What Happened To Mary

Here we go again. If you're new you really need to catch up. Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6. You'll love me for it. 

Jeff scooped up poor Scooter the dog, wrapped her in towels and put her in the freezer. It was late at night and I had a feeling dealing with Scooter could wait until morning.

Bright and early the next morning Jeff called Mary with the news that Scooter was chillin’ in the freezer. She didn’t seem to be upset, as a matter of fact, she was matter of fact.

“Just bury her in the back yard under the apple tree.”

Jeff and a couple of our employees took the task seriously. They gathered shovels, rubber gloves and the pooch pop. They solemnly walked out into the back yard that was filled with old machine parts, wheels and forgotten appliances.

There had been showers that morning; the ground was damp. The cat litter that had been strewn about the yard through the years was also damp. One of the guys forgot to dodge the cat litter. In a flash he was down. Not only was he down, he slid down an entire hill layered by hundreds of pounds of old, used kitty litter.

He tried to jump to his feet, but slipped again. The words coming out of his mouth could have thawed poor Scooter on the spot. Poor guy was slippin’ and slidin’ all alone. Not one man was going to chance getting the slimy soup on themselves, even with rubber gloves and work clothes.

He finally made it to his feet and over to the gravesite. Three men were digging and he stood there mumbling under his breath about old ladies, garbage and cat shit. Finally Scooter was laid to rest and work on the house could begin for real.

The house was spotless. All four 40 yard dumpsters filled with years of garbage were gone. Carpets and furniture had been steam cleaned and there was not one plastic spoon in site. The smell, well, it was almost gone.

During the next few weeks sub contractors came and went. Soon the job was finished. It was beautiful. No one could believe the transformation. It was time for Mary to come home.

Weeks before, while Mary was in the hospital, I had called Adult Protective Services and was able to get Mary assigned to a case worker. The case worker picked Mary up from the nursing home and brought her back to her house.

We were all there nervously waiting for her to come through the new doors. No one knew what to expect. Everything Mary had known was gone. In it’s place was a clean, new home. Dirty clothes had been washed and put in drawers, papers had been filed and the remodel had been finished.

The case worker helped Mary in with her walker. Mary looked around. She didn’t say a word. She went from room to room not speaking. She ended up in her bedroom sitting on the side of the bed.

She happened to look in the drawer of the bedside table and saw that her “toys” had been put back, along with new packs of batteries.

Suddenly she barked, “Where’s my coffee pot?”

You’ve got to be freaking kidding me! Her house was beautiful and she wanted her 10 year old, corroded, stalactite growing coffee pot?

“I threw it away,” Jeff said, “It wasn’t safe. I bought you a new one.”

“I want the old one.”

That’s about all we got out of Mary after that. Her world was upside down and she didn’t know what to do with it.

The reverse mortgage was granted and she was allowed to keep her house providing she kept up with the property taxes. All of the money from her collectibles that were sold was in a trust account for her taxes.

That’s where our story with Mary ended. Through public records I was able to find out that the state took guardianship over her and placed her in a State home several years ago.

Last night I did a search of the Social Security Master Death File. Mary died September 2, 2010. 

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I Know I Said I Would

I said I'd finish Mary by the weekend. Fail on my part. I will finish her I promise, soon. Then I have another epic tale that you won't freaking believe. I wouldn't believe it had it not happened to me. Like most of my life I guess.

I've been busy with Diva stuff, ya know, massages, pedicures and shopping. Then there was the massive wrapping of presents for the creatures that abide in my home, and the ones that live 10 minutes from me. I've also been able to sneak in some shopping from me. I think I'll wrap the stuff I got for myself, stick it under the tree from Santa. Who's going to say anything about it at that point? How do you think I got my Louis Vuitton luggage set? Score one for the Diva!

I'm actually excited for tomorrow.  Tomorrow will be a day of making fudge, picking up the Christmas cake, and lots of fun tomorrow night. Oh, and I have my cute little mistletoe headband so hopefully I'll be getting lots of kisses from all of the group! Well, maybe not all of them.

