Every now and then I remember that I have a blog. Of nothing in particular, but more of an online diary that everyone can read. In my case, no one. Which is the way I want it i think. I'm lost in the shuffle and someday in the future maybe my little piece of history will be uncovered by a future relative.
To the future: Hi!
I'll pop in again and update my life again soon.
Friday, September 09, 2011
Monday, August 02, 2010
My Kindle, My Love.
So I have a kindle.
And I love it.
The endless boxes of books are gone, replaced by a slim tablet capable of holding thousands of titles. Oh technology! How I love you! You've made me an even bigger book nerd if that was possible. I just finished my 90th book read so far this year, all thanks to the kindle. The last book was a great one too, and quite different from my usual romance novel. The Passage by Justin Cronin. Holy shit what a bag of win that was! I can't wait for the next 2 books to come out!
And I love it.
The endless boxes of books are gone, replaced by a slim tablet capable of holding thousands of titles. Oh technology! How I love you! You've made me an even bigger book nerd if that was possible. I just finished my 90th book read so far this year, all thanks to the kindle. The last book was a great one too, and quite different from my usual romance novel. The Passage by Justin Cronin. Holy shit what a bag of win that was! I can't wait for the next 2 books to come out!
Friday, January 09, 2009
Wonderpets: Heaven or Hell?
So Rowan is on this Wonder pets kick lately. Obsession is more like it. Today alone he watched the "save the armadillo" episode 5 times. It's OnDemand, and the only episode he wants to watch. For some reason the Nutcracker episode freaks him out, and he's scared of the nutcracker.
Here's Rowan last summer at the Obama rally I stumbled upon, in downtown Manchester.
Here's Rowan last summer at the Obama rally I stumbled upon, in downtown Manchester.
Thursday, November 06, 2008
Yah, so its been awhile.
I keep meaning to get back to this and finish the story, but I just can't seem to do it. Some day I will, but for now I'd like to focus on some happier things. Its kinda weird putting this all out there for everyone to see, but I don't think there is too many of you out there anyways. Probably a good thing.
I visited my dad's grave not too long ago, and for the first time I was able to do so without crying. Em and I did our usual poor a bottle of scotch on dad's grave, talk about funny shit dad did, and how much we missed him. Having a parent gone is a weird feeling, it's like having a buffer to death gone. I think about all the things I could have told him, but didn't, and I think of all the things I should have asked him, but didn't. I think about how, like myself, my kids will never know their grandfather. Or how funny, smart, and the life of the party my dad was. How he pointed out constellations to us and explained worm-hole theories while we were still small children. How even though he was an atheist, he took us to church because we asked him too. How whatever the question, he would always give us the straight, truthful answer. How his lawn was his religion, and how insane it made him that the next door neighbors had nothing but dirt and crabgrass. How he trusted us to do what was right and to stay out of trouble, never doubting us unless we gave him cause too. How pissed he would get if you turned up the heat from 65 degrees, and tell us to "put a sweater on". Or if we were inside on a beautiful day, he would threaten to "find us something to do if we couldn't", which always meant some sort of gardening, including the dreaded "here is a bowl. Fill it with blueberries" or "go pick up all the sticks in the front yard".
How much he loved all of our many animals, looking for lost ones, and finding the dead ones. How much he loved scotch, and not in an alcoholic way, put in the way a connoisseur loves it. How much he LOVED Cape Cod, and happy hour with the family. How much he hated George Bush, and how he still voted in 2006 even though he couldn't walk, and was in immense pain, he still went to vote. His funny laugh, when if he really got going , he would kinda giggle in such a peculiar way. How much he loved astronomy and his telescope, and the hours in the cold he spent in his little observatory. What a genius he was with computers and technology. How he couldn't draw or spell to save his life. How bad his handwriting was, so that even he couldn't read it. How much he loved the Patriots, and thank fucking god they won a few superbowls before he died. How he was full of what I like to call 'dadisms', including:
"exactly"
"it is what it is"
"negative"
"affirmative" (always confused the waitresses)
"not bad, yourself"
"shitski" (Russian for shit)
and so much more.
I miss him every day, and after almost two years of him gone, I wonder if I will ever get used to it.
