Things they don’t tell you in books about grief, but probably should, according to me.

(NOTE:  This is really more of a “rant” than a “post”, but, frankly, this is all I’ve got today and technically it qualifies as “writing” [according to me] so, ummm, here goes.)

Here’s the thing.

I’ve read a lot of books on grief and grieving.

Some of them are helpful, others are not.

They all mention “denial” and “coming to terms with the reality of death”-type stuff, but they don’t seem to really capture just how fucked up it is to wrap your head around the fact that someone who was HERE is now NOT HERE and, moreover, will never be HERE again.

We all think we know what “death” means.  I mean, everyone knows this basic fact of life, right?  And then it happens and you’re all “what?”.

Or, if you’re like me, it’s more like this:

“WHAT THE FUCK JUST HAPPENED!?”

and

“No no no no no nononononooooooooooooo”

and

“Wait, did that seriously just happen?”

and

“No. No, it didn’t.”

and

“OH FUCK, IT DID REALLY HAPPEN?”

and

“Why are these people just going about their daily lives like nothing has happened?  Don’t they KNOW?  WTF?  Why are the banks even open?”

and

“Now what?”

and

“I’m just supposed to keep living?” 

and

“IS THIS SOME KIND OF SICK JOKE!?”

and

“FUCK.”

and

“OMG I can’t wait to tell  [insert dead person’s name] about this bullshit.”

and

“Oh.”

and

“Oh. My. God.  That picture just fell off the wall…. is [insert dead person’s name] trying to tell me something?!  What?  WHAT?  I DON’T SPEAK DEAD PEOPLE LANGUAGE, DAMMIT!”

and

“Ok, I’m a little creeped out that [insert dead person’s name] is probably here, right now.  Does he/she watch me on the toilet?”

and

“Maybe [insert dead person’s name] is not, in fact, dead.  Maybe he/she is just hiding….”

and

“Fuck.”

and

“Oh look, it’s Dead Person X’s favorite movie….(happy/sad moment) and there’s Dead Person Y’s car and here’s Dead Person Z’s favorite restaurant/song/shoes/tree/flower/beverage and on and on and on and on”

and

“THIS ISN’T FUNNY ANYMORE.  MAKE IT STOP!”

and

“Fuck me.”

and

“What does death even mean?”

and

“I’m scared to die.”

and

“How could [insert dead person’s name] leave now?  We weren’t done yet.  There’s so much more.  And what about [insert every single thing you thought you were going to have time to share with the person who is now, evidently, dead]”

and

“I STRENUOUSLY OBJECT TO THIS BULLSHIT, GOD!”

and

“If one more person tells me that [insert dead person’s name] is in a “better place” now I will, in fact, become violent.  WHO THE FUCK CARES ABOUT [insert dead person’s name]?  OF COURSE HE/SHE IS IN A BETTER PLACE, I’M CRYING FOR ME, ASSHOLES…. WHAT ABOUT ME?  I’M SURE AS FUCK NOT IN A “BETTER PLACE” NOW.”

and

“I am officially the most selfish person in the entire world, and possibly the entire Universe.”

and

“If I had been a better person, this might not be happening.”

and

“Fuck.”

and

“I’m going to be a much better person now….”

and

“OMG, [insert dead person’s name] would shit if he/she saw how dirty my car is right now!”

and

“What if I forget what [insert dead person’s name] looks like?  What if I forget the sound of his/her voice?  His/her laugh.  The way he/she walked?  What then?”

and

“Oh fuck.  I almost went a whole day without remembering that [insert dead person’s name] is gone.”

and

“I’m pretty sure this is just a bad dream.”

and

“WHAT THE FUCK JUST HAPPENED?”

***********

And it goes on like this for quite some time.

Around and around — I believe it happened and then I don’t believe it happened and then I actually forget about it for a while and then something reminds me and the grief is fresh again and it’s as if I’ve never felt it before.

I know that it ends at some point.

My Dad died in his sleep 15 years ago and I’ve recently realized that I’m no longer surprised when I remember that he’s gone.  It still hurts.  I miss him all the time.  But I  am finally resigned to the fact that he is gone.

