bits

• this is a very cute costume (by alex mill staffer rose florence anderson, courtesy of cupofjo)
• was watching tv halloween shows to “get in the mood” and then switched over to silence of the lambs and holy hell that movie is so good and so scary, i had forgotten, and jodie foster and anthony hopkins 100% deserved those academy awards. absolutely chilling.
• i think i’m finally coming around to pizza?????
• back on my bullshit and watching playoff sports AND the NBA and trying to decide if i’m getting league pass again (can i make it work without spending the $$$)
• seeing niece and nephew (and other little friends) play soccer
• this exceptional list about handling grief — especially this:
  Grief is a transformative event in that there will always feel like a “before this happened” and an “after this happened” it may take time to feel okay with that but I tried to look at it as entering deeper into the depths of the human experience as we all do face it eventually as dreaded as it is. Part of this journey may include coming face to face with your own mortality for the first real sobering non purely conceptual time barring life events that have also done that.
• i think the thing that is hitting me with — especially lou’s death — is just the person is GONE. just no longer, like…POOF. it’s been making think about the leftovers, which i didn’t love (who cares), but that sudden unexplained goneness is hard to grasp.

🤝

the countless moments of being alive

from interview with a sober person:

boring dumb things

• this past summer i was taking a headache preventative that caused me to gain weight, which i did [nine pounds!!!!] (very cool)
• at the same time my thyroid stopped working (or maybe my thyroid hasn’t worked for awhile? only just got my first comprehensive blood test in two years. or even three. or maybe four? i guess i haven’t had a proper doctor monitoring anything in awhile) (p cool!!!) (ignore your health and let the problems pile up and assume they are just “aging”) anyway, so on top of the preventative headache med, my metabolism was going south
• also apparently i went through menopause [TMI sorry] while my mom was going through her most intense times, which maybe makes sense? or maybe it triggered it. can stress trigger things like that. [quick internet check: no]
• one cool thing is that at last i’m seeing doctors (although successfully? questionable) AND my sleep is 100000 times better (guess that’s actually two cool things)
• another cool thing — WEEKENDS (but also wish they were three days long) (but then don’t you know i’d get used to three days and want FOUR days and WHERE DOES IT END) (A: never working and just being a dope friend and auntie!!!!)

light on the way to fort davis

a lot of things going on over here (and also nothing)

went to my sweet aunt louie’s memorial last weekend. flew into baltimore, stayed at the four seasons (why not? kind of stupid but at the same time it was a relief) (view from my room pictured above). on sunday morning, was driving to the memorial in lancaster, PA, it was raining like crazy, and this car pulls up next to me — and the license plate said, “STLOUIE” — !!!! I was like, WAIT — and i was trying to take a photo, but it was raining, and this is the best I got. But it was wild — like the universe winking at me. Or…uncorking champagne. It reminded me of how my mom passed away as soon as ross and i got home from hospice. (it sounds like NBD, but it was uncanny, because we had to take this circuitous route home, had to check on our friend van, and it took us about an hour, but then i left my house keys in the house, so we had to go in the back way, and as soon as we were in the house, we got the call. her death was timed exactly to our entry into the house.)

you can’t win

a dress i can get behind

losing people

AKA dealing with death, the concept of death, post # 2500 million

i mean, just looking at photos of people that are gone (my mom, my aunt) and it’s just like _____________________. they were here and now they’re not. they had these lives, and now: ______________________. blankness. it’s hard to conceive completely, just going from something to nothing. like obviously i know they’re not here, and it’s not pressing on me every moment, but it’s just hard to wrap your mind around — the goneness. my friend monika sent me this book called the light between us — about a medium (!) — and she swears it will explain life, death, all of it, and offer me a lot of comfort. i’m reading it EXTREMELY slowly (and skeptically) (AND fearfully, if i’m being honest).

simple pleasures

• lanterns
• discussing the “best tv shows of the 21st century” list in the ny times
• striped shirts
• the whinnying of the horses across the street
• the [riotous] marigolds ross planted