All I Want Is A Normal Life

God, denial is a funny thing. Ok, not funny ha-ha, but funny fucked-up. Over the past week, I’ve decided that I should go to visit my Grandma again. My mom said she thinks that G’ma is well enough to recognize me, but I was trying to explain to my mom that MY G’ma went away three years ago, and the person there is just kind of G’ma-ish, but not really G’ma to me.

My mom and G’ma had a really strained relationship at times when I was growing up. My mom went and told them (both grandma and grandpa) that they had a “dysfunctional” family, since that was what her therapist told her and, in many ways, I guess her family wasn’t all open with their emotions and stuff when they were growing up… but that’s a lot of family stuff that a lot of families have to deal with. I mean, my family life wasn’t all that good until much later. I think the only reason we have such a good relationship now is because we’ve all been able to put a lot of that crap behind us and move on as friends. All families are fucked up in many ways. I don’t know a single one that isn’t. So there’s really no judgment there.

But Mom and Grandma didn’t really have that great of a relationship always, so now that mom is getting to know grandma’s kinder side — the side I loved her for — she’s getting to really appreciate the best thing about grandma: her heart. And that’s about all there is of Grandma anymore. So all that stuff that was some parent-child dynamic isn’t there and both of them just get to appreciate each other: my mom gets to appreciate grandma without all the weird mis-communications, and my grandma gets to appreciate how amazing, strong, and caring that my mom is. About all this, my mom feels like I’m judging her or like I’m saying she only loves grandma when she’s frail or something. But it’s not like that. It just that I feel like she’s finally getting to know the person I knew.

And even as I type this, I feel myself distancing from the situation, making it a story, not a thing I’m actually going through. I’m going to try to bring it back.

My grandma is not dead. But I’m acting like she is. I’m acting like the shell of the person isn’t important… like a husk or something. But she’s still in there. She’s still her. And even if all that’s left is her heart, that’s the best part about her. I miss her brain, her understanding, her caring, all these things are gone. But the best part is still there, at least according to my mom. And I’m avoiding — yes, I said it: avoiding — going up there, not because it’s not important to me, but because I’m in denial of my feelings about her. My feelings of love, my feelings of loss. I’ve done everything in my power not to think about it. I’ve even taken anti-anxiety medicine that my friends have very kindly given to me. All these things make me question what I should do. They make me calm, but I am not calm. Truly. Really. In my heart.

And I can never understand if I’ve done the “right” thing until it’s too late to do the “right” thing anymore. So I have to take a chance and face the panic of losing the person who has been, for most of my life, my favorite family member.

Since I decided to go up there, I’ve been all moody and needy to David, which has made him kind of pull away, which is really hard. Really fucking hard. Because I need a close friend now, but Teresa, my best friend from years ago who knows me pretty well, but who is just awful at getting back to me. And David is not really helping. He just doesn’t understand why I’m so insecure and constantly needing reassurance that he loves me. And I am not one to get hurt, so I, of course, have to pull away from him. I have to protect myself. I just really want Teresa, since she and I understand each other around stuff like this. But she’s also got her own problems and really needs a friend herself these days.

My mom says G’ma might not last three weeks. I am going to try to go up there on the 23rd.

Side note: Nick, this is why I haven’t written back about this and probably will never be able to pull myself to write back about this. I’m really weird about my emotions around this. This is my journal.

(sorry, I couldn’t resist the gratuitous Beatles reference)

So, here’s how this generally works: I write out some really general 5-year plans, then I struggle through some really far away 3-year plans based on the achievement of the far away 5-year plans, then I write some 1-year plans (again, based on the 5 and 3 year), and then I write some 6-month plans, and finally some 3-month plans, and then I review it all and go, “ok, what did I forget in my Memento-style approach to goal setting?” Usually, it’s quite a lot. In 5 years (2014, to those who want to be surprised by a year that looks very far away, but is actually right around the corner), I am not thinking about how much I’ll owe in taxes, whether I still have this 20 lbs to lose, visiting G’ma before she dies, and stuff like that. I’m thinking in huge generalizations like “have friends,” or “have a good relationship with my family.” But if I worked it from the 3-month out, I wouldn’t ever get to the bigger goals like “Hike the Pacific Crest Trail,” since that requires a lot of foresight that I typically don’t have when thinking of immediate needs…

