Finally

Today was awesome.

Get Me Away From Here, I'm Dying

Gayle Brandeis has a stunning essay up on The Rumpus.

The Grandness

My purchase of a hideously ugly purse was necessary.  I say this like it's a fact, because to me it is.  This won't make sense to everyone, but it likely will to those who have kicked against the currents of the wild, consuming river of grief.

I had to buy a new purse, and it had to be an awful one, because the one I've been using for the last five months was lovely in a way that makes me ache to think about.  It was blue and it was sleek.  It was simple and practical.  It was big enough to contain everything I needed, though I stuffed it so much its inside liners fell apart.  It garnered me compliments from both residents at the retirement center where I work and women whose age falls closer to mine.  It was exquisite not because of its designer or brand, but because it belonged to my grandmother.  It was the last purse she owned before she died.

I carried it around with me all these months like I was carrying her, too.  I've been using her wallet, her sunglasses case, her coin purse.  Carrying all of her things -- holding them -- as I navigate this world without her.  I've been toting around a very heavy load.  I decided I couldn't do it anymore, and I needed to get something terrible to replace it, so this is clear: Nothing will ever replace anything.  There is no sand to fill in that hole.  I feel her absence -- some would call this her presence -- every day and using her purse was a constant reminder of my lifelong attempt to emulate her.  I'm not her, and I can't be, and there will never be another like her.  Such is the grandness of a grandma. 

Some day, I'll feel at peace with her absence.  In the meantime, it's imperative I use an ugly purse.

My grandma Margie turned 90 in October and then died in December, so this phase of my life has been bittersweet.  But today's another milestone for another lady.  Today my grandma Florence turns 90 as well.  I wish I could separate the two events, think of today only as the celebration of one grandma and not the reminder of a loss of another, but that's not possible.  I can only marvel in their similarities, marvel at the way they've both been such grand presences in my life.

My two grandmas were and are my two biggest supporters.  They believed in me when I had nothing to show for myself.  They encouraged me when it would have made all the practical sense in the world to gently suggest I try something else.  My grandmas have helped me chip away at my massive student loan debt.  They told me I'm talented and never allowed any discussion to the contrary.  In their minds, their was one option and that was for me to make it.  Margie reminded me of this all the time.  Florence still does and it is what makes all the difference in my life.

There is nothing like the grandness of grandmas.

I'll see my grandma Florence soon and I hope I'm able to convey just what she means to me.  I hope she understands that the impact she's had on my life is profound.  I hope she knows that my love for her is so strong, I would happily carry around an ugly purse or its equivalent in her honor.

Today I celebrate a grand woman, my grandma Florence.  There is no one else like her, and there never will be, and I'm so insanely grateful that she's still here and still a part of my life.  90 years, my my my.

     

Reason #789,488 Why I Love My Job

Today's quote of the day:

"If anyone ever decides 

to get rid of you,

I'd like to adopt you."

--A Very Sweet Resident

My, What Thin Corneas You Have

I get strange news every time I visit an eye doctor.  There's always a moment or two when the doctor says "hmm" while doing the examination.  Last year, my doctor asked me if I'd ever been in a major accident or hit in the face, because there was such a difference between the optic nerves in each eye.  These differences made me a likely candidate for glaucoma.  My new doctor calls me a "suspect." I am a suspect  for glaucoma and I am a suspect for keratoconus.  This basically means that while I have neither conditions, I have enough troubling symptoms that my likelihood of developing either of these is greater than in a normal patient.  And what that means is one of three things: these conditions won't develop any more and my eyes will be absolutely fine, or they'll develop severely and I'll need glaucoma surgery and/or a cornea transplant, or something in between.  For now it's nothing to worry about, and simply something to keep my eyes on (yep, I said it) for the next few years.  Should it ever develop any further, though ... well, let's just say I highly discourage you from Googling cornea transplants.

15 Ways to Stay Married for 15 Years

I loved this article.

Ay Yi Yi

I was fortunate enough to spend about five years of my life working as a freelance writer, during which I was able to devote a lot of spare time to my own writing.  Though it was a financially challenging period of my life, it was liberating and wonderful to be in control of my own schedule.

These days, I work a full-time job I love.  I have great ambitions of writing in the evenings after work, but sometimes that just doesn't happen.  I also have great ambitions of working out in the evenings.  And keeping up with cleaning my apartment.  And maintaining some semblance of a social life.  And going to bed at a decent hour.  It's hard to do all of these things, much less any of these things, after working eight  hours.

So yes, it's hard.  Obviously that's just the way life works.  It's kind of sucky, and nothing comes easily, and everything requires a lot of energy and attention.  In order to be the person I want to be, I kind of have to be three people.  And every once in a while something -- my clean apartment, my sleep schedule, something -- is just going to have to give.

It's a lot of pressure.  But I keep asking myself: What do I really want?  I want to write, and I want to be fit and healthy, and I want to be well-fed and well-slumbered and living in a clean environment.  So either I figure out a way to do it all, or I fail.  Failure doesn't sound very appealing to me right now.