I visited my dad's grave not too long ago, and for the first time I was able to do so without crying. Em and I did our usual poor a bottle of scotch on dad's grave, talk about funny shit dad did, and how much we missed him. Having a parent gone is a weird feeling, it's like having a buffer to death gone. I think about all the things I could have told him, but didn't, and I think of all the things I should have asked him, but didn't. I think about how, like myself, my kids will never know their grandfather. Or how funny, smart, and the life of the party my dad was. How he pointed out constellations to us and explained worm-hole theories while we were still small children. How even though he was an atheist, he took us to church because we asked him too. How whatever the question, he would always give us the straight, truthful answer. How his lawn was his religion, and how insane it made him that the next door neighbors had nothing but dirt and crabgrass. How he trusted us to do what was right and to stay out of trouble, never doubting us unless we gave him cause too. How pissed he would get if you turned up the heat from 65 degrees, and tell us to "put a sweater on". Or if we were inside on a beautiful day, he would threaten to "find us something to do if we couldn't", which always meant some sort of gardening, including the dreaded "here is a bowl. Fill it with blueberries" or "go pick up all the sticks in the front yard".
How much he loved all of our many animals, looking for lost ones, and finding the dead ones. How much he loved scotch, and not in an alcoholic way, put in the way a connoisseur loves it. How much he LOVED Cape Cod, and happy hour with the family. How much he hated George Bush, and how he still voted in 2006 even though he couldn't walk, and was in immense pain, he still went to vote. His funny laugh, when if he really got going , he would kinda giggle in such a peculiar way. How much he loved astronomy and his telescope, and the hours in the cold he spent in his little observatory. What a genius he was with computers and technology. How he couldn't draw or spell to save his life. How bad his handwriting was, so that even he couldn't read it. How much he loved the Patriots, and thank fucking god they won a few superbowls before he died. How he was full of what I like to call 'dadisms', including:
"exactly"
"it is what it is"
"negative"
"affirmative" (always confused the waitresses)
"not bad, yourself"
"shitski" (Russian for shit)
and so much more.
I miss him every day, and after almost two years of him gone, I wonder if I will ever get used to it.
Friday, June 15, 2007
My Father
My brother and I arrive at the hospital.
The emergency room receptionist fails to realize our rush. I have urges to punch her, dash past her into the emergency room, and cry hystericly, all at the same time. After an eternity she gives us his room number.
Kathleen is standing next to my Dad's bed looking as she has just finished crying. Duncan gives her a hug. Dad is writhing in the bed, in obvious pain. I take my place at his side, opposite of Kathleen and Duncan.
For some reason, Dad decides he needs to sit up and get out of the bed. In his drugged and morphined state he tells me to grab his arm. I humor him and take his arm, pulling slightly, hoping he will abandon the idea. He's with it enough to know, I'm makeing a lame ass effort and calls me on it. "Sara, pull harder!" he yells, "harder!"
I look around me for help, not sure what to do. He obviously can't get up, he hasn't walked in over a month, he can't even support his weight. I few days ago I watched as to firefighters made that verry assumption and dropped him on the floor. God that was aweful to watch, that scream still haunts my dreams. I wanted to fucking rip their heads off for doing that.
"HARDER" my dad screams at me, I look at the nurse helplessly, I don't want to help him up, but I don't want to say no to a dieing man.
I start to cry, which makes my Dad more mad. "Sara, why are you crying?!"
A nurse takes mercy on me and leads me from the room. She gives me a big motherly hug outside the door. "He doesn't know whats going on honey" she says, "It's the morphine, it makes them hallucenate, and say things they don't mean. My daddy died a few months ago, I know how it is. The best thing you can do is hold his hand and be there. Its going to be ok"
The emergency room receptionist fails to realize our rush. I have urges to punch her, dash past her into the emergency room, and cry hystericly, all at the same time. After an eternity she gives us his room number.
Kathleen is standing next to my Dad's bed looking as she has just finished crying. Duncan gives her a hug. Dad is writhing in the bed, in obvious pain. I take my place at his side, opposite of Kathleen and Duncan.
For some reason, Dad decides he needs to sit up and get out of the bed. In his drugged and morphined state he tells me to grab his arm. I humor him and take his arm, pulling slightly, hoping he will abandon the idea. He's with it enough to know, I'm makeing a lame ass effort and calls me on it. "Sara, pull harder!" he yells, "harder!"
I look around me for help, not sure what to do. He obviously can't get up, he hasn't walked in over a month, he can't even support his weight. I few days ago I watched as to firefighters made that verry assumption and dropped him on the floor. God that was aweful to watch, that scream still haunts my dreams. I wanted to fucking rip their heads off for doing that.
