January 2024 can go fuck itself.

we released Rose from her suffering on December 30th.

we had gotten a full extra year with her and we savoured every second of it, but as the days ticked on it was becoming increasingly obvious that her health and quality of life were declining as rapidly as her belly was swelling from the fluid accumulating there. so, one last time, i fed her smoked salmon with her gabapentin and took her to the vet where i held her and stroked her softness for the last time as she went to meet up with Amy and mom.

it was the right choice, but i’ll forever miss her and question whether it was either too soon or too late. and, more importantly, if she understood it was because i loved her that i didn’t want her to ever suffer.

then, i experienced an unexpected mind-fuck: relief.

i hadn’t consciously recognized just how much stress i was under from the constant fears and worries about her and her health. would she be alive when i woke up or came home from work? how much pain is she in? was bringing home two other boy cats the thing that made her decline?

the duality of the emotions i was experiencing were intense. i was so sad and grief-stricken at the loss of the last of “my girls” (mom and Amy being the other two) yet… i could feel the weight of that prolonged worry and burden was lifted from my shoulders.

once i reconciled them in my brain a bit, i thought “okay, this is good. i can use this extra energy – direct it towards things i need to work on.”

then i received a phone call from my dad.

dad turned 90 on December 20th! we spent a lovely day together. i took him for a straight razor shave & haircut, then we spent several hours going through old photos and talking about his life and our memories, after which we went out to dinner to his most regular of regular spots. it was a good day. a great day, really. i left with a full heart, thankful to still have him in my life – especially since, for his age & life history, he’s in considerably good shape!

but, that phone call from my dad was him letting me know he was in the hospital and would probably be there for a few days. it wasn’t clear for a day or two after, but he caught Covid (for the second time – probably at Christmas dinner) and it had wreaked havoc on his already compromised heart & lungs. so much so that during his initial treatment after arriving by ambulance (which he called for himself) his heart stopped beating a couple of times i found out from his nurse when i asked about his status & treatment.

luckily, he got there in time. by the time i arrived at the hospital, an hour after i hung up the phone, he was already stable, if still having a lot of difficulty getting oxygen. he spent the week being pumped full of antibiotics, antiarrhythmic drugs and receiving supplemental oxygen. by the time he was released on friday – after our first winter storm of the season – he was feeling great!

he’s made a full recovery, but i think this episode has revealed a couple of things to him:

one – that he’s got fewer days ahead of him than behind. he’s become quite sentimental and reflective in the past couple of years. more expressive of his emotions and communicative of his life regrets.

two – that maybe there are some things he could do to help himself age even more comfortably at home. i’m hoping i won’t have to step in with the legal paperwork he gave me to force him to get some supplemental oxygen for the house, but we’ll see.

so, i no longer worry and fret about the health & happiness of my cat, i now worry and fret about the health & happiness of my father. well, it was a nice week without that weight. sure was.

next, January fucked us with that ice storm followed by a sixteen-inch dump of snow a week later. i couldn’t get to see dad because the roads weren’t in good enough condition and, as is well-documented, i just don’t drive in snow. so brad and i took transit to work for half a week (which fucked my already not-so-good knee, but was otherwise not unpleasant). by the way, serious shout outs to our badass lady bus drivers – they were fucking rock solid and, if i remember to, i’m absolutely going to write commendation letters about them. they deserve huge praise. our bus route is hilly and not well maintained in winter and they navigated it with aplomb.

then… i got Covid.

i’m so mad about it, too. almost four years! i dodged it by doing all the right things. avoiding my friends and public places and wearing masks (bought and made) and washing everything down with lysol. not going to see my mom often enough for the last two years of her life. letting my world get smaller as everyone else seemed to think it was fine to go out and socialize again.

i’m not sure if i got it at the hospital while visiting dad – the timing doesn’t quite line up – but, last wednesday i started getting a sore throat which only got worse as the day progressed, so i took a rapid test when i got home and, yup. there it was.

