That is what my weekend will consist of. Two parties and a funeral and maybe a hospital visit…to see my mother. The parties are in the southern part of the state and the funeral is in the northern part of the state and I am determined to make all three. This will be the first time I return “home” since I separated myself from my family of origin. They all (mom, brother, and sister) live down in the southern part of the state and I will be in such close proximity to them, and it has been stressing me out! I haven’t reached out to any of them to let them know I’ll be in town. I guess that’s the point of separating yourself from people. You don’t communicate with them. I used to always see my brother and I used to always see my nieces, which means I would always see my sister. And, well, I would always see my mom, out of guilt, and it would always turn out shitty. I remember one time I decided to be “a good daughter” and spend the night at my mom’s house with her because she would always try to convince me to. My wife ended up booking me a hotel room at midnight because I couldn’t stay at my mom’s house another minute. That was shitty.
There’s a good chance I will run into my sister at one of the parties I plan on attending. And that has been causing me a lot of anxiety. She isn’t very nice to me, and I don’t think she likes me very much at all. I will get to a place of acceptance and ease and decide to just be myself if I do run into her, which is pretty kind and reasonable. But then I jump to conclusions, all kinds of conclusions, on how the interaction will go and then I get revved up again. It’ll be fine.
The other party is significant not only because it is a birthday and retirement party, but it is essentially my best friend from childhood’s going away party. She is moving to THE OTHER SIDE OF THE COUNTRY. Since 6th grade, 1992, age 11, for OVER 30 years, she has been my family. Her family has been my family. When I would get kicked out of my house, I would walk to her house and take a shower there and brush my teeth and eat. And then I would move on. I would never stay there because I knew my mom would look for me there and I never wanted to put them in a compromising position or in a position to feel my mother’s wrath. What kind of best friend would I have been if I did. I feel sad that my friend is leaving, even though we currently live on opposite sides of the state. It’s at least not opposite sides of the country!! It’ll be a good party. It always is.
Sooooo. Yesterday my mom’s neighbor called me to let me know that my mom called the ambulance for herself and was taken to the hospital. The neighbor was concerned. I was concerned too because I don’t think my mom has ever called the ambulance for herself. She usually tries to get out of going to the hospital by ambulance when they do go out there for her, so she must have really been scared. This call made me question my boundaries. It made me think of all kinds of scenarios. It made me mad that I now have to figure out if I want to bend my boundaries and visit her since I will be in a city close to where she lives and she is in the hospital. It fuckin’ stressed me out, man. I haven’t spoken to my mom in 5 months now. She was able to somehow leave me two voicemails in July without me knowing about it until I checked my voicemails by dialing the voicemail number. Not sure how she was able to get through the Verizon system that has her blocked. But she did. I’ll save those messages for another blog. I don’t know what I will do. My weekend is already jam packed and my mom is not good for me or to me. We shall see. I suppose I will wait for an update to see what is going on with her and make a decision then if I have to. That’s the maybe a hospital visit part.
And then there’s the funeral. Sucks. A friend passed away. Age 50. Cancer. A mother. A best friend to one of my close friends. She came to my engagement party and my wedding, and the professional photographer put a big panoramic picture with her in the very middle of my engagement party photo album. It was hilarious. She was so vibrant and sweet and kind and funny and warm and welcoming and loving and so many things. So, my wife and I are going to celebrate her life on Sunday and Monday. I struggled so much to decide whether or not to go to the parties in the southern part of the state this weekend and when I learned of my friend’s passing, I was like, “shit, fuck, yes, I need to go to the parties.” Why wait to celebrate someone when they can no longer celebrate themselves? Why prioritize funerals and not parties? We are always thinking that there will be another one or next time. But sometimes there is no next time. So, thanks for that gift, friend.