just a roller coaster...

today was a day filled with lots of wonderful things...

bloody mary's at the pub...

a day at the orchard...

presents from the gift whisperer...

amazing friends that make my stomach hurt from laughing so much...  corn and penis jokes...  music of mother jane...

but then everyone leaves and i think about how much i miss this smile...

and how this smile is a million miles away...

and this smile is a million miles away too...

and how this smile is leaving tomorrow...

and how this wonderful, amazing, kick ass woman is sick...

but then i get a text that says "you got good friends... family...  me to carry you"...

and i think about walking into this empty house that's not empty at all...

i have this face...

and this face...

and i can still hear the laughter and feel the love that has always and will always fill this house...

and i am home...

just watermelon...

people come and go...  some stay for only a short time...  some longer...  some never leave...  some leave and come back...  this is a story all about how (how many of you have the fresh prince of bel-air song in your head right now?) watermelon was in my life 10 years ago and has now resurfaced as heather...  we lived at applebee's...  kinda like we live at the pub now...  i'm sensing a pattern...  anyway - watermelon was one of our favorite servers...  she was our friend inside and outside of applebee's...  we loved our watermelon...  and we kind of knew that her real name was heather...  kind of...  this was before smart phones and facebook and all that other crap...  so however it happened - we stopped going to applebee's and watermelon stopped working there...  we lost touch with everyone that worked there...  i thought about trying to find her but how do you find someone named watermelon or heather when that's all you have to go on???  so imagine my surprise when, out on a friday night at the fest of ales, i get a friend request from heather kimberling...  staring at the tiny little profile pic on my phone thinking - heather kimberling...  why do i know that name???  is that???  no...  i'm sure it's not...  but it kinda looks like...  then i see the message attached...  OH MY GAW watermelon!!!!!  holy crap it's watermelon...  yes... Yes... YES i will be your friend...  look at her page - she's at the fest of ales... WHAT???  i'm here...  don't move...  i'll find you...  i was so excited i almost felt like the beggin strips dog...  a lot of things have changed over the past 10(ish) years...  her smile and laugh are exactly the same...  we both have changed and grown (i think)...  but we have remained true to who we are at our core...  heather has experienced the loss of her brother and father...  i have lost both of my parents...  i find great comfort in talking to someone who is not experiencing the exact same loss as i am but who knows exactly how i feel...  i have a tendency to wallow in my own self pity...  let life get me down and keep me down...  heather will have none of it...  that honky calls me on everything...  and yes watermelon - i just called you a honky...  no self pity when she's around...  pretty much what i'm trying to say, in my own long winded way is

heather - thanks for coming back into my life...  it's friends like you that make my heart happy and i love you oh so much...

for you and your sisters...

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it(anywhere
i go you go,my dear; and whatever is done
by only me is your doing,my darling)

 

i fear no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want
no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)
and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

 

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows
higher than the soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

 

i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)

 

- e. e. cummings ~

just found...

found in between some placemats while going through mom and dad's stuff...

your mother is always with you...  she's the whisper of the leaves as you walk down the street...  she's the smell of bleach in your freshly laundered socks...  she's the cool hand on your brow when you're not well...  your mother lives inside your laughter...  she's crystallized in every tear drop...  she's the place you came from...  she's your first home...  she's the map you follow with every step you take...  she's your first love...  she's your first heartbreak...  nothing on earth can separate you...  not time...  not space...  not even death...

just sometimes...

when i'm alone, all i want is to be surrounded by people...

when i'm surrounded by people, all i want is to be alone...

sometimes hearing a song, not any one in particular, can make me fall apart...

sometimes just a look or a pat on the back from a friend can throw me into a tailspin...

sometimes, when my stapler gets jammed, i throw it on the floor as hard as i can...

sometimes i say "every day's a school day" and smile at the thought of dad...

sometimes i tell the story of the hospital bringing in a little puerto rican baby instead of me and smile at the thought of mom...

sometimes i smile through my tears when i think about how lucky i was to have such amazing parents...  how every part of me is because of both of them...  although i'm sure each is taking credit for the good and blaming the other for the bad...

sometimes i fall to the floor in the living room and cry and cry and cry and cry because i can't believe that they are both gone...

but most of the time i fake my way through another day without either of them...

just big papa again...

on monday they figured out that it was fungal pneumonia and starting treating him for that...
they have bumped his oxygen intake up from 4 to 10...
his oxygen level dropped into the 50s last night...
they put him on the bi-pap for a while to get him leveled out...
they are giving him morphine to keep him calm and help his breathing because he get's freaked out when he can't breathe...
chest x-rays show no improvement...
they gave him a breathing treatment this afternoon when i was there and his oxygen level was in the mid 90s throughout and for about 20 minutes after that...
then his oxygen dropped to low 70s...
bumped his oxygen intake up from 10 to 15 and put a mask on him instead of just the nose tubes...

that's where we stand right now...

just nine...

it has been almost nine years...

i can't remember your laugh
i used to have it in my head
i could recall it whenever i needed to
but now
now it's gone

i can't remember your voice
i used to have it in my head
i could recall it whenever i needed to
but now
now it's gone

i can't remember your touch
i used to have it in my head
i could recall it whenever i needed to
but now
now it's gone

i am losing you all over again
you are fading away...

just big papa...

so here's the latest on dad...

on thursday they went into his lungs and pulled out some of the 'gunk' so they could test it and see what they are up against... he's been in the icu as a precaution since then... it'll take probably about 72 hours to get the results back... that puts the results coming in on sunday and we don't really think that's gonna happen... so hopefully on monday they'll be able to be more accurate with how they treat him...

he's coughing up a lot of nastiness... he's on oxygen but get's winded very easily... sometimes it's even hard for him to talk... so we're kind of in a holding pattern until they get the test results back...

i'll continue to do my best to keep everybody updated... thanks for all the positive energy coming dad's way...

if you feel like sending a card or email for dad, here's my info

136 ridgecrest road
lancaster, ky 40444

jbreier@statebeautysupplylex.com

i'll make sure he gets it...

much love