it’s not been a good time. i feel like i’ve had all the symptoms except loss of taste/smell (which, phew). i’m in that mid-better stage where i would normally go back to regular life a little too early and thereby prolong my healing. but, this is Covid and i’m not fucking with it. i’ve spent more than half of my conscious time wondering what kind of long-term damage this disease is causing in my body and how it’s going to show up later. i keep taking long, slow, deep breaths and doing head-to-toe body scans as if i could pick up on any cellular signals about future vascular impacts.

luckily, Brad is still healthy and testing negative. he’s been sleeping on the couch while i’ve been sequestered in our bedroom when he’s at home. we will both mask up to spend no more than an hour together watching a show in the evening before i go back upstairs for quarantine. it sucks. we miss hanging out. we can’t even eat our meals together.

then, today, on the last day of this cursed month, i woke up from a night full of scary, heartbreaking dreams and an unrelenting headache to my second completely bricked Google Pixel 3XL phone.

my first one lasted 852 days until it bricked itself. but, i loved the phone so much, i bought a new one to replace it and that one lasted 976.

fuuuuuuuuck!

i am absolutely blessed to have amazing friends with extra phones they are willing to lend me so i will have use of another pixel until i figure out what i’m going to do about replacing it. i just need to figure out if it’s currently better to spend the money on having my car disassembled to clean up my epic latte explosion mess (which is getting pretty fucking stinky, honestly) or get a new phone right away (and trying to figure out which one to get).

so, yeah. January 2024 can just sit and spin.

[i’m a day late, so i’m a 100% going to backdate this post to yesterday, fyi.]

welcome to my blog’s 23rd birthday!

i thought i shut it down in 2020, but then stuff happened and i needed a safe place to share. so, i came home to this wee blog. as i’ve been doing since august 10, 2000.

i don’t really have much to day today. as i’ve already written here, it’s been a really bad couple of years – personally – in addition to all the universal bad going on for everyone. not to mention specific bad personal stuff happening to people i care greatly for. i kinda hate that the blog’s become Bummer Central. it used to be so fun and creative and hilarious (if i do say so myself). that’s just not the way i’ve been feeling since march 2020, though, so i guess it tracks.

i’m trying to do things which will fix that, though. i am now seeing a therapist because everyone needs therapy. i got my money house in order last year and things are going very well with that. so, those are positive changes i’m pleased to report.

i’m still sad and grieving my loved ones.
i’m still constantly worried about Rose’s health.
the world is still a dumpster fire.

but… but!

i am loved beyond what i deserve by some of the most amazing people i have been blessed to welcome into my life. thank you, dear reader, for you are part of that group, whether i know you well or not. ♥

yesterday marked one year since the last time i hugged my mom.

last night, i dreamt that she held me as i peacefully died.

i don’t think those two things are unrelated.

i didn’t realize that particular anniversary was yesterday. i’ve been a little more focused on the looming anniversary of her death, if i’m honest. i remember being over to visit in early june last year, but i thought it has either passed or was still coming up. when i woke from my dream (see, you don’t die in real life if you die in your dream!) i could still feel her soft skin and squishy arms holding me as i told her i wished that people had thought i was funny with my last laboured breath.

so many people i know are losing their parents & close family members lately. i understand we’re in that age bracket now, but fuck. we’re all hip deep in death and grief and it’s just so much.

but, that’s not what i’m here to talk about. i’m here to remember my mom and her love for me and mine for her. that even though she’s gone, she’s still with me when i need her.

i miss her so much. i wish we’d had more time.

i find myself increasingly uncomfortable when people mention procreation.

i, myself, never wanted kids. when i hit 40, i briefly thought about having kids in only the most abstract “who will look after me when i’m old” way. my oldest friend and i joked that when we were 65 we’d co-adopt an 18-year-old to help us in our dotages. other than that, nope. no biological clock up in this bitch. i only ever wanted cats.

now, i’m a bonus mom to three kids. what? how did that happen?

but, recently, i find myself thinking – a lot – about how selfish and cruel it is to bring a child into the world we now live in. it feels like an act driven purely by ego. and don’t even get me started on people who have more than two kids. fuuuck. no. just don’t.

it’s dumb and emotional, but everything is fucked. why would you want to literally condemn your precious junk-puppets to a life worse than yours was? it seems counter-intuitive to me.

