holy long absence, batman!

so after poking a facebook friend to read my blog and then i'll read hers i decided to see how long it's been since i blogged and was gobsmacked to find out it's been two plus months! then again, the past two months have been very full. just two days after my last blog, on august 8th, my sweetheart fry was in a very bad car accident and nearly killed. thank the gods he was able to walk away. here's what happened:

he was headed north on round lake boulevard in anoka. it's a two lane highway, the speed limit is 55 mph. a car was stopped to make a left. so the car in front of fry stopped. and fry stopped. and there's where it got ugly. the 20-something girl behind him "looked down for a second" when she looked up everyone was stopped. she jerked the wheel to the right and slammed on her brakes but hit the back right of fry's yaris hard enough to bend the axle and plow his car into the car in front of him and into oncoming traffic where his car was then hit again by a full size dodge ram pickup. his car was completely totaled out. and everyone who talked to us in the weeks after said usually the driver doesn't live in accidents like this:


even now with him sitting next to me eating bbq pringles and watching a very bad "meteor destroys earth movie" knowing he's safe. knowing he's ok. i get panicky and tears threaten to run because i came so very close to losing him. my heart races and my throat closes and i want to drop to my knees and thank the gods for sparing him.

he did actually WALK away from this accident. he got himself out of the car. called me when i was on my way to my part time job and said "i was just rear ended, do you think you can give me a ride?" i asked if he was ok and he said yeah, fine, he just needed a ride. thankfully i didn't see the car until the next day when i went to empty it for him. he didn't even want to go to the hospital, i made him because he had the seat belt mark embedded in his chest and kept saying he wanted to sleep and i was worried about a head injury. thankfully the full extent of his injuries were deep bruises, some slight ligament tears, and partially detached muscle. minuscule in relation to what could have been.

august was filled with helping fry recover. find a new car. both of us learn to be ok riding in cars without fearing the person behind us was out to kill us. i still sometimes feel anxiety when driving. and even more so when i'm passenger. his sister came up to visit from hawaii. we saw weird al at the state fair. life was getting back to normal.

and then bad news from the west. my uncle john, my uncle joe's younger brother, was getting weaker. my aunt sharon emailed us asking for prayers. not prayers for a cure or a miracle. but prayers for comfort and peace and no pain. then in the evening on wednesday september 8th, a month to the day after fry's accident, my cousin rico called to tell us the doctors said my uncle would be lucky to make it 24 hours and they would be simply shocked if he made it through the weekend. my dad packed a bag. tossed and turned all night. and headed west early on the 9th. he made it to the hospital in north dakota just before 2pm on the 9th. he spent a few final hours with his best friend/brother before my uncle john died on september 10th just before 5am.

so with a lot of fear of driving, cars, and dying behind the wheel: i got in my saturn and drove west to say good bye. i returned to the town i was born in. a town i hadn't seen in 30 years and 2 months and 29days. all in all i spent less than 24 hours in that north dakota town before returning east again. to home.

now, not like any of this is ALL about me, but i had just started to gain my balance again and completely had the pins knocked out from under me. my uncle john was my godfather. one of the steadies in my life. i still have both my parents, but i always thought that when the time came that i lost one of them my uncle john would be the one to hold me up and give me strength and he would still be there to take care of me. i wanted to see his face when i received my mfa from hamline. i thought he'd dance with me at my wedding. that he'd hold my babies and they'd call him grandpa john. i've had to learn to live again in a world without him. and, honestly, i hate that. but i'm trying not to resent it too much. trying not to have too much animosity towards the heavens for taking him.

it's exhausting to be thanking the gods for sparing fry while at the same time cursing them for taking my uncle john. oh, and then, the day my uncle died it was announced that i got a promotion at work. seriously. talk about an emotional mixed bag. but. blessing too? because i needed something new at work. a new challenge to better use my talents and skills. i'd been in my previous position for nearly 3 years and it was time for a change.

sum up? so, the past 2 1/2 months = nearly losing my lover, my uncle dying, and a promotion.

did i mention that i also have stopped seeing my therapist & nutritionist and decided i'm well enough to tackle this whole eating disorder thing on my own? but, you know what? maybe i am. because all of this could have sent me into a serious spiral and caused me to starve myself again. and it hasn't. i have my moments of poor choices, but everyone does. it's called being human.