"HARDER" my dad screams at me, I look at the nurse helplessly, I don't want to help him up, but I don't want to say no to a dieing man.
I start to cry, which makes my Dad more mad. "Sara, why are you crying?!"
A nurse takes mercy on me and leads me from the room. She gives me a big motherly hug outside the door. "He doesn't know whats going on honey" she says, "It's the morphine, it makes them hallucenate, and say things they don't mean. My daddy died a few months ago, I know how it is. The best thing you can do is hold his hand and be there. Its going to be ok"
Sunday, April 29, 2007
my father
It has taken me awhile to return to my post. But here it goes...
As I drove to my brother's high school, I called my sister.
I didn't want her to panic when my son was with her, so I thought about what I was going to tell her. I went into Get Things Done Mode.
"Emily, this is what I need you to do," I laid out my plan of action to her step by step.
"Get dressed, then put Devyn in the car with his backpack. I need you to take him over to mom's house. Don't rush, you have enough time. Then you need to come over to the hospital. Today is the day."
"Will I get there in enough time?" she asked, close to tears but still managing to hold it together.
"I think so, I'm on my way to pick up Duncan right now. We'll be getting to the hospital probably around the same time. Don't forget to drop off the car booster seat with Devyn, so mom can take him to Kindergarten."
Devyn was blissfully ignorant to what was going on. In his 5 year old brain he knew his grandpa was sick, and probably going to die, but didn't know what death was. It was what happened to bad guys on cartoons, and as we all know bad guys don't stay dead on cartoons. He had no idea of the chaos that was swirling around him.
Then I called my father's twin brother, my Uncle Bob.
He answered after the first ring. I remember exactly what I said to him
"Uncle Bob? It's Sara, You need to come up to (the town dad lived) today."
There was a brief silence. "Is everything OK?" he breathed.
"I think today is The Day."
"I'm leaving now."
Next I called the High School. I told the woman who answered the phone that I needed to pull my brother out of class and that I was on my way over. Immediately she was suspicious, as is her nature as a high school official.
"For what reason?" she asked.
"We have a family emergency, his father is about to die and he needs to come to the hospital immediately." I said those words so calmly, but I was shaking. I have a knack of staying calm in all sorts of emergencies, but as soon as that responsibility is off my shoulders and someone else takes over, I pretty much fall apart. I was safe for now. I had things I had to do.
There was silence on the other end of the phone.
"What do we tell him when we pull him from class?" she whispered
"You don't need to tell him anything," I said, "he'll know whats going on as soon as you walk into class."
Duncan was a smart kid, really a genius. When he was a toddler, he didn't say much. We all thought he was a bit behind in the talking department. Then one day he just talked. In full sentences. Pretty much from that day on we knew there was something special about them. That and he never shut up from that day on.
I waited in the foyer of the high school.
The assistant principle escorted him from his class, and ass he approached I could see the worry on my brother's face.
"He's not dead", I blurted at him, "but we have to hurry."
The assistant principle looked uncomfortable, "let me know if you need anything Duncan"
We rushed to the hospital, while I filled Duncan in on the mornings events. When I was done, he told me he couldn't stop shaking. My dad and Duncan were like best friends, they did everything together. I'm sure in his mind he never really believed this day could come, that his dad would die.
As I drove to my brother's high school, I called my sister.
I didn't want her to panic when my son was with her, so I thought about what I was going to tell her. I went into Get Things Done Mode.
"Emily, this is what I need you to do," I laid out my plan of action to her step by step.
"Get dressed, then put Devyn in the car with his backpack. I need you to take him over to mom's house. Don't rush, you have enough time. Then you need to come over to the hospital. Today is the day."
"Will I get there in enough time?" she asked, close to tears but still managing to hold it together.
"I think so, I'm on my way to pick up Duncan right now. We'll be getting to the hospital probably around the same time. Don't forget to drop off the car booster seat with Devyn, so mom can take him to Kindergarten."
Devyn was blissfully ignorant to what was going on. In his 5 year old brain he knew his grandpa was sick, and probably going to die, but didn't know what death was. It was what happened to bad guys on cartoons, and as we all know bad guys don't stay dead on cartoons. He had no idea of the chaos that was swirling around him.
Then I called my father's twin brother, my Uncle Bob.
He answered after the first ring. I remember exactly what I said to him
"Uncle Bob? It's Sara, You need to come up to (the town dad lived) today."
There was a brief silence. "Is everything OK?" he breathed.
"I think today is The Day."
