asked how I was doing; he always did when we spoke. We probably discussed my girls and how Bill was doing. Yet, even with the Swiss cheese memories of our conversation, it was one that will always sit in my heart and keep a fire going strong.

Goodbye, Grandpa. I love and miss you.

THE

THE (7/13/09)

The whoosh

The giggle

The pattering

The reach

The balloon

The chewing

The choking

The Heimlich

The call

The ambulance

The grass

The tears

The hole

The baby

The grave

Counting Down

I am looking at the clock
trying to turn away
but its hands keep pulling
at my eyes with each tick
and tock

I try not to dwell
on the little time left
until I relive
the shattering moments
of my personal hell

My eyes are dry
I can not blink
but I feel it swelling
up from my heart
and out my eyes

Tears now fall
from the creases
of my eyes
from while I sit
alone, in a stall

My insides churn
my bowels break
memories don't fade
like they're supposed to
instead they burn

Up comes my pain
out of my mouth
it spews
years of love
gone down the drain

I stand and swear
to no one I can see
"How can I tell the girls?"
I shout
my fist rising in the air

The clock is not at fault
yet it
I want to blame
for stealing my time
from my life's vault

Twenty-seven
years is too young
to die and leave me
and my precious girls
to go to heaven

What Today Would Have Been

Today would have been Adam's 33rd birthday. I can hardly believe that he has missed 6 of his birthdays. I am going to buy 3 purple balloons and the girls and I are going to write messages and send them up to heaven.

Scars

"Time heals all wounds"
Or so the saying goes
I have wounds
that are scarred
That will never fully heal
When the weather changes
pain creeps in
slowly
secretly
Until the rain falls
from my heart
and out my eyes

Certain times of the year
My scars burn
as if it were just yesterday
that I was wounded

Time does not heal all wounds
It just takes longer for the fall
from my deep, deep scar.

I See Dead People | Celeste Johnson

Of course all my stories of freaks start out and take place at Wal-Mart - so why should this one be any different?

An old lady, painfully sauntered into the store and I couldn't help but stop and stare. She was tired, her eyes showing her exhaustion. Short and dingy ash hair looked unkempt. All wrapped up in an over sized jacket, she nears me. I get a good look at her face, her hands, her neck, any exposed skin showing: all completely slate gray. My eyes bug out of my head and I look to my husband whose face also shows complete shock; he sees her too. We exchange glances and when she is out of earshot, I told him, "I see dead people."

32 | Celeste Johnson

Today
He would be 32
Healthy
An accountant
Right where he
thought he would be
and 32 years old

Over 4 years ago
Thousands of moments
taking my breath away
Gone
No more
53 months
Gone
Not ever coming back
234 weeks
Gone
Taken away
1640 days
Gone
Ripped from my side
39,360 hours
2,361,600 minutes
141,696,000 seconds
Gone
Plucked from this earth

Today
He would have been
32 years old
Before he breathed his last breath
And is now
Gone

The Ring | Celeste Johnson

Opal, swirls of color shine
Diamonds surround it
All encased in gold
An heirloom promise to me
With trembling hands
I place the ring on my finger

I can hear her speak
Never an ill word
Loving and full of kindness

I can smell her
A floral bouquet captured scent
on her freshly pressed blouse

I can feel her
Hugs and kisses
Her hands of comfort

I can taste her
The sweet crisp, crunch
Of her Christmas cookies

I can see her
Sitting in her chair
Rocking and crocheting

The opal ring
On my finger
Aurora Borealis glistening
Part of my Grandma
Lives on.

Alone Again | Celeste Johnson

Alone again
Sitting in my car
Radio cranked up
Voices singing
Like distant friends
My useless attempt to
Drown out my thoughts

I don't want to think
Not anymore
Too much pain
Comes from my thoughts
Of long ago
A happier time
A happier place
Can't go back
But can't forget

Cranking the knob right
The voices are ear piercingly loud
Trying to burst my thoughts
Of him
Before he died