Not so with my sweet grandmothers and my artistic genius Mom (with great hair) — all of whom died in the last three years.

I find that I’m not at all convinced that they are truly gone.

And yes, I know that people you love are never truly gone because they live on in your heart and blah blah blah blah…..

But really, they are gone.

WHAT THE FUCK JUST HAPPENED!?

xoxoxo

kim

p.s.  YES, as a matter of fact, I am still taking my antidepressants 🙂

p.p.s.  have I mentioned that I’m struggling with writing?  aarrrrgggghhhhhhh!

When all else fails, write a list, right? Here are 32 mostly true things about me, right now.

I’m alive.

Is that true?  What if this is all an illusion?  What if I’m really in a coma?  Or in suspended animation on a spaceship on my way to Jupiter?  What if all this is just one second of one minute of a daydream that the “real” me is having?  What if I’m really a fruit fly?  Do fruit flies grieve the loss of their parents?  I’m a little speck of life on a big blue planet rolling through a vast universe.  In the big scheme of things, do I matter?  Does anyone?  Anything?  Are there other beings out there who pity me for the teensy tiny life I am granted?  Do they wonder if a little thing like me grieves the loss of her parents?  Do they wonder why I bother to do anything given the ridiculously short amount of time I’m allotted to “live” on this one lonely planet in space?  Maybe I’m an ant, in an antfarm, on a little boy’s dresser.  Maybe I’m his favorite ant.  Maybe he’s never noticed me.

Everything is relative, it turns out.

But I digress…..

What I meant to say is that “Hey, I’m still alive and I haven’t abandoned my blog, despite convincing evidence to the contrary!”

And I also meant to say that I’m having a ridiculously hard time sitting down and writing anything meaningful, interesting, or even coherent.

But I long for connection.

So here I am.

And here are 32 things that are mostly true about me, right now, in this moment:

1. I don’t like Mondays.
2. Which is weird, since I don’t even have a job to dread going back to on Mondays.
3. I don’t like March.
4. I’ve never liked March.  In Colorado, March is the month that teases you into thinking the long, dark, cold days of winter are over and then slams you with a snowstorm from hell (or two) just so it can laugh at your naivete.  I’m not sure how I feel about March in Mexico yet.  So far it’s not my favorite.  The bright, sparkly high season is coming to a close which feels like a relief and also like sadness.
5. I miss my son.  I think this is the longest stretch of time that I haven’t laid eyes on him in his entire 19 years of existence.  I don’t like it.  I don’t care that he probably likes it, that it’s normal, that this is what happens when kids grow up and go away to college.  I don’t like it.  It’s not fair.  When will this feel ok?  I think NEVER….
6. I hate this cheap computer.  Now the “r” key is sticking, which is uber-inconvenient.
7. I love my new salad spinner.  I don’t love that it cost, like, $30.00 and I had to go to 5 different stores in Cancun to find the very last one left on the shelf at Walmart.
8. Yes, there’s a Walmart in Cancun.  I know….
9. I’m annoyed with Sue, the pretend-buddha iguana.  He’s very inconsistent.  I think he’s just not that into me anymore.
10. I miss my Mom.
11. I’m thinking about learning how to make jewelry.
12. My Mom made amazing jewelry so, of course, I acted like I wasn’t interested in learning how to make it and then she died and now I’m all “What the fuck?  How do I not know how to make this cool jewelry?” and “What an asshat daughter I’ve been.”
13. I miss my car.  It’s a PT Cruiser convertible and it’s zippy, and I’m super-cute when I drive it (according to me…)
14. I’m not cute when I drive Mom’s old blazer here in Mexico.  The paint is completely trashed, the tires are usually flat and it makes a lot of weird noises.
15. I miss my  sassy virgo sister.  She always makes me laugh.  She makes me laugh on the phone, too, but it’s more fun in person.
16. I’m obsessed with the song “Somebody That I Used to Know” by Gotye.  It’s a catchy tune, but what I love about it is that it is true.  Sometimes people come into your life and suddenly your life revolves around them and you can’t imagine that you ever even had a life without them and then, eventually, they somehow become just someone that you used to know.  Everything changes.  It’s weird.
17. I’ve recently learned that there is such a thing as a “Pick-Up Artist” and there are books for men to learn how to become one of these things.  So, because I’m insanely curious about it, I’m reading one of these books.  I probably need to dedicate an entire blog post to this, but for now, let me just say that it’s (a) very interesting and oh-so-different from the books written about dating/relationships for women, and (b) somewhat insulting and (c) completely clear that I’ve totally been “Gamed” over the years.
18. Oh, I also read that “Fifty Shades of Grey” book that everyone is talking about.
19. It’s good, but I’ve read MUCH better erotica, FYI.  (Anne Rice, for one, is a master of the genre.)
20. I’m as shocked as every other wanna be author (and publisher) that this book is making such big waves.
21. Who knew the market was ripe for some light BDSM and lots of email flirtation?  Ummm, E L James, I guess…  You go girl!
22. My nerves are on edge because my neighbors (a) have a new baby who cries all the time and (b) have a 2-ish year old son who is totally unsupervised most of the time and when he’s not unsupervised, he is being spanked/beaten….with a belt.  And everyone gets in on it, including his brother who can’t be more than 8 years old… Oh hello to my issues re: my career in child welfare law and any kind of violence.  It’s horrible and it’s gotten to the point where I have decided that I’m going to at least go talk to someone at the Department of Families here in town.  I realize there are cultural differences and I know I’m super sensitive to this stuff, but I am concerned for these children and I couldn’t live with myself if I did nothing.
23. I haven’t decided whether I’m going to try to stay here in Puerto Morelos.
24. Which seems odd since I can’t imagine going anywhere else at this point.
25. Except to Ft. Collins, Colorado, because that is where my awesome Aunt (and related family members!) and my son are — but what would I do there?
26. What am I going to do here?
27. The truth is that I have tons of ideas of things to do here (or things that can be done from anywhere, so I could live in several places) but it seems that I have absolutely no motivation to make any of those things actually happen.
28. I’m working on trying to understand why I’m so lacking in motivation.
29. It’s not pretty and it’s part of why I’m having trouble writing.
30. Because then I would probably have to say out loud what is really going on.
31. And then I would probably need to get back into therapy ASAP.
32. Which would be better than being paralyzed and sitting on the fence, most likely.

xoxo

kim

p.s.  for those of you trying to live your lives vicariously through me (you know who you are!)  i’m sad to say that you’ve probably made the wrong choice….  there’s just not a lot of hot action around these parts, if you know what i mean!

p.p.s.  ok, here’s the deal, the nice man who i mentioned previously (a) was not all that interested after all, and (b) had to leave town.

p.p.p.s.  nonetheless the Moratorium is still OVER, so there’s that.  😉

When I woke up this morning I didn’t know who Joseph Kony was. Now I can’t unknow it.

A friend posted this video on her facebook wall this morning.

I was curious.

Thirty minutes later I was speechless, sad, afraid, outraged, sickened, heartbroken.

But mostly I was in awe at how much of a difference a few courageous people can make.

Joseph Kony and the LRA must be stopped.  I pray it happens soon.

Please watch the video and share it:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y4MnpzG5Sqc

xoxo

kim

I’m staring at the keyboard and it’s staring right back at me. It’s a motherfucking impasse y’all. Time to write about sex.

I’ve been staring at the keyboard for, ummm, hours.

And it’s been staring right back at me.

The keyboard is strongly suggesting that I “write something already”.

I’m politely suggesting that the keyboard can kiss my sweet ass.

It seems we have arrived at an impasse.

A stalemate.  A standstill.  A good old-fashioned standoff.

(Oh the drama…..)

Well.  We were at an impasse.  Then I decided that I wanted to write something.  And I decided that my decision to write something has nothing to do with the fact that the keyboard has been taunting me mercilessly.

Win/win.