Which brings me to why I think goals are important. When I’m unhappy with my life, goals give me a hope for the future. Instead of waking up every day and slogging through an endless march of shitty monotony, I know that I’m marching through this shitty monotony to the FABULOUS FUCKING CASTLE ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE MARSH! OOH a castle! But if I didn’t have that castle, I’d just look at the grime on my shoes and mutter about how no one knows the trouble I’ve seen. And also, I usually start wondering why I’m in this monotony and start taking actions –often quite drastic actions– to break the monotony, which sometimes isn’t the best from a long-term perspective. Likewise, when I’m happy with my life, it’s easy to coast through the years without noticing that time is passing, waking up at some later time wondering why I didn’t hike the Pacific Crest Trail [before I lost both my legs in the Revolution/before I got married and had children/while I was still insane enough to try it]. Don’t get me wrong… everything is great with loving the time you’ve got and being present in the moment and just being happy (in fact, Buddhists would say that this is the absolute in enlightenment, and that wanting all these goals and stuff is the path to unhappiness), but I think I’ll be happier knowing that I accomplished many things and had many experiences at the end of it all. I mean, I had to decide far in advance that I wanted to bike the Lifecycle, otherwise I never would have started training in time. And some day, I will want to accomplish things far greater than the Lifecycle that will require training of years, not just months.

So, that’s goals. Or resolutions. Or whatever.

Last year, I totally phoned it in. Those goals down there aren’t goals. Most of them weren’t even things that I cared very deeply about. Not that I’ll have more attachment to my goals that I’m working on now, but you’ll see the behemoth task of goals when I finally finish them up.

Right now, I’ve done up a 5 year plan and a 1 year plan, but I was distracted and people were talking to me and doing yoga and stuff like that, so I missed some stuff. My dad and I are getting together in a few days for more hours of goal-setting. It’s always great to do the goal-setting with my dad, since he’s so ambitious and taught me how to do them in the first place. Also, he’s wildly proud of me and it’s kind of nice to have someone cheering and who I can cheer for.

And as you’ve probably inferred from the manifesto above, you should really work on your goals, too. I’ve got some handy tips about categories and what type of things to include.

Anyways, off to do yoga!!

On this eve of the first of the new year, I get to opportunistically reflect on the things I have, the things I want, and my purpose in life. I’ve always wanted to be “normal” and have a “normal life” (though most people I know would laugh if they heard me saying that, since my life bears little resemblance to the boring slog that most people think of when they hear “normal” — something I think of more as “quiet desperation”).

Ever since I was a little kid, I didn’t fit in. I looked like a boy until I was 9 and had to get into the habit of asking for the “ladies’ room” because service staff always directed me to the men’s room. I was too tall. I had no friends. Kids made fun of me. I wouldn’t wear a “training” bra and ended up needing a real bra earlier than anyone else I knew. Boys would dare each other to ask me out and then run away laughing. I got picked last in any athletic event I was forced to participate in. “Normal” seemed like this unattainable golden state that everyone else existed in… so when I got to pick my name, I decided that, by hook or by crook, I was going to be normal.

And that’s how I got to be “Normal.” And it really fits me, I think, since I have a regular job that I go to every day at roughly the same time. I have fairly un-exceptional thoughts on a day-to-day basis. I’m not very fashionable, but I’m also not notably unfashionable. I have hobbies like normal people: hiking, camping, hanging out with friends, blogging, photography. Yes, some of my hobbies are un-normal: collecting taxidermy, listening to Cracker all the time, modeling for unconventional photos (right), camping in the desert and applying spark to combustibles.

One thing I think I want to look into for the new year is what really *is* “normal life.” I want it… but do I? And what is it to other people? So I’ve set up a Google alert and will set out to figure out what a normal life is. Wish me luck.

It’s coming to that time again… when I take care of the arduous task of working on my New Year’s Resolutions.