“but, you’ve never felt real love until you’ve had a child.”

bullshit. if you need to have a child in order to feel unconditional love for another human being then that’s an issue with YOUR ability to connect to someone who you don’t have a controlling interest in. who isn’t dependent on you. who literally can’t walk away if you do shitty stuff to them.

it just feels gross.

then i feel gross because these people making new humans are so happy. they’re excited by the possibilities when all i see are the hardships, complications and longer-term struggles both they, their children, and everything & everyone on the planet are going to face.

i’m finding myself in a state of being constantly bombarded by awful.

  • awful news about friends & family
  • awful news about politics
  • awful news about technology
  • awful news about money
  • awful news about the environment
  • awful news about heroes

a long-term, local acquaintance dies of cancer. an equally long-term friend is diagnosed with stage 3 cancer. an even longer-term online friend suffers a stroke.  friends’ parents are falling ill/dying.  my last uncle is having new and scary cardiac issues.  friends’ pets are passing away.  my cat continues her slow decline.

every time i listen to the news, i hear about all the hate and fear in the world.  anti-trans, anti-intellect, anti-women, anti-reason, anti-government, anti-anything-not-christian, anti-acceptance.  everything is driven by money, of which no one has enough and i’m watching the world become unaffordable for most everyone, myself included. the weather is absurd and only getting more dangerous. nature is sobbing and we’re still arguing over straws vs. industrial chemical emissions, shaming individuals for not recycling their coffee cups when one location of one national company produces enough plastic waste for thousands.

people are shitty and doing shitty things, after they’ve done amazing things, so those now become shitty by association.  every piece of technology is recording everything we do all the time and then we’re surprised that we’re being commodified and sold off and to and turned into nothing but a means to inflate stock prices to help send white men to space.  outside is both dying and killing us.  there is no place left on the planet which is not affected by microplastics or forever chemicals.  we’ve effectively ruined everything.

you wouldn’t think it from reading this, but my mental health is currently much improved from its state the previous months. i’m definitely not as sad, but i’m certainly more disappointed.

oh, look.  i’m posting. bad things must have happened.

  • my beloved friend has cancer
  • my cat, while initially seeming to rebound, has regressed
  • my uncle (dad’s little brother) passed away on monday

yeah, i get it.  the 2020’s suck.  the only truly good thing was getting married (even though that wasn’t without its challenges & impacts, obviously). but, for fuck’s sake. do they have to be this unrelenting shitstorm of trauma?

okay, sometimes there are good things. like, we got a new cat last week. his name is Cedar and he didn’t immediately hate Penguin, like Rose did, so that’s good.  he licks my nose and sleeps on my chest. and, um, yeah. i think that’s all.

i loved my uncle and i am saddened at his loss, but he was old and unwell for a really long time, so this end to his pain is a blessing for him and a type of relief for his family.  i just feel so keenly for his three daughters because i am so acutely aware of how they are feeling right now with the sudden loss of a parent who wholly and unconditionally loved them…

christmas and new years absolutely bottomed me out emotionally.  i was at my absolute lowest of the entire last seven months.  i was sitting in the shower sobbing and completely unable to process even the most basic of requirements by the end of december. it was bad. i was a little scared for myself. no, i was a lot scared.

but, the last couple of weeks… i’ve been feeling better. actually, kind of okay even.  so much so that i’d actually noticed that i’d been feeling less bad.  it was nice.  i was hopeful this was a glimpse of progress.

this news, though, and the empathy i have for my cousins as they navigate this loss and my father for losing his baby brother, have slammed me right back to where i was in june. it feels like i’ve lost mom all over again. and i’m not fucking okay with that.