"I'm leaving now."
Next I called the High School. I told the woman who answered the phone that I needed to pull my brother out of class and that I was on my way over. Immediately she was suspicious, as is her nature as a high school official.
"For what reason?" she asked.
"We have a family emergency, his father is about to die and he needs to come to the hospital immediately." I said those words so calmly, but I was shaking. I have a knack of staying calm in all sorts of emergencies, but as soon as that responsibility is off my shoulders and someone else takes over, I pretty much fall apart. I was safe for now. I had things I had to do.
There was silence on the other end of the phone.
"What do we tell him when we pull him from class?" she whispered
"You don't need to tell him anything," I said, "he'll know whats going on as soon as you walk into class."
Duncan was a smart kid, really a genius. When he was a toddler, he didn't say much. We all thought he was a bit behind in the talking department. Then one day he just talked. In full sentences. Pretty much from that day on we knew there was something special about them. That and he never shut up from that day on.
I waited in the foyer of the high school.
The assistant principle escorted him from his class, and ass he approached I could see the worry on my brother's face.
"He's not dead", I blurted at him, "but we have to hurry."
The assistant principle looked uncomfortable, "let me know if you need anything Duncan"
We rushed to the hospital, while I filled Duncan in on the mornings events. When I was done, he told me he couldn't stop shaking. My dad and Duncan were like best friends, they did everything together. I'm sure in his mind he never really believed this day could come, that his dad would die.
Tuesday, January 09, 2007
My Father
Its been awhile.
A ton of things have happened since I last posted. For one, my father passed away. He died in a such a horrible way, something I would not wish on my worst enemy.
Late spring we found out that Dad had Multiple Myeloma, a cancer of the blood & marrow. We were hopeful because there seemed a good chance he could pull through and go into remission. So he started chemo. After some time passed he got a bone marrow test to see if the chemo was having any effect. I don't know if any of you have had, or know someone who had, a bone marrow draw but it is extremely painful. My poor father went through many of these to see how his cancer was progressing, and like most guys didn't complain, but I could tell by the way he looked and sat that it really bothered him. When he got his test back he found that the cancer had spread to 80% of his body. That was bad.
So he started a new round of chemo, but this time it was with a new drug, one with really promising results.
Only Dad got worse.
Sometime around mid October things went downhill quickly. He started bleeding internally from all the anti-clotting drugs he was taking for a previous blood clot in his lung. My 16 year old brother had to call 911 to get him to a hospital. The end result made Dad unable to walk from that point on. He managed to get around for awhile on his rolling desk chair, scooting with his feet or being pushed.
The 4th or so bone marrow test in early November confirmed that not only did he have Leukemia as well as Multiple Myeloma but he had about 2-4 weeks to live. By this time he was completely bed bound, a hospital bed was placed in his living room. I immediately took time off from work to be with him, as did my sister Emily. My little brother Duncan still went to High School everyday, even when he knew that he could have stayed home as well. The twins Annie and Hillary did the same with college. I think that they just wanted some normalcy in their lives and it freaked them out that dad was going to die.
People told me and Em that we were wonderful for helping our Dad out in his time of need, but I can't even imagine not doing it. He was completely reliant on us for feeding him, helping him go the bathroom, massaging him, rolling him, washing him, getting him drinks, and other odd jobs. Including the time I drove an hour away to get clementines, because he was craving them. I couldn't find any peaches though, they weren't in season yet. God, you have no idea how upset I was that I couldn't find peaches for him.
He was in immense pain. More pain than I can ever imagine. They had him on so many pain meds, Oxycontin, Diluden, and so many others. He didn't like taking them because they made him groggy and sometimes hallucinate. But near the end it was so bad, he stopped fighting it and just took him.
He was to start hospice on a Friday, because his last appointment was on a Thursday, and Hospice will not kick in until you stop all treatment. He wanted to be 'topped off' with a blood transfusion and some platelets on his last appointment, which always made him feel better. So this last appointment was very important to him, it meant possibly more time with his family.
That Thursday morning, I drove over to his house with my son to drive him to his appointment. My sister Emily informed me he had a rough night, and was breathing badly. He sounded awful. His friend Carl was also their to help us get him into the car. Carl was a big, strong guy, and I don't know what we would have done without him. Their was no way me, my sister em or my step mom Kathleen could lift him. He was pretty much dead weight at this point.