Last year’s were as follows:

1. Live in a place where Diva can run free – done
2. Find a hike in the SoCal area with miner’s cabins -OR- go up to Jorstead’s cabin
3. Read Jorstead’s book – no longer available
4. Go camping once per month – started well, but stopped
5. Write in Journal several times per week – started late, but in progress
6. Be in awesome shape for 4 consecutive month
7. Prioritize backpacking!
8. Do yoga for a few months – have started recently
9. Prepare to hike the Pacific Crest Trail in 2010
10. Take the Wilderness Travel Course – tried, but broke my arm. have re-enrolled
11. Be mayor of Gigsville – done
12. Go kayaking
13. Don’t get pneumonia – done!!
14. Don’t get tuberculosis – done

So, I did moderately ok, but still had epic fail on many levels of this. I’ll post my new resolutions here.

David got me the most awesome present for Christmas: A 1930 Royal typewriter. I looked up the serial number on the Typewriter Serial Number Database (possibly the coolest thing in the whole world).

My mom just sent me a photo of G’ma. She warned me that she didn’t look very good, but she looks barely like herself. So frail. So small.

You may recall from the earlier post that she isn’t doing that well. You can see a photo from about a year and a half ago in the other post (maybe 2 years).

As long as I’m home sick watching Survivorman (I love Survivorman!), I might as well catch up on the bloggage.

I worked super late last night, despite getting sicker and sicker. Now, I’m all achy and my tonsils are impassable boulders. I’m going to go to sleep after this episode, even though “Twilight” (book, not movie) is getting interesting.

So, last night, when I got off work, I figured I should call my mom, since she called a few days ago. She called to talk about Grandma, who is sick and probably not going to be around much longer. A little bit of background on G’ma: she’s pretty much been my favorite relative, at least until she started getting more confused and my own direct parents started getting more like friends and less like parents. I have had years to get used to her aging. None of this is a surprise. But still, hearing the details of what seems to be kind of a confused depression (loss of interest in thing that used to interest her, general lethargy, refusal to eat) was really hard. I love her and I don’t want her life to be sitting around in a bed waiting to die. And she’s not aware enough to be depressed about the futility of her situation, which is kind of good and kind of bad. For her, it’s good. She’s not aware of this plight, even if she’s kind of deep-level depressed about it. For me, it’s sad. I’m sad on her behalf, and I’m sad because I miss the friend I used to have in G’ma.

My mom and I talked about it for a while, and then I talked with David about it for a long time, since he’s had a lot of experience with death.

And really, the thing is, I don’t know how to deal with this. First, she’s not dead. No matter how not there she is, she’s still with us and some part of her is in her head. She’s still mentally aware enough to be concerned with politeness and kindness, which is something that’s in her most basic make-up. She sometimes remembered me when I visited last time, and the rest of the time, she pretended to. Because, hey, that’s the way she is. Second, it’s not certain how close to dying she is. My mom thinks she’s really close, but the hospice people don’t think she is, and David said that even in this state, people can continue on for years and years. And part of me wants her to stop suffering, but part of me also feels guilty for feeling like she should die. And also, there’s some desperate part of me that wants more than nothing in the world for her to live forever, even if she’s a shell of her old self. But she’s not herself. It’s a little like pet cemetery… it’s just not right to wish for someone to be alive for so long that you’re willing to sacrifice who they are to achieve it.

But basically, I just don’t know how to react. I’m dealing. In many ways, I’ve had to deal with this for years.

And then, at 4:00 in the fucking MORNING, I woke up in my footy pajamas in a pool of URINE. No, I’m not kidding. Diva has been getting older (seems to be a common theme around me) and in the past year or so, she occasionally (really occasionally) has incontinence. If it wasn’t infrequent, I wouldn’t let her sleep with me, obviously. But this morning, I woke up in my fleece footy pajamas (which wick moisture, both conveniently and inconveniently) and I was soaking wet.