i didn’t want to muddy the waters in my last post, but there’s more life trauma to relate to you.

as briefly mentioned a previous post, my cat, Rose Tyler, “almost died“.  i admit, i took liberties with hyperbole and she wasn’t exactly on death’s door, but she did have a fluid-filled cyst surrounding her left kidney which, if left unchecked, would have, at the very least, destroyed said kidney, if not her.

this led to my my beautiful, sweet 12-year-old kitten to have surgery to remove the cyst, which, over the course of two weeks, had been drained and refilled with a clear, low-cellular fluid.  the hope was, once the cyst around her kidney (i think of it like those balloons you get at Disneyland which has the coloured Mickey balloon inside a clear balloon) was removed, any fluid produced would be absorbed by the tissues in her abdomen without the direct, crushing risk to the kidney itself.

surgery happened.  my poor girl had a 5-inch long incision and had to wear a compression onesie and get pain meds twice a day for two weeks.  at a six-week checkup, everything looked great.  she was slim and trim and feeling good.  that was early November.

about two weeks ago now, i noticed that she was looking a little round around the middle.  at first, i figured it was from all the extra eating she’d been doing (her appetite had been on fire post-op – yay!).  again, i chalked that up to her just feeling better overall without this water balloon growing in her body. last week, though, i was giving her cuddles and kind of palpated her belly and it was very firm and very round and she seemed uncomfortable when i gave it a little extra poke or prod, so i called the vet to get her checked out.

unfortunately, our regular vet (who is the owner of the clinic) is off on a six-week trip of a lifetime and isn’t due back until next week.  after everything i went through with Amy Pond’s health issues last year, i didn’t want to wait the two or possibly three weeks to get her seen, so i just got her in as soon as i could.

a very unhappy cat in a box, an x-ray and quick ultrasound later, it was confirmed that her abdomen is filling with fluids.  well, fuck.

they took a little fluid out and sent it off for analysis.  again, it’s that low-cellular fluid which indicates it’s being produced by the remaining cysts in her kidney.

oh, her bloodwork also shows she’s hyperthryoid. and, she has a heart murmur.

of emotional note, from the day i took Amy to the vet for her similarly fluid-filled abdomen (but, from cancer, not kidney), it was less than a month to when she died after an aggressive abnominocentesis at the vet’s office.  it’s fair to say this news/diagnosis has started a bit of a countdown in my head about Rose’s longevity.

honestly, i wish they’d removed the funky kidney when they already had her on the operating table.  with the heart murmur and her age any surgery is risky – two big ones in a few months probably isn’t all that great for her.  the other option is to do regular fluid taps (at $800 each), but Rose is severely stressed out by car rides & vet visits, which, again, can’t be good for her heart and general well-being.

all currently available options are either too traumatic or too expensive.

our regular vet returns next week and we’re already booked into see her on tuesday. we’ll discuss options with her directly and then try to figure out a way through this.

in the meantime, other than getting more pot-bellied everyday, she seems to be in good enough spirits when Penguin isn’t harassing her.  she’s still loving me and letting me love her back, which is all i can hope for.

i’m just so fucking scared of having to make a heartbreaking decision so soon after Amy and mom and everything else this fucking year has tried to crush me with.

i love you, rosecat.

i got the ipad & apple pencil, so y’all can stop calling santa about it.

but, before that surprise, we spent about three weeks pretty sure we were going to lose our home.

the landlord’s mortgage renewal was going cost so much more that our rent was no longer going to keep the house self-supporting and she was going to have to sell if we didn’t agree to an 12% rent increase (the legally allowed increase for 2023 is 2% for comparison).  after a look at the current housing market, we realized we were utterly FUCKED in trying to find an equally-priced home big enough for 5 people. we could just barely absorb a 4% increase, but 12% was entirely out of the question with our current financial situation.  all of the current options in the rental market are shitholes, 3-bedroom apartments or way outside the area we need to be in for the kids.  it’s DIRE out there for renters right now.