Carl got him into my car and me, Dad and Kathleen drove to the clinic, while Em stayed with my son and relaxed a little. She had slept on the couch every night next to Dad those two weeks, helping with every little detail. So when I came over, she was relieved for a bit of the 24 hour care that my Dad needed.
When we wheeled Dad into the clinic, the other chemo patients looked a bit frightened of Dad. I look back now and can see what they must of saw: A man struggling to breathe, bare chested because it was too painful for my dads arms to be moved into a shirt, with no mobility whatsoever, in a drugged state, in the last stages of an obviously deadly cancer. It must have scared the bejesus out of them. This could be their future.
The nurses immediately took notice of Dad. They hovered around dad, trying to make him comfortable, as one of them rushed out of the room to get the doctor.
When the doctor showed up, he told my dad that he couldn't get the transfusions, he was too sick. My Dad, as out of it as he was, looked visibly dejected. Then, for reasons unknown to me to this day, the Doctor bent down and looked into my dads eyes and told him that this was probably the day he was going to die. I look back at this, and ask myself why did he have to say that? That was cruel thing to say to my father. At that moment I saw my father loose all hope.
The doctor then turned to me, Kathleen and poor Carl that he needed to go to a Hospital asap. I asked if we could take him back home so he could die there, where he wanted. The Doctor advised us against it, saying he could die on the way home. An ambulance was called.
I rushed over to the High School to get my brother.
A ton of things have happened since I last posted. For one, my father passed away. He died in a such a horrible way, something I would not wish on my worst enemy.
Late spring we found out that Dad had Multiple Myeloma, a cancer of the blood & marrow. We were hopeful because there seemed a good chance he could pull through and go into remission. So he started chemo. After some time passed he got a bone marrow test to see if the chemo was having any effect. I don't know if any of you have had, or know someone who had, a bone marrow draw but it is extremely painful. My poor father went through many of these to see how his cancer was progressing, and like most guys didn't complain, but I could tell by the way he looked and sat that it really bothered him. When he got his test back he found that the cancer had spread to 80% of his body. That was bad.
So he started a new round of chemo, but this time it was with a new drug, one with really promising results.
Only Dad got worse.
Sometime around mid October things went downhill quickly. He started bleeding internally from all the anti-clotting drugs he was taking for a previous blood clot in his lung. My 16 year old brother had to call 911 to get him to a hospital. The end result made Dad unable to walk from that point on. He managed to get around for awhile on his rolling desk chair, scooting with his feet or being pushed.
The 4th or so bone marrow test in early November confirmed that not only did he have Leukemia as well as Multiple Myeloma but he had about 2-4 weeks to live. By this time he was completely bed bound, a hospital bed was placed in his living room. I immediately took time off from work to be with him, as did my sister Emily. My little brother Duncan still went to High School everyday, even when he knew that he could have stayed home as well. The twins Annie and Hillary did the same with college. I think that they just wanted some normalcy in their lives and it freaked them out that dad was going to die.
People told me and Em that we were wonderful for helping our Dad out in his time of need, but I can't even imagine not doing it. He was completely reliant on us for feeding him, helping him go the bathroom, massaging him, rolling him, washing him, getting him drinks, and other odd jobs. Including the time I drove an hour away to get clementines, because he was craving them. I couldn't find any peaches though, they weren't in season yet. God, you have no idea how upset I was that I couldn't find peaches for him.
He was in immense pain. More pain than I can ever imagine. They had him on so many pain meds, Oxycontin, Diluden, and so many others. He didn't like taking them because they made him groggy and sometimes hallucinate. But near the end it was so bad, he stopped fighting it and just took him.
He was to start hospice on a Friday, because his last appointment was on a Thursday, and Hospice will not kick in until you stop all treatment. He wanted to be 'topped off' with a blood transfusion and some platelets on his last appointment, which always made him feel better. So this last appointment was very important to him, it meant possibly more time with his family.
That Thursday morning, I drove over to his house with my son to drive him to his appointment. My sister Emily informed me he had a rough night, and was breathing badly. He sounded awful. His friend Carl was also their to help us get him into the car. Carl was a big, strong guy, and I don't know what we would have done without him. Their was no way me, my sister em or my step mom Kathleen could lift him. He was pretty much dead weight at this point.
Carl got him into my car and me, Dad and Kathleen drove to the clinic, while Em stayed with my son and relaxed a little. She had slept on the couch every night next to Dad those two weeks, helping with every little detail. So when I came over, she was relieved for a bit of the 24 hour care that my Dad needed.
