my advice in this moment

how I am feeling right now — always be patient and gentle and kind with anyone you care about — with everyone actually? — and always treat your last words like they really are the last. last time mom and I talked was Friday morning — we were going over her day’s schedule. it was so short, she was cheerful. But I was at work and what did I even say that was loving. Can’t remember. Why couldn’t I take the time, I wonder.

things that are giving me comfort

• all the best friends, plus all the nice people and family writing texts (though it’s what makes me cry) (also seeing mom’s little things)
• inside the nba clips
• watching basketball
• walks in houston
• Houston itself
• my dad and stepmom

on the walk to the hospice

(is that a baby flying in the air?!)

too much kindness

overwhelmed by kindness from everyone. we got mom moved to hospice last night, and it’s infinite better than the hospital. so much more peaceful. they gave her a bath as soon as we got here, which was such a kindness (i sort of feel like hospitals should be like hospice but i know it’s not realistic). i’m sitting with mom now, playing willie nelson, and i put some lavender balm on her feet. teddy came to visit and barked a bunch, so it was just like old times.

my mood

good things

hard stuff these days, but bright spots: having enough money; my kind friends; people’s kindness making me cry; walking in Houston; eating carrabas takeout and watching the beautiful PERFECT DAYS last night with my dad, stepmom, and brother (btw it stars the amazing Kōji Yakusho, who was in THE EEL, a movie I loved when I saw it in 1997 [at the four star?] — just watched the trailer, and it looks so intense now, but maybe it’s my birthday film this year).

a little fat

• got a little fat these past few months, most of my pants are TIGHT. i’m not sure how it happened (lots of muffins, ice cream, cookie dough, not working out, not walking to work), but i’m back on my regimen now, so hopefully things will settle down. but wow wouldn’t it be great if i could just eat coffee cake and ice cream all the live long day and not worry.
• i’ve been getting so many newsletters about $200,000 facelifts and ozempic and 30-year-old billionaires and meanwhile i’m reading the news about gaza and ukraine and the assault on science and all of it feels pretty dystopian. like we’re just like the old days and no one’s more aware or more conscious now, in fact we’re actually worse? i guess i’m just saying, maybe it’s our curse as humans, to never really get more enlightened, in a real way.
• in anticipation of the latest mission: impossible, we watched all of the previous movies (#1-7) and until 6 and 7, i found the series strangely moving, like seeing tom cruise age, like he was our hardcore, traumatized friend, and we were checking in on him every few years, kind of like those 7 Up movies. #6 and #7 are too hectic, basically just insane action sequences strung together with the lightest evil plot, but still…it was a journey i enjoyed.
• mom fell twice this morning, she’s on her way to the trauma E/R. i jinxed myself because just yesterday someone asked me how she was and i was like, “she hasn’t been in the hospital since late february, she’s great!”

exactly this

this whole thing is such a frustrating mess — from the ny times article “Kennedy and Trump Paint Bleak Picture of Chronic Disease in U.S. Children”:

this was a dumb book

no offense

goal: fun, funny, chill?

from saipua (bolding my own) — all i wanted in high school was to go to keg parties and be a pretty, light-hearted girl, and my eternal quest to be chill and fun:

Such calculations seem related to professional imposter syndrome and also linked to my formative years as an overweight kid who circled around the popular kids at school, desperate to fit in. All I wanted was to be thin like the jCrew catalog models of the mid-90’s and have a lacrosse boyfriend.  …

Anyway, grateful to be an adult and have a vacation, full of seafood and seed oils, old Gregg, and to be reminded that there is a world beyond the vortex of worlds end and that I should go visit there more often and work on my personality. (Goal: fun, funny, chill?)