In other Diva news, I feel good. As a matter of fact I feel great. That's a feeling that I thought I'd lost to medication and other nuisances in my life. I always worry feeling wonderful is the beginning of mania, but you know what? I miss mania so what the hell, I'm going to roll with it. I'm going to believe that it's the new medication finally taking hold.

There have been a lot of armed robberies going on all around the shopping centers so I've been carrying my .38 on my hip instead of my purse. That's freaked out a person or two, but I'm not taking any chances. Take my credit cards, I don't care.....but don't touch the Louis or my car!

Speaking of my car, you remember the "woman" whose heathen spawn of satan kid-like creature threw her car door open, dented my car then walked away? The police tracked her down. I'm getting my car repaired Monday. Yea me!

I know I've been a slacker on the blog front, both reading and writing. You have to forgive me, it's that time of year and I have a crap load of kids. Can't wait to get back to my normal schedule! 

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It's Really Been 33 Years?

Yesterday was the 33rd anniversary of my grandmother's death. She had just turned 56 barely a month before. Lung cancer is what got her.

She wasn't the cookie baking, gray haired grandma. As a matter of fact when I was born her mother said her baby was too young to be a grandmother and I would call her by her name, Denia.

Denia was incredible. One thing she taught me was how to bet on the horses. One of her favorite tricks was to "station" my aunt and me in different areas of the track. She'd have us look at the racing forms like we were confused. Soon men would come over to the damsels in distress and help us choose a horse.

The three of us would then meet back up and go over the "tips" we received. We used the covert info, made a decision and placed our bets. It was a pretty good system. Never mind that I was 13 and you had to be 18 to get into the track. My aunt would put make up on me, my grandmother would make me toss the bubble gum and off we'd go.

Denia liked flash, she liked bling and she was beautiful. Striking was a word I heard a lot from the people that would stop us just to tell her how stunning she was. I was always proud to be seen with her. She had a sophisticated style about her. She carried herself like royalty, to me she was.


Denia had this plant in her home, a diffenbachia. When she died in 1977 my mother took it. After my mom was killed my dad tried to let the plant die, but my sister would see it droop and water it. When Dad died, Tina took it.

Last year my sister sent me this tiny cutting of the plant and it's taken off and grown like wild fire. I look at it with amazement. My plant is part of my grandmother that still lives. I see it every day. I think of her every day. My kids have already claimed the plant after my death. They seem to be claiming a lot of things lately.....I wonder if they have plans?

Oh, I'm going to try to finish Mary tomorrow!

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Demonic Deeds

I know she's ugly. But don't make too much fun of her, she's 17.

My cat is a demon. She likes demonic things like snakes. She’ll stalk them, play with them and then when she’s good and ready she’ll bring the living, unharmed snakes into the house.

In the Willamette Valley, where I live, there are no poisonous snakes. We have garter snakes. No big deal, unless you’re from Texas. In Texas there are killer snakes. There are all types of rattlesnakes, water moccasins, copper heads, cotton mouths and who knows what else is creeping around there. Point being that if you grow up in Texas you’re taught that snakes are deadly. I’ve come foot to fang a little too often and I’m terrified of snakes.

Callie, the cat of compassion, must have thought we were too stupid to find our own play things so she brought a nice, fat, 2 ft long garter snake into the house. My kids have never seen a poisonous snake, they have no fear of them.

The little ones ran off to find a jar to contain the nasty thing. The slithering serpent was a trophy and had to be shown to their dad. Soon they were back holding a 2 gallon pickle jar, without a lid. I should have nixed the idea at that point, but the kids really wanted to show their father.

They wrangled the snake into the jar and covered it with a piece of foil. Really? A piece of foil? How totally stupid was that? Bottom line is that the snake escaped from the jar and was somewhere in the house. That was almost more than I could take, but as the days went by I grew more comfortable with the fact that the snake had found its way outside.