When we wheeled Dad into the clinic, the other chemo patients looked a bit frightened of Dad. I look back now and can see what they must of saw: A man struggling to breathe, bare chested because it was too painful for my dads arms to be moved into a shirt, with no mobility whatsoever, in a drugged state, in the last stages of an obviously deadly cancer. It must have scared the bejesus out of them. This could be their future.
The nurses immediately took notice of Dad. They hovered around dad, trying to make him comfortable, as one of them rushed out of the room to get the doctor.
When the doctor showed up, he told my dad that he couldn't get the transfusions, he was too sick. My Dad, as out of it as he was, looked visibly dejected. Then, for reasons unknown to me to this day, the Doctor bent down and looked into my dads eyes and told him that this was probably the day he was going to die. I look back at this, and ask myself why did he have to say that? That was cruel thing to say to my father. At that moment I saw my father loose all hope.
The doctor then turned to me, Kathleen and poor Carl that he needed to go to a Hospital asap. I asked if we could take him back home so he could die there, where he wanted. The Doctor advised us against it, saying he could die on the way home. An ambulance was called.
I rushed over to the High School to get my brother.
Friday, October 06, 2006
More spooky stories
So you might of thought that wasn't really a ghost story, that was some sort of coincidence. Maybe I've been watching 'Lost' too much, but I don't believe in coincidences. Something similar happened to me while I was a teenager, a premonition that came out of nowhere, and more importantly, in front of a large group of people.
It was my senior year in high school, around 1991, probably the early fall because it was still relatively warm out. At the time my parents were separated, and my father lived at home with my sister and I. He was out of town for some reason that night, and we decided to get some friends together and drop some acid. (mom if your reading this, don't worry I haven't done it sense at least 95, at an amusement park in RI at the best rave of my life. Another story entirely...)
So someone scored some acid, and a bunch of us, probably around 10, kicked back and let the good times roll, so to speak. At some point we ended up on the roof of our family room, it was accessible by my sisters bedroom window and only one story. Were we lived in New Hampshire there were no big cities or even towns nearby that would add any light interference in the sky, so star gazing at night was amazing. Fucking amazing on acid. We laid up there looking at the stars for what seemed like forever, and had a few cliche conversations about the meaning of life, how small we are in the universe, and even a crazy argument about how our world might even be inside many, many other bigger worlds. But it was beautiful. And dark. We lived on a dead end street and next to a swampy conservation land, the only other light around was from our neighbor's front porch, which was a ways away, and if that was shut off we would only have the moon and stars to light our way. It made you feel, looking up at the stars laying on that roof, that you were floating.
At one point everyone had been quiet for awhile, and a few people had gone inside to use the bathroom. They had been gone awhile, no doubt entranced by the cat or maybe the wallpaper in emily's room, and who knows if we'd even see them again that night. Everybody had stopped talking on the roof , so you could hear everything from the crickets to the beavers slapping their tails on the water nearby. It was in this quiet that I heard this humongus crash that brought me up to an immediate sitting position. "What the fuck was that?!" I yelled.
Someone asked me what the fuck I was talking about. "That big crash sound!"
Everybody just looked at me with that 'WTF are you talking about' look.
Then it happened
For real.
A huge crash came from Emily's room. And everybody looked at me again.
"Did you hear that?" I asked, somewhat hesitantly.
I'll never forget what happened next. This kid named Rich Clivieo (I spelled his last name phonetically, cuz I have no idea how it's spelled), who was the local cheapskate pot dealer, looked at me with the most freaked out expression and said, "your a witch!" and scrambled away from me as far as he could on the roof.
Just then someone poked their head out of Emily's room and apologized for nocking a shelf off the wall that held every bit of ceramic art she had created in High School. Most had survived, but some did not.
For the rest of our trip, everybody gave me these odd looks, as if they weren't sure of what I would do next.
Anytime I saw Rich after that, he always referred to me as the "witch".
It was my senior year in high school, around 1991, probably the early fall because it was still relatively warm out. At the time my parents were separated, and my father lived at home with my sister and I. He was out of town for some reason that night, and we decided to get some friends together and drop some acid. (mom if your reading this, don't worry I haven't done it sense at least 95, at an amusement park in RI at the best rave of my life. Another story entirely...)