(ha)

Oh alright.  The keyboard totally won.

Fuck.

Now what?

How about a list!

THINGS THAT I’M THINKING ABOUT RIGHT NOW THAT WOULD PROBABLY BE GOOD TO WRITE ABOUT IF I WERE MOTIVATED TO WRITE AN ACTUAL BLOG POST, WHICH I’M NOT.

1. I’m all twitterpated because the Moratorium is officially over and there’s a nice man here who might be a little bit sweet on me. (Note:  yes, Virginia, “twitterpated” is a real word, mostly.)
2. Is it just me or does being on a beach make everyone horny?
3. Honestly (as I’ve mentioned previously) it isn’t the beach, it’s the ocean.  And it isn’t just the ocean, it’s any body of water.
4. Rain also puts me in the mood.
5. Snow is also fun.
6. So there it is, all precipitation turns me on.
7. OMG am I having my sexual peak right now?
8. Oh, who am I kidding.  I’ve been having my peak since I was 17 16.  (One benefit of being an orphan at 47 is that you don’t have to pretend you didn’t mess around as a teenager.)(Not that my parents harbored any illusions that I was a sweet, demure girl.)(Plus I told them I was sleeping with my boyfriend at age 17, because I was POSITIVE we were going to get married.  Reasonable, right?)(That might have been the date of my Dad’s first heart attack… we will never know.)
9. Hmmmm, there seems to be a theme developing here…
10. Anyway.  So it’s fun to be twitterpated, but here’s the thing, I’m living in an episode of “The Bachelor”…  Seriously, there are about 10 American/Canadian women and 1000 Mexican women for every single, decent, person with a penis in this town. 
11. And this is a resort town. 
12. A small resort town.
13. So why would a guy who has his pick of hundreds of attractive, tan and horny women “settle down” with just one of them for any length of time?
14. Vacation romances are awesome, but what do you do when you live in the vacation spot and maybe want more than a vacation romance?
15. Not that there’s anything wrong with vacation romances.
16. I mean, 12 years ago I had the vacation romance to end all vacation romances.  My friends affectionately refer to it as my “vacation romance on steroids”.  It was awesome and, ultimately, a sad chapter in my life.  It probably should have just stayed a vacation romance.  On a lighter note, I would never have found Puerto Morelos without that vacation romance, so there.
17. I have no idea what I’m trying to say here.
18. Yes, I do.
19. Am I up for a vacation romance?
20. That is the question.
21. Probably!
22. That is the answer.
23. That Moratorium lasted a long time….
24. Here’s another thing:  When one is a blogger who talks about shit like “What if I told the truth on my Match.com profile?” and “I’m depressed and grieving and probably crazy“,  and “Oh yeah, I’m having a relationship with a pretend-Buddha iguana who doesn’t know I’m alive” — when exactly does one roll out the fact that they write a blog chock-full of intensely personal shit to a potential love interest?
25. Fuck!
26. Probably “never” is the right answer, which means “Right away!!” in “Kim’s world”…. 🙂
27. Also.
28. Probably not a great idea to brag (in a very public forum, i.e., your practically- internationally- famous blog) that you’re awesome at anything, much less fellatio.
29. Note to self:  Remember how it’s good to under-promise and over-perform?  Yeah.  This bragging thing is a problem, at least in theory. (wink-wink)(OMG there I go again!)(oh, for god’s sake, this is entertainment, yall.  not “the truth”.)(supposedly).
30. Jesus Christ, what have I done here today?

xoxoxo

kim

p.s.  all y’all are awesome.  thank you for your kind comments/notes on my last blog post.  i love the internet and you people who somehow found me and don’t mind that i say “fuck” a lot.

p.p.s.  my smarty-pants “English Teacher” cousin told me that “p.s.s.” isn’t even a thing.  it’s “p.p.s.” whatever.  🙂

p.p.p.s.  i still have no plan (no Plan A and no Plan B) but my tan is really coming along!

p.p.p.p.s.  please tell me i’m not the only one who says “twitterpated” (or thinks it?)