About four days had passed when I was pretty sure the damn thing was gone. I went to get a glass out of the dishwasher, bent over and opened the door. The snake lunged at me and hit me in square in the face! It's mouth was open and I swear I saw that freaking forked tongue flicking at me. I screamed a scream that I’m sure was heard throughout the neighborhood. I was doomed to die at the fangs of a non-poisonous snake, probably from a terror induced heart attack.

Two of my kids were sitting on the couch. After hearing my blood curdling scream my daughter said, “Mom must have cut herself again.” My son shook his head and said, “Nope, she FOUND the snake.”

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Well, I Was A Little Busy

I know I promised this awesome post for tonight but I've been a little busy. For some reason, known only to starry eyed grandparents, I brought my two four year old grandsons to spend the night with me Friday night.

Josiah is on the left. He's Karli's son. 

Aiden is on the right. He belongs to Michelle.

Look at them sitting there like they're all innocent, sweet, little candy-coated boys. They actually do pretty well together, much better than when they're with their sisters.

Friday night they were totally excited because I left some of the Christmas tree decorations for them to put on the tree.

They giggled and snorted looking at each ornament. They handled each nutcracker, candy cane and colorful ball carefully as they found the perfect spot to hang them. Everything ended up in one 18" area on the tree about 3' up. There's no way I can move any of it. They worked so hard and were so proud of their creation. It's absolutely perfection for a Nana. I smile each time I look at it.

Saturday is where it got tricky. I haven't done a pair of toddlers in 25 years. I found out why yesterday. Two four year olds, two booster seats, Starbucks, Target, the mall, the gun shop and torrents of rain made for an "interesting" day.

The boys were good, but they were boys. That means there was giggling, kicking, squealing and boogers for several hours.

Finally we got to the stop we were all looking forward to: the gun shop.

The boys walked slowly by each glass case memorizing all of the cool guns. They picked out what they wanted when they were "grown up." I grabbed about a dozen boxes of ammo and had the guy show me several pistols.

After the boys had looked in each case they noticed the animals. First was a bear. They wanted to touch it so badly, but they were both a little scared, after all it had TEETH! The boys slowly approached the stuffed bear. Each one tried to get the other one to touch it first. For some reason they fixated on its tongue. Just when Josiah got his nerve up and touched the tongue, the man behind the counter growled. Both boys jumped about three feet straight up and back. The man chuckled, the boys were near tears but were too brave to show it.

Next Josiah spotted the "reindeer." OMG! REINDEER! It's Christmas time and there were reindeer heads, with no bodies, on the walls! What did Santa do? Were the reindeer bad? How was Santa going to fly with only half of his reindeer force?

That's when Josiah decided that Santa didn't go to gun shops because they had no fireplaces, so those couldn't be his reindeer. The boys seemed happy at that explanation, but they kept one eye each on the "reindeer."

We paid for the ammo I'd chosen and petted a buffalo head on the way out. The boys walked a little taller with a little more machismo, after all they had just toured a "real" gun shop and had come face to face with a real bear!

They went home Saturday afternoon and Nana went to bed.

This morning was strangely quiet having the boys gone, a little too quiet. I grabbed up my gun bag, all of the handguns, a crap load of ammo and drove to the gun club. Some day, when they're a little older, I'll have two grandsons at my side.

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Checking In

Just checking in everyone.

Things are going well, I'm feeling great and the sun is shining.

I've just been really busy with who in the hell knows what.

I had an awesome lunch with an awesome guy this afternoon. Little did I know when I bought the first Harley that I would also make a friend for life. I hadn't seen him in 3 years and we picked up where we left off. He's remarkable and I'm blessed to have him in my life.

Other than that, birthdays, Christmas, classes, it's been a whirlwind.

I have a post for tomorrow if I can get the time to get it together. I have little ones here tonight and tomorrow, so it may be challenging. If I miss tomorrow I'll put it up Sunday night.