we did come up with a plan to stay in place temporarily until we could move somewhere less expensive, but it involved other people’s agreement & sacrifice which came with a LOT of landmines we’d have to tip-toe around.  #cryptoblogging

the plan as a whole is still in effect, though:  we’re staying in place until we can get a unit in a co-op, which is so much more affordable and has a lot of other benefits for the kids in particular. we just won’t have to involve the trickier people now as my dad offered to cover the rent increase.  after i got over the shock and cried just a little bit, i told him we would only agree to it for as long as it took to get into the co-op and not any longer.  he didn’t say anything specifically about my imposed condition, so we’ll see what happens.  he’s tricksy that way.

it’s really conflicting to be a 50-year-old woman who still needs her daddy to rescue her financially.

i never, EVER asked him for this.  i had only been telling him about our housing issues as they were unfolding as it was the current news in my life.  he brought this up while we were on our way to lunch.  i’m thankful to know that it’s not a financial hardship for him (he’s FAR too practical to spend money he couldn’t afford), at the very least.

so, yeah.  it could take anywhere from three months to two years to get into the co-op, so we’re not going anywhere anytime soon.  it will be a significant down-size, though, so we desperately need to spend that intervening time getting rid of the stuff we’ve filled the house with over the last 5.5 years.

it sucks so much.  we love our house.  it’s perfect for us.  we really didn’t picture our lives anywhere else.  heck, even my mom was obsessed with buying it for us so we’d never have to move.

(that’s another kick in the cootch about the whole situation – thank god she’s not here to have to worry about this.)

oh, and on top of it all, dad was the one to get me the ipad for christmas.  *sob*

2022 is turning out to be the literal worst year of my life.

(note: for the purpose of my ranting and hyperbole, 2022 also includes the last three months of 2021)

my uncle died.
my cat died.
my dad had a cancer surgery.
my other uncle died.
my mom died.
i turned 50.
i filed a consumer proposal.
my other cat almost died.
i had an abnormal pap test.
our landlord is selling our house.

and that’s just the shit happening directly to me.

my friend circle is also suffering far too many losses and hardships this year and the world as a whole is imploding in innumerable ways.

i’m hanging on by a thread and i don’t know how i’m going to manage.

first of all, i don’t want to fucking hear your opinion on the monarchy. of course it’s fucking problematic – it’s a thousand-year empire filled with terrible history.

second of all, this isn’t exactly about the death of the queen, but it kind of is.

yesterday, Queen Elizabeth II died. there was no more than an hour between when i heard the news she was under medical supervision to when i found out she was gone. i knew at the first that when she succumbed i would be torn apart.

1. i’ve only ever known the world in which our head of state was Queen Elizabeth. her face has been on every cent i’ve ever spent.
2. learning about her personal history only made me respect her more. she was 25-years-old and thrust into a position she didn’t want and did it with such grace and composure in the face of seven decades of the most change and tumult in history.
3. despite being a remote figurehead, she managed to engender an innate familiarity. i believe i’m not the only one who would say they felt they knew her better than they had any practical reason to.
4. in a world where EVERYTHING seems so wrong and angry and confusing and disappointing, she was a constant. a mast to cling to in a storm. now that that mast cracked and i’m adrift in a world which barely makes sense.

but, those aren’t the reasons why i fell apart and spent hours sobbing until my sinuses and eyes swelled shut.

it’s another loss of something i always had in my life. and, i have some – albeit tenuous – family connections to the royal family which, as they are cut, feel like i’m getting further and further removed from my past and family connections.

my mom’s dad was the mayor of the small town they lived in. as the story was told to me, mayors from the region were invited to dine with the queen and prince philip at a function when she was quite early in her reign. that means my grandparents got to eat with the queen! later in life, my grandmother had an affinity for the queen mother, even though she more closely resembled Elizabeth in features. honestly, it’s hard to look at certain older photos of the queen without seeing my grandma staring back at me – it’s uncanny.

but, at the core of it, the death of the queen felt like losing my mother all over again. it felt like something broke inside of me when i didn’t know there was anything left to break.