So I had to get out and change, take a shower, change the sheets, and check the blankets (it wasn’t actually that much when I turned the light on, but it’s sure enough to make me spring up and shower). And it’s not that easy to get back to sleep at 4:30 in the morning after a freezing shower (my shower heats up verrrry slowly) and a lot of jumping around (if you’ve ever been soaked in urine that isn’t your own, you know the kind of jumping around I’m talking about).

And keep in mind that I’m still super sick and all I want to do is sleep for days.

After about an hour of laying in dry pajamas and fresh sheets, thinking about G’ma and how depressed she must be, I finally got to sleep.

And then at 6:00, Diva woke me up and wanted me to go feed her and let her out to pee… and you better believe that I jumped up to let her out to pee.

Ok, this entry is getting long and probably tedious, but there was one super-awesome cherry on the shitty sundae of that 12 hour span: the hydrogen peroxide gargle. My doctor advised that I mix 50% water and 50% hydrogen peroxide and gargle with it to fight the infection in my tonsils. I hesitantly tried to gargle with the mixture this morning, holding the foul-tasting stuff in my throat for as long as I could, and then spitting it out. But anyone who knows anything about hydrogen peroxide knows what it does when it hits infection: it foams. And when your whole mouth is a cesspool of infection, it foams A LOT. And it doesn’t just foam forward, it foams backward, down your throat, which causes a gag reflex, which causes whatever you ate to fly forward with great velocity, which leaves you puking in your own sink and foaming at the mouth like a sick, rabid animal.

And then I went to work.

And then I realized I was too sick to be at work, so I came home. And now here I am. So, yeah, that’s how my day went.

I feel like I’m just seeing a best friend after months of not talking. There was SO much stuff I wanted to write about… everything from the cyber-bullying case (briefly: It’s awful that the girl killed herself after being bullied by the mother… that woman -the mother- is a sick individual who should be in a mental institution. It’s people like this who make our society bad in the ways it’s bad. But at the same time, there’s no *explicit* law that if someone harassed someone else into killing themselves, that the harasser is a murderer. I mean, I could call you every day and tell you that everyone hated you and you should die, but you are ultimately responsible for if you kill yourself as a result of that… and, for whatever is right or wrong here, that’s the way our society is put together -or should be-. I can’t sue McDonalds for seducing me with trashy food that ultimately will kill me) to Mary Poppins (briefly: watched it last night for the first time, and OH MY GOSH that’s the best movie ever. I want to watch it every day. STEP IN TIME! hahahaha… awesome) to Beyonce (briefly: I love her. I don’t care what you say. She’s great).

But this morning, I’m eating the most amazing meal I’ve cooked since going vegan: a soyrizo burrito with sauteed mushrooms, peppers, garlic, scallions, onions, and jalapenos, topped with some fresh avocado and wrapped in a fresh and delicious flour tortilla. YUM! I’m watching Survivorman, one of my favorite shows (Les Stroud is my television crush). At 1pm, Santacon (Lord knows where that website came from… Santacon’s always been kind of an underground event), which I’ve managed to talk David into coming on. After watching Mary Poppins last night, I realize that Dick Van Dyke’s character, Bert, would be an awesome boyfriend. But no one is like that, and the fact is, David and I get along really well. We laugh at the same stuff and we laugh pretty constantly. No, he’s not goofy or larger-than-life like Bert, and I had to do a little convincing to get him to come to Santacon, and he doesn’t really like camping or hiking, but I love being with him, I love talking with him, I love laughing with him… I love HIM. So much so that I don’t really care if he doesn’t want to do all those other things that used to be most important to me in a relationship — things I thought I’d never compromise on. So I’m sticking with David and trying to find the motivation to do all these other things (hiking, camping, karaoke, etc) without him. He’s not a vegan and doesn’t even eat organic/sustainable meats or vegetables/fruit. He’d never even had real peanut butter until he met me… it had always been that sugar and lard concoction that they market as nutritional paste. Bleh. And he loved the real peanut butter! I warned him that he’d probably not like it, since it just tastes like peanuts, but he likes peanuts and loved the peanut butter! And he at least plays along when I make vegan food.