Thanks for sticking by me!

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Just A Word

I'm going to tell you all a secret here: I really do have bipolar. Scandalous I know. Most of you sort of figured that out by the name of my blog. I just have a few comments to make.

My main reason in writing this blog is not to highlight my disorder. It's to have fun. I don't concentrate on writing about the disorder or my battle with it. I will bring it up when it's affecting my life.

I have many readers that are bipolar and I get tons of emails from those readers thanking me for being honest and transparent about my disorder. That's awesome for me to read. They say that in reading through some of my struggles they feel that they're not alone.

I tell it like it is. If for some reason you don't like a topic that I've written about, just click out. It's ok, come  back when there's another topic. 

Having bipolar means that there are lows, struggles and obstacles to overcome. I've made amazing progress since I was diagnosed.

This blog can be therapeutic for me and eye-opening for others. There's a terrible stigma attached to bipolar and hopefully I can change a little part of it. Usually I do really well. I have the same moods as other people, mine can just be more exaggerated. I'm not psychotic, I'm not delusional and I don't hallucinate. I'm a normal person.

I've always been very open about my life and I don't plan on changing now. It's just who I am.

Right now I'm in a low cycle, I'd change it if I could, but I can't. I have to ride it through.

My last post was about how I was feeling that night and I got a deluge of positive feedback, support, and thanks for posting it.  If you happened to be offended by it, I offer my sincere apologies. Out of all of the messages I got, only one was somewhat negative.

Bipolar isn't a choice, it's genetic. I guess I drew the short straw on that one. It's not going away, the lows won't go away, the highs won't go away, the feelings won't stop and the guilt will remain. If it were a choice, I would have chosen differently.

I'm me guys, you can take me or leave me. But being open is the only way I know how to be. I say things sometimes that others only think. I'm not ashamed of having the disorder and I'm not ashamed of my openess. All of the emails with thanks about my last post only make my resolve stronger to shine a light on what can happen.

That's all I have for now.

Thanks so much for your support.

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The Storm Has Come

These are two old pieces but they describe what's going on. I'm sinking here and holding on has been difficult. My writings are jumbled, as are my thoughts. Just thought I'd fill you in on why I've been sporadic here. The actions described below have not taken place, but are in the forefront of my mind. I'll say that I'm safe and that all things that can cause harm have been locked away or thrown away.

For me, being bipolar brings mixed feelings. I'm usually on the manic side, loving life and having fun. I treasure that part of me. The the flip side is the dark. Darkness is coming and I'm trying my best to fend it off. The good thing is that I now can recognize the signs and take preventative action.


 Unorthodox:

Even through the fog the vision was clear, unsettling and necessary.


Through the haze I heard the call and followed the echo of my name that was being repeated in the heavy, thick air that surrounded me. 

Time had been suspended in those eternal minutes and the distraction that followed was a welcome relief from the bombardment. 

The movements were smooth and deliberate. Emotion was numbed and release was imminent. 

Seeing the effect of those carefully placed strokes was strangely calming and despair was banished. 

The cause and effect has been burned into my soul and will not fade from memory.

Although unorthodox in it's delivery, the ethereal peace that flooded my mind and body was as life giving as the crimson drops that fled the open wounds. 

The whirlwind that surrounded this peace was for a time stifled, the world had stopped and I was allowed to catch my breath. 

I'm left to contemplate the actions and the benefits and wonder if another time I shall surrender to it's spell.


Calm:

I think tonight will be a night for a bottle of wine, Blue Six in the CD player and a very hot, very long bubble bath.

My heart feels like it's turning, beats skipping. 

I'm fighting the allure of what's become my escape. Maybe I shouldn't fight it, but give in and let it envelope me in its calm.

I would slip beneath the foamy water and feel the heat cover every inch of my body only to look down and see my long blond tresses floating beneath bubbles that have been mixed with crimson threads.

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