perspective

my life, my struggles, & my issues have just been shoved into stark perspective for me today. today i got an email from my mom saying that my uncle joe is really sick, the cancer is winning, & he probably doesn't have much longer. i don't even know how to react to it, in a way i'm just kind of numb. obviously i'm sad & i've cried. i've cried today at work while thinking about it. i'm not as close to him as i'd like to be. i'm closer with my uncle john who is also my god father.

quick interjection: joe & john are not biologically related to me. their family took my father in after my grandfather died. the carusos basically raised my dad, called him one of their own, & treated him as one of their own; it was an unofficial adoption basically. i was raised with joe & john as my uncles. their parents as my grandma & grandpa caruso. & it never occurred to me that we had no blood relation, that they had just "adopted" my father & raised him from the time he was 13 & on.

even though john lives in north dakota i'm closer to him than joe. maybe because my dad is closer to john. maybe because john is my god father. maybe because somewhere in my memories i still hold onto the three years i spent in north dakota where he & sharon & jason (my cousin) were my closest family besides my parents. but while i'm closer to john, my uncle joe is someone that i really enjoy having in my life.

he's the kind of a guy that there aren't many around anymore. not saying it's good or bad, just is. he still lives over in the "old neighborhood" where they all grew up in the west 7th area of st. paul. he restores old cars & rides a motorcycle. he has a deep, gruff, gravely voice. his laugh reminds me of santa. if santa was a smoker. besides john he's my dad's oldest friend. not many people hang onto friends that long. my dad'll be 61 in june. he's known the carusos for so much of his life he probably doesn't remember a time without them. i know that i don't have any friends like that. i have some that are close, but not quite.

my uncle joe's time is being counted down now. if each life has a certain number of grains of sand his is almost empty. my dad tried calling his house earlier today & there wasn't any answer. joe may be on his way to the hospital again. my uncle john is stuck in north dakota because of the flooding & now snow that has pretty much shut the state down & isolated them. i'm stuck in limbo just waiting to hear something from someone. i really hope my dad gets to see joe one more time. i know that no one wants their last memory of someone to be when they're sick. but i also think it's important to get another chance to tell someone how much they matter in your life.

for me, one of the last times i saw joe was this past summer at a restaurant down on west 7th. i think it was this past summer. i was there with my parents, my uncle john & aunt sharon, & my brother. it was an italian restaurant & this was after my surgery so i didn't eat much, i only had a small salad. & i couldn't stay long. i don't remember now why i had to rush off. in hindsight it must not have been that important, the reason i couldn't stay. but it seemed like it at the time. but we had a good time, all of us talking & laughing. & it's always so bizarre for me to see this side of my dad, when he gets together with joe & john & they talk about the old times & the old neighborhood & all these stories bubble up about my dad, his childhood, his antics, all these things that i never even knew about. things i never even suspected.

the time i remember before that is at my grandma caruso's funeral. uncle joe was wearing a suit, which is much different than what he usually wears---jeans & a leather jacket is what i always remember. & i read a poem at the service that i wrote for my grandma caruso. & i met his daughter for the first time that i could remember. & her kids. & i had to leave the funeral early to go to a friend's wedding. & on that day i found out that my best friend tina's grandma died. may 13 2007 was one hell of a day, really.

here's some pictures of my uncle joe. i pulled them from his caring bridge website (which is linked above in the first paragraph). i'll update as i find out more. in the mean time, i'm sending lots of love & energy & healing into the universe for my uncle joe, my uncle john, & everyone that loves joe.

thank you agent orange: santa has cancer

the twin cities are more like fraternal twins than identical. for anyone who was born & raised here, or even, has lived here for a while. they know it. & they pick a city. aligning themselves on the west or the east side of the river. there's very few people who are able to stay neutral in this debate. you love st. paul or minneapolis, but nearly never ever, both.