So someone scored some acid, and a bunch of us, probably around 10, kicked back and let the good times roll, so to speak. At some point we ended up on the roof of our family room, it was accessible by my sisters bedroom window and only one story. Were we lived in New Hampshire there were no big cities or even towns nearby that would add any light interference in the sky, so star gazing at night was amazing. Fucking amazing on acid. We laid up there looking at the stars for what seemed like forever, and had a few cliche conversations about the meaning of life, how small we are in the universe, and even a crazy argument about how our world might even be inside many, many other bigger worlds. But it was beautiful. And dark. We lived on a dead end street and next to a swampy conservation land, the only other light around was from our neighbor's front porch, which was a ways away, and if that was shut off we would only have the moon and stars to light our way. It made you feel, looking up at the stars laying on that roof, that you were floating.
At one point everyone had been quiet for awhile, and a few people had gone inside to use the bathroom. They had been gone awhile, no doubt entranced by the cat or maybe the wallpaper in emily's room, and who knows if we'd even see them again that night. Everybody had stopped talking on the roof , so you could hear everything from the crickets to the beavers slapping their tails on the water nearby. It was in this quiet that I heard this humongus crash that brought me up to an immediate sitting position. "What the fuck was that?!" I yelled.
Someone asked me what the fuck I was talking about. "That big crash sound!"
Everybody just looked at me with that 'WTF are you talking about' look.
Then it happened
For real.
A huge crash came from Emily's room. And everybody looked at me again.
"Did you hear that?" I asked, somewhat hesitantly.
I'll never forget what happened next. This kid named Rich Clivieo (I spelled his last name phonetically, cuz I have no idea how it's spelled), who was the local cheapskate pot dealer, looked at me with the most freaked out expression and said, "your a witch!" and scrambled away from me as far as he could on the roof.
Just then someone poked their head out of Emily's room and apologized for nocking a shelf off the wall that held every bit of ceramic art she had created in High School. Most had survived, but some did not.
For the rest of our trip, everybody gave me these odd looks, as if they weren't sure of what I would do next.
Anytime I saw Rich after that, he always referred to me as the "witch".
Thursday, October 05, 2006
It's Halloween time!
In honor of my favorite blogger, I thought I would share one of my many ghost stories...
Way back in 2000, I lived in an extremely small apartment in the Jamaica Plain area of Boston with my then boyfriend, and future husband, Chris. We lived across from Forrest Hill Station, which was the last stop on the Orange line. At the end of our street, there was the most beautiful graveyard that I have ever seen, Forrest Hills cemetery. It was filled with wonderful works of art and the most wondrous mausoleums I have ever laid eyes on. Sometimes they even have Art installations there, with all sorts of crazy sculptures and odd formations of objects. One time they had all these billowly dresses hanging from trees, god that was creepy thing to do in a graveyard, even looking at it in the day light.
At it's center there was a small man made pond that swans floated around serenely in, while huge packs of geese milled around it's edges, just waiting for some poor fool to pull anything edible from his pockets. You don't ever want to experience a riot of geese attacking you for your misguided attempt at charity, by feeding some birds with some old, leftover, stale bread. If your smart you'll throw the bread one way and run the other. But that is another story...
Anyways, one night in spring of 2000, I was woken up by Chris from dream. It was a really fucked up dream, consisting of a friend of mine named Renee. Now I had lost touch with Renee in the mid 1990's while I was still in Art School, I'd see her every once in a while, modeling at my school for cash, or around Allston. She started hanging with a more coke and heroin kind of crowd, and I was never into that so we lost touch. We were never super close but had some pretty fun times in High School, getting stoned and drinking. Chris actually dated her for a while.
She eventually overdosed, on a speedball it was rumored, and lapsed into a coma. I think I found out a good couple a months after this had happened, from a friend of a friend. We all in the back of our minds new something like this would happen eventually, she was a risk taker and was extremely unhappy girl. She had a hard life growing up, and she was one of those people who tried to dull the pain with drugs. I never visited her at the nursing home, but some of my friends did , they found it hard to see her like that.
The story gets worse. At some point the hospital orderly starts to rape her secretly, and repeatedly, for months. Eventually she gets pregnant and by the time the doctors find out, she gives birth 4 days later to a brain damaged baby girl. Eventually they catch the orderly with DNA and he's sentenced to 10 years in prison.
Now back to my dream. Renee appears in it, and is fully conscious, telling me "I'm awake, I'm going to be OK" over and over. I feel unbelievably happy and she is smiling at me, dressed in the old hippie clothes she used to wear when we were teenagers. Chris wakes me up, saying I was crying in my sleep. I tell him that I just had this great dream that Renee has woken up from her coma, "wouldn't it be great if this was some sort of premonition, and she wakes up?" I tell him. But Chris seems wierded out, "you were crying pretty loud", and this is from the guy who didn't even wake up when the homeless guy under our porch decided to yell anti-Semitic remarks at his cans at 2am.
