I wasn't really sure what to call this post. The past couple days have been CRAZY (well...mostly just yesterday and today...but still...). You know how I posted several weeks ago (1 / 8 to be exact) about how my step-dad (John) was diagnosed with lung cancer towards the end of 2008? I don't think I mentioned that he had been in and out of the hospital...but he had. Anyway...then I posted again last week about how he only had between 2 weeks and a month left, and the cancer had spread all over.
The moral of the story (and I'm sorry to those of you who read this and didn't know yet that this is how you have to find out): John died yesterday.
I'm not really sure what to say next / how to proceed with this entry from here. There has been a lot of fighting going on between my mom and John's mom recently (and just tonight one of his sisters kind of got involved with it too). For a while John's mom felt that my mom wasn't doing a very good job taking care of John, and they were trading back and forth (i.e. when he was not in the hospital or at the hospice center, he was either here at my / my mom's house or at his mom's house...when he was at his mom's house my mom was still kind of caring for him i.e. bringing him medicine when he needed it / going to stay with him once when his mom had a doctor's appointment and didn't want to leave John alone...but that's kind of a different story). After a while things settled down because John got kind of demanding and couldn't get up stairs anymore, so his mom found it hard to take care of him as well. More recently, however (and this started even before John passed away) my mom and John's mom have been fighting about arrangements for the funeral (i.e. payment / what kind of service to have, etc.). My mom and I looked up average funeral costs online one night and found that they are approximately $9,000 ($8,900 to be exact), so we figured that between my mom, John's mom, and his three sisters (aka 5 people) that they could each pay $1,800 and that would cover it. I don't know exactly what happened after that, but for some reason I feel that my mom told John's mom about the whole money thing and for whatever reason she wasn't happy with it. My mom seemed to think that if she had given John's mom a check for $9,000 dollars that she would have been her best friend. When we went to visit John on friday, his mom did not even acknowledge mine. Her husband (John's step-dad, Dick) was very nice and he came over to talk to me and my mom, but John's mom just walked right past mine without even saying anything.
I'm gonna side-track for a second: The people who read this know that yes, parts of my family (on my mom's side) are pretty rich (My one uncle who was big in the stock market and now has all kinds of animals on this HUGE property in Mt. Kisco, NY, and my other uncle who was on 20 / 20 on ABC and now has his own show on Fox Business Network). However, both of these uncles married into the family. My mom did not get so lucky. Yes, my dad was an eye doctor, and had more than enough to support himself and then a little more (he wasn't really rich, tho...and I'm not complaining). My parents got divorced when I was young and then my mom married John, who was by no means rich. He grew up on a farm in NJ and worked with his father's welding business for a while. He went to college, but I don't remember if he graduated or not. He was on the rescue squad for a while and did various jobs with welding and in dental labs and stuff before he started his trike business. The trike business did him well for a while, but suffered during the recession, and was never really able to get back on it's feet before John got sick. The moral of this story is that John was not made of money and left my mom in debt for various reasons that I don't really feel like going into here and now certain members of his family are expecting my mom to do god knows what (aka pay for the entire funeral, among other things). Honestly...this is the last thing that my mom needs now. I don't know what else to say.
When we went to the hospice center to visit John for the last time (yesterday...after he had already passed away) My mom and I were going around and hugging everyone (his mom, his aunts, his cousin. etc.) and when we got to his mom she said that john loved me very much and mentioned how much I helped him, but she did not say anything to my mom. I told my mom afterwards that she was acting like a 2 year old...and later she said "not even that...she was acting like a 1 year old", so I was joking and saying that because she's 70 years old in real life, if you were to subtract 68 or 69 from that, that's how old she really is (and I thought that was funny of course because of '69'...ok I said it I'll get my mind out of the gutter now...LOL). It's just "very bizarre" as my best friend from home put it. There's not much else I can say about that.
In other related news, one of John's sisters (I'll call her PB) called me on my cell phone today to tell me that there was an open slot if I wanted to read something from the bible. She also said that if I wanted to say something at the reception after the funeral that I could do that too. I told her that I had something written, and I would feel more comfortable saying it at the reception. Later, one of John's other sisters (whom I'm going to call MA) called my mom and it seemed like the conversation started off innocently enough (I heard my mom asking about catholic funerals and what the normal procedures for saying things were...then she read MA what she had written, which apparently wasn't good according to MA, although I had written it and it seemed appropriate to me...my best friend from home said that usually not even the family says anything at catholic funerals and they are more like mass services, but I still think it would have / could have / should have been appropriate for my mom to read what she had written at the reception after the funeral) but then MA must have told my mom to stop yelling at her because I heard her say what she always tells me and Ben when we tell her to stop yelling at her ("You want me to yell at you? THIS IS WHAT IT SOUNDS LIKE WHEN I YELL AT YOU!!!"). I don't remember where exactly I was going with this...except to say that I don't really want to say what I wrote either now. I wrote it for me, I have it for me to put in my scrapbook (and post here in a bit, and maybe read at the shiva we are going to have at my house on thursday) and it doesn't really matter to me whether John's family gets to hear it or not at this point. ::SHRUG:: Right now I really just want to post some song lyrics (of several songs that John loved and that make me think of him. These are all Fleetwood Mac songs, btdubs. Fleetwood Mac was one of his favorite bands and one that we listened to a lot together, especially when we were driving in his PT Cruiser):
Don’t Stop (The reason why this song relates is kind of sad because in addition to it being one that we would listen to a lot together, it kind of makes me think about how John was the last couple weeks that he was alive, because he didn't really know what was going on since the cancer had gone to his brain and affected his short term memory, so like he kept asking if / when he could come home or go to his mom's or stuff like that. In other words, he was always thinking about what was going to happen in the future, as if he was going to get through this, which I guess in a way was good, but it's sad to think about now).