It’s a beautiful day and I’ve got a lot of stuff to do today, so I have to get moving. I’ve set myself up for a vigorous training program to ensure I’m in shape for the Wilderness Travel Course. Even though the “Girlfriends” episode of “Flight of the Conchords” is on, I’ve got to peel myself off this couch.

Seriously.

Off the couch.

OH and props to WordPress on the new look. Um, now you just have to get mobile uploads, hey?

Brigitte Dale did this cute piece. I love it.

David and I had what I guess is the closest thing to a fight that we’ve had. –Eh, I guess there was the dispute over his contract work about a month ago, when this contract that he was spending his nights and weekends on really started interfering with our relationship.– Anyways, it was kind of a fight, and we never really fight. First, he’s too apologetic to fight. Whenever a conflict comes up, he apologizes. I don’t know if that’s because he really sees my way on things (hey, I only bring stuff up about once every three months) or because he doesn’t want to cause trouble, but he seems to try to diffuse conflict pretty rapidly. (which leaves me feeling like he doesn’t really get what I’m upset about) Second, I don’t really bring up much of anything. The things I’ve brought up I can count on one hand: “I’ve never met your friends,” “You work on this contract too much and it’s affecting our relationship,” and “I really needed you to pet my hair and be supportive, but you aren’t even staying the night tonight.”

Last night’s was the last of those three. After the bee encounter, I really needed a mommy. I wanted someone to pet my hair and feel sorry for me. I don’t need these things very often, but it was a shitty, pointless day and I really needed it. I told him this in IM, but he thought I was kidding or exaggerating, not that I was being serious. Instead, he wanted to stay home and watch the Vice Presidential debates and then watch a hockey movie. I was disappointed, but he was going to come over last night, so I figured I could buck up and put my need for pity on hold and deal with it then.

I made a really nice dinner with seared tuna, sauteed spinach with garlic, and fried brown rice (ok, from a bag from Trader Joe’s). Everything was going nicely, but when I laid my head on his lap, there was zeroh petting to be had. I gave him hint motions (you know, grabbing his hand and making a petting motion), but there was no petting. And definitely no “poor baby” or anything like that.

And then when it came time to go to bed, he told me he wasn’t staying. What? Oh man… it’s because Diva always keeps him awake when he sleeps over. But I was planning on keeping Diva in the main house so he could sleep, and hey, if he wanted to have a different situation, he could have asked! I’m always very flexible and understanding and open to communication, but the communication has to be out there. He countered with that I could have asked if he was staying, too, but then I talked about how I was really looking forward to last night because I didn’t get my “poor baby” the night before, when I really needed it. He didn’t know what I was talking about, so I reminded him that I even asked for what I needed (I think many girls expect psychic stuff, but I don’t. If I need something, I put it out there), and that I didn’t think I could have been more clear about my specific needs.

So here’s my dilemma: I just don’t understand it. I don’t understand how he could have heard that I really needed him and thought I was joking. I don’t understand how he could have not communicated with me about what he needed to be comfortable at my place, when I’ve been so clear about being open to his needs and wants. I just don’t understand this whole thing.

I called him and said that it was just inconsiderate. He was being inconsiderate of my feelings. He said he didn’t think it was inconsiderate because that meant that he knew my feelings and just ignored them, but I said that was a value judgment on the meaning of the word. Just by the definition of the word, he was not considering or being sensitive to my feelings.

It’s hard, because I feel like I’m really trying to be the most awesome girlfriend I can be. I encourage him to do things he wants to do. I don’t complain about things he does. I communicate in a really straightforward, non-nagging way. I don’t get angry or fly off the handle. Even when I’m angry, I tell him I am in a calm way and then tell him exactly why I am angry. I don’t fling blame around, but rather, I use the Nonviolent Communication method and say things like, “When you x, I feel y.” It’s exhausting, but I think it’s rewarding…

… except when I do all the “right things” and it still doesn’t work. And then I get really irritated because I’m doing everything right and things still aren’t perfect!

Anyways, I’ve got to get on the dog walk. I guess this is the part of the relationship where I have to keep working on it even though it isn’t fun to work on it anymore. And maybe try to help David learn to communicate and hear me when I communicate.