okay.

today i took care of–well, got the ball rolling, at least–a very painful and adult thing that involved a lengthy telephone conversation with various parties i didn’t know about things i didn’t understand and that made me sad, but i did it.  well, got the ball rolling, as i said.

go, me.  two months into the new reality.  it’s still weird.

take the long way home

this year i’ve been such a sad bastard that i didn’t feel like spending a lot of time with my family at christmas.  i didn’t want to just sit around and cry with my cousin, which is, of course, EXACTLY what i want to do, so i just ran up christmas eve day and came home again today, christmas day, via scenic jenny lind road and milton and farmington and escalon.  i cruised in front of the high school, but it looks foreign to me.  i drove by madame baymiller-with-the-cats’s house and walked around at dent for a while–no more swings.

i was so sad.  i am so sad.  i should be so sad.

it’s not even been two months and i feel like i’m just coming to my grief new every day, every time i see someone who mirrors that pain in my eyes.

betty ambushed me as soon as i walked into the 33.  i thought i could wear tight jeans and a little mascara, even, and have some fun, but i get to be all blotchy and cry first thing.  people are so kind and i want to just be gracious, but i hurt.  it hurts too much.  it’s so hard to just say “thank you for your concern” and not fucking disintegrate with every casual glance.  but people loved her and love me and we are together and it is just another day.  what’s a little mascara?

play the jukebox, drink and talk.  this is how it is.

that special time of the year.

“supervised” the winter band concert at my high school tonight…haven’t been to one in ages–practically since i was in high school, myself.  of course, because this is how things always seem to be for me, it was unexpectedly a memorial for a kid who was stabbed and killed on campus in 1969.  obviously it’s been my whole lifetime since that happened, but it doesn’t make it any less sad…and, also, a friend of maureen’s was there who i haven’t seen in the last couple months since she died.  there is just always something there to remind me…and not in a fun, pop song sort of way.

ah, well.  it was good to go…plus, you know, i had to do it, so there’s that.  go, band!  it made high school almost tolerable…except for those awful girls who played the flute.  at least one of them grew up to be an awful woman who probably doesn’t play the flute but is just as bitter and awful.  the other one is supposedly a “nice” person now, but i bet she’s still a bitch on the inside.

man, let’s file this entry under “annette has issues”.  😛

it’s my party and i’ll cry if i want to…but i don’t think i want to, right now.

went out tonight with a couple of friends for tapas and strolling around galleries and the hot chocolate that comes in tiny cups and is like drinking hot chocolate pudding to celebrate my birthday.  a lovely evening!  we had these thinly sliced grilled artichokes that were amazing, some potatoes and mushrooms and things at picaro on 16th, then walked to viracocha to look at stuff and meandered up and down valencia to look at galleries and such in the not-awful mist.  we stopped at dandelion chocolate for the amazing european drinking chocolate–hot chocolate pudding in a shot glass and one of the best things ever.  last night i was there and got the mission hot chocolate, a wonderful spicy-spicy frothy traditional hot chocolate and tony got the european and i was jealous, so this was extra satisfying.

anyway, good food, good art, good company, good chocolate.  a good birthday, all around.

but.

it’s still a hard thing, to not have her here to share this with, the cat birthday cards, my outfit,  the hot chocolate pudding cup, the fact that they’re remodeling and fancying up the mission mickey ds.

my birthday. 

everything. 

it’s still a hard thing, but people have been really amazing and supportive and caring to me, more than i expected.  i am grateful and happy and sad and–

completely freezing-ass cold.  fuck the environment and my pg&e bill–it’s my birthday and i’m running the heat until i can unclench my muscles a little.  nigh-nigh.

thanksgiving

it was good to spend some time with my mom.  she’s having a hard time with losing maureen and a harder time watching me have to do it.  i told her that i need to have her hold on for a long time yet because i just can’t take it right now.  i hope that she’ll get to move down closer soon–she’s so tired of eureka and it would be nice to have less of a drive with the little man, though he was practically perfect in every way and traffic was better than it has been in years–i think i made it in four and a half hours on wednesday, which was fantastic.

 blah blah blah.

anyway.

helped my mom pack the china and some other things up and went to feed the sea gulls in that weird old town boat club area we like to go.  when we went with maureen, she got to not only feed gulls with us, but also a pelican.  that was a red letter day.

i read several good books over the long weekend that i’ll attempt to make some comments about in the upcoming days…_eleanor & park_, which is as lovely as everyone says, _home front girl_, a diary from a young girl in chicago, 1939 to the end of 1941…uh…and something else that i’ve already forgotten, but i’ll remember tomorrow, i’m sure.

okay.  back to school tomorrow.  short week!  my birthday coming up!  it’s still good!