minneapolis is the glam twin. with the hopping night life, breath taking sky line, posh clubs, restaurants, & extravagant hotels. it's the twin with the pizazz, the glitter, & the glitz. much more cosmopolitan than it's sister to the east. st. paul is a city of neighborhoods. we do have the science museum, the minnesota historical society, the state capital building. none of which, except possibly the science museum, can claim to be sexy in anyway. but it's ok, because we're a city of neighborhoods. you move to minneapolis to be anonymous, you move to st. paul to get to know your neighbors & become part of something larger than the four walls of your home.

one of the largest neighborhoods in st. paul is the east side. it sprawls all the way from the mounds park bluffs up to oakdale & over to maplewood. most of the people who live on the east side, especially my area of the east side, have been there for years & years. they grew up there as kids, their families are near by, & it's their home. they come from blue collar, working class families. where you go to work every day, put in your eight or ten hours of honest work & come home to your family, maybe stopping for a beer along the way. it's people who may not drive the newest cars or own the newest high definition tv on the market. but we have high speed internet. & cable. & we have our community.

& community is one of our most valued possessions. we may not sit naked around a bonfire every friday night singing kumbya, but we're aware of what's going on, & we care about the people living their lives parallel to ours. one of the landmarks of the east side, is our family owned businesses. it's not all chain stores & a mc-life. our neighborhoods have personality & individuality.

today i saw something that made me see my little corner of the world in a different way. while getting our weekly cheese & meat from the butcher i was looking at the fliers they had hanging up & one caught my eye. it was for a benefit dinner for a man who was just diagnosed with cancer, the suspected culprit: agent orange. his wife has struggled with MS for several years, so a benefit dinner was being hosted for them to help with the medical costs & other bills that were accumulating. & staring at the fuzzy black & white picture, i recognized the guy, at least, i think i did. i think i do.

at little oven, which is just across the street from big steer, there's a man that often comes in to eat alone. he has white hair & a big bushy white beard, just like the guy in the picture, just like santa claus. at christmas this gentleman even dresses up as santa, red suit & all, to hand out candy canes to kids. he's always smiling & always cheerful, no matter what the weather is like outside. now, it's very possible that the gentleman i know from little oven is different from the one i saw in the picture at big steer. it's possible.

but even if they are different men. the one smiling from the pixelated gray & white photo still looks like santa. & he still has cancer as a result of serving in vietnam for the american military. & there's something about that situation that makes my day just a little more gray.

call me lab rat #61577B

so if splenda causes cancer then just call me rat #61577B, 'cause i'm probably close to od-ing on the junk. i'm on my third cup of coffee for the day, with four packets of splenda per, some how i don't think that's too good for my health. what do you think, dear reader? but it tastes pretty yummy & no calories, unlike it's cousin sugar. seriously though, if it causes cancer it may not be a good thing for me to consume in large quantities.

i'm trying valiantly to have an about face on my attitude here, & per jenn "you can't change the past, it's hard not to dwell sometimes, but you can't change it." seriously guys, i love her dearly, but sometimes she sounds like a fortune cookie. & that is, of course, said with the utmost affection. it is great to have friends around that listen to you bitch & moan & then tell you to stop being a drama queen, someone else needs the tiara.

three days til my birthday & i won't be making most of my short term goals. let's see, 28 poems? hmmm, yeah, if i do them all in the next three days, that's only about 7 per day. five puppy walks? as long as i do two in one day, still slightly doable. the into the 250's by the 15th, unlikely considering i'm not the starve & purge type of girl, just not my thing. i've actually managed to blow most of these. how did two weeks go by so fast?

i really wish the world would just slow down, give me a minute to think, to do something. but i blink & it's not only tomorrow but the day after. somehow i'm guessing this is not a good thing, to have such disconnects with time. i hope i'm not the only one who feels the world speeding up & not getting enough done & having days literally flow past.

on the upside, i can now taste again. so much for my perfect weight loss solution. drats! maybe that one isn't an upside, but jack is happy that i can taste food again, so i guess that counts for something.

i have about an hour & a half left at work tonight. well, to be exact an hour & 21 minutes. so maybe if i'm quick like a bunny i can get two or three poems written tonight. which would be fabulous since i'm meeting with my advisor tomorrow & i need to have some new work to hand in to her. work that i was supposed to have in last month. seriously fucking up. big time.