If you wake up and don't want to smile,
If it takes just a little while,
Open your eyes and look at the day,
You'll see things in a different way.
Don't stop,
thinking about tomorrow,
Don't stop,
It'll soon be here,
It'll be better than before,
Yesterday's gone, yesterday's gone.
Why not think about times to come,
And not about the things that you've done,
If your life was bad to you,
Just think what tomorrow will do.
Don't stop,
thinking about tomorrow,
Don't stop,
It'll soon be here,
It'll be better than before,
Yesterday's gone, yesterday's gone.
[Instrumental]
All I want is to see you smile,
If it takes just a little while,
I know you don't believe that it's true,
I never meant any harm to you.
Don't stop,
thinking about tomorrow,
Don't stop,
it'll soon be here,
It'll be better than before,
Yesterday's gone, yesterday's gone.
Don't stop,
thinking about tomorrow
Don't stop,
it'll soon be here,
It'll be better than before,
Yesterday's gone, yesterday's gone.
(Oooooh) Don't you look back,
(Oooooh) Don't you look back
(Oooooh) Don't you look back....FADES OUT
Go Your Own Way
Loving you
Is it the right thing to do?
How can I ever change things
That I feel?
If I could
Maybe I'd give you my world
How can I
When you won't take it from me
You can go your own way
Go your own way
You can call it
Another lonely day
You can go your own way
Go your own way
Tell me why
Everything turned around
Packing up
Shacking up's all you wanna do
If I could
Baby I'd give you my world
Open up
Everything's waiting for you
You can go your own way
Go your own way
You can call it
Another lonely day
You can go your own way
go your own way
You can go your own way
Go your own way
You can call it
Another lonely day
You can go your own way
go your own way
You can call it
Another lonely day
You can go your own way...
Call it another lonely day...
you can go your own way...
Say You Will
Somethin' in you brought out somethin' in me, that I've never been since
That part of me that was only for you,
That kind of romance
Comes only once, that kind of love
That kind of fever dance
That you love because you become someone else in an instant
Say you will, say you will give me one more chance
At least give me time to change your mind
That always seems to heal the wounds, if I can
Get you to dance
Somethin' in you put a hold on my heart
It's hard to believe now
Here in the place that will never be dark
I remember that place...
That kind of touch, electricity of love
That certain kind of grace
That you love because you become someone else in an instant
Say you will, say you will give me one more chance
At least give me time to change your mind
That always seems to heal the wounds, if I can
Get you to dance
Say you will, say you will give me one more chance (say you will)
At least give me time to change your mind (say you will)
That always seems to heal the wounds, if I can
Get you to dance
Say you will, say you will give me one more chance (say you will)
At least give me time to change your mind (say you will)
That always seems to heal the wounds, if I can
Get you to dance
Say you will, say you will give me one more chance (say you will)
At least give me time to change your mind (say you will)
That always seems to heal the wounds, if I can
Get you to dance
Say you will, say you will give me one more chance (say you will)
At least give me time to change your mind (say you will)
That always seems to heal the wounds, if I can
Get you to dance
Say you will, say you will give me one more chance
At least give me time to change your mind
That always seems to heal the wounds, if I can
Get you to dance
What's The World Coming To
What's the world coming to?
What's the world coming to?
Everyone's gone to the moon
What's the world coming to?
Every night, every day
In this house filled with shame
I can say I care
But there's no one there
There's no truth in my life
There's no light in my eyes
And it's all I guess
That I'll ever miss
What's the world coming to?
What's the world coming to?
Everyone's gone to the moon
What's the world coming to?
I can jump right off and fall right into the ocean
I can come right out and think just what I say
But if I don't call for a reservation
They'll just turn me down
Turn me inside out
I don't say what they want
I don't do what they say
So I'm on their list
So I'm gone, I guess
What's the world coming to?
What's the world coming to?
Everyone's gone to the moon
What's the world coming to?
What's the world coming to?
What's the world coming to?
Everyone's gone to the moon
What's the world coming to?
I'm sorry that this is so long. I think I'm gonna put my speech (sp.?) in another entry that will follow shortly after I post this one. I guess that's all for now. I can't think of anything else to say.
--Emily
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