The next day Chris' best friend John visits us, and because he knows her and I cant get it out of my head, I tell him about the dream. We all kind of laugh about it and move on to other topics. Sometime later that week, I get a phonecall. Its my friend Ade, "Sara, I've got some bad news for you. I just found out Renee has died."
immediately I ask her when. That's when she tells me that she died that night I had that dream.
I tell her about it, and get that funny response from people that don't believe in that shit, or don't want to believe.
I tell Chris what just happened, and he and I have a WTF moment together. Now I know why it was a happy dream and why I was crying.
Way back in 2000, I lived in an extremely small apartment in the Jamaica Plain area of Boston with my then boyfriend, and future husband, Chris. We lived across from Forrest Hill Station, which was the last stop on the Orange line. At the end of our street, there was the most beautiful graveyard that I have ever seen, Forrest Hills cemetery. It was filled with wonderful works of art and the most wondrous mausoleums I have ever laid eyes on. Sometimes they even have Art installations there, with all sorts of crazy sculptures and odd formations of objects. One time they had all these billowly dresses hanging from trees, god that was creepy thing to do in a graveyard, even looking at it in the day light.
At it's center there was a small man made pond that swans floated around serenely in, while huge packs of geese milled around it's edges, just waiting for some poor fool to pull anything edible from his pockets. You don't ever want to experience a riot of geese attacking you for your misguided attempt at charity, by feeding some birds with some old, leftover, stale bread. If your smart you'll throw the bread one way and run the other. But that is another story...
Anyways, one night in spring of 2000, I was woken up by Chris from dream. It was a really fucked up dream, consisting of a friend of mine named Renee. Now I had lost touch with Renee in the mid 1990's while I was still in Art School, I'd see her every once in a while, modeling at my school for cash, or around Allston. She started hanging with a more coke and heroin kind of crowd, and I was never into that so we lost touch. We were never super close but had some pretty fun times in High School, getting stoned and drinking. Chris actually dated her for a while.
She eventually overdosed, on a speedball it was rumored, and lapsed into a coma. I think I found out a good couple a months after this had happened, from a friend of a friend. We all in the back of our minds new something like this would happen eventually, she was a risk taker and was extremely unhappy girl. She had a hard life growing up, and she was one of those people who tried to dull the pain with drugs. I never visited her at the nursing home, but some of my friends did , they found it hard to see her like that.
The story gets worse. At some point the hospital orderly starts to rape her secretly, and repeatedly, for months. Eventually she gets pregnant and by the time the doctors find out, she gives birth 4 days later to a brain damaged baby girl. Eventually they catch the orderly with DNA and he's sentenced to 10 years in prison.
Now back to my dream. Renee appears in it, and is fully conscious, telling me "I'm awake, I'm going to be OK" over and over. I feel unbelievably happy and she is smiling at me, dressed in the old hippie clothes she used to wear when we were teenagers. Chris wakes me up, saying I was crying in my sleep. I tell him that I just had this great dream that Renee has woken up from her coma, "wouldn't it be great if this was some sort of premonition, and she wakes up?" I tell him. But Chris seems wierded out, "you were crying pretty loud", and this is from the guy who didn't even wake up when the homeless guy under our porch decided to yell anti-Semitic remarks at his cans at 2am.
The next day Chris' best friend John visits us, and because he knows her and I cant get it out of my head, I tell him about the dream. We all kind of laugh about it and move on to other topics. Sometime later that week, I get a phonecall. Its my friend Ade, "Sara, I've got some bad news for you. I just found out Renee has died."
immediately I ask her when. That's when she tells me that she died that night I had that dream.
I tell her about it, and get that funny response from people that don't believe in that shit, or don't want to believe.
I tell Chris what just happened, and he and I have a WTF moment together. Now I know why it was a happy dream and why I was crying.
Tuesday, July 04, 2006
Nerds fixin' things
Check out my sweetie with his hands all over my pipes! Not those pipes, you perve! The bathroom pipes. Look at how hott he looks in those safety glasses. He was asking me to hold the pipe but I had better ideas, I held the camera instead. Look at how gross our old floor is! Ewe! I 'm soo glad we covered that up with tile.
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