UPDATE: found it! this is the visit and the very luncheon my grandparents were at!

I sewed a thing today. It’s the first thing I’ve sewed in eight months.

Sure, it’s just another mask. But this one is for me.

I just needed to make sure I remembered how to sew at all. At least I didn’t have to rip out any stitches.

I have a plan to make something important to me and I was doubting if I had the ability to make it happen. If I take it slow, I might just get through it.

You know what I don’t like? I don’t like people saying “I still miss my mom and it’s been X years”

It feels like a competition and it makes me angry.

Fine. Want to make it a competition?

I win.

Know why? I haven’t even fucking finished grieving yet. I haven’t had to spend her birthday without her. Or thanksgiving. Or xmas. Or motherfucking mother’s day.

You’ve had a shit ton of practice living without your mom and – right now – I’m the goddamn valedictorian of not knowing how to get through each of those days without mine.

Also… geezus. Thanks for basically telling me that it NEVER GETS ANY EASIER. Fuck. That’s exactly what I need to hear right now when I’m eyebrows-deep in sad and hurt. Thanks a bunch!

it’s been 50 days since mom died. and, i’m now 50 years old. oh, and, look, it’s this blog’s 22nd anniversary. i didn’t even plan to post today. how coincidental.

i don’t even know what to say or where to start. my mom is dead. how the fuck am i supposed to handle that? the person who loved me most in this world is gone. forever. no one will ever love me that way again. that’s not even hyperbole. just fact.

i am so lucky to have been loved and wanted by my mother. so many people i know have such complicated relationships with their parents. i cherish the knowledge of true, unwavering care and support of me through my entire life.

it’s such a momentous loss i’m constantly astounded that i’m still breathing and somehow managing to get up every morning to do normal life things.

i feel guilty for continuing to exist without her. i feel guilty for being happy sometimes. i feel guilty for not seeing her often enough. i feel guilty for the moments i’ve forgotten she’s gone.

i’m angry that she never got a cpap machine to help her breathe better. i’m angry that she didn’t live to 100 like she promised me she would. i’m angry that she didn’t get the thyroid tumor removed. i’m angry that just a week before she died, she told me she was “healthy as a horse”. i’m angry that she just dropped dead. i’m angry that people ask me how i am – my mom is dead. i’m not okay.

i’m thankful she didn’t have a long, lingering decline. i’m thankful she doesn’t have to suffer through another summer heat wave. i’m thankful i knew true unconditional love. i’m thankful that she was living her life up until her last moments. i’m thankful that i got to share her with my friends. i’m thankful for all the lessons and adventures i got to experience thanks to her.

i feel numb and broken and very apart from the world. everything is too loud or rough or heavy to manage. i don’t mind, though. i don’t want to feel normal.

she’d hate this photo. she hated all photos of her. i love it because that’s a genuine smile right there.

Donna Mae (Hannah) Logan

It is with shock and great sadness that we announce Donna Mae (Hannah) Logan passed away unexpectedly at home in Parksville, BC on June 21, 2022 at the age of 84 and three-quarters. She is survived by her daughter Heather Logan (Bradley Toews) of Coquitlam, BC and sister Beverly Nicholl (Jack) of Parksville, BC.

Donna was born in Little Long Lac (now Geraldton), ON on September 23, 1937, the first child of Mae Frances and Alexander Hannah. She was followed thirteen months later by her sister Beverly Joyce and, two years after that, Patricia Gail.

The family moved about frequently for the first years of her life, eventually settling in Sioux Lookout, ON where Donna completed her high school education. She then pursued nursing at the Port Arthur General Hospital School of Nursing in what is now Thunder Bay, ON. Upon graduating in 1958 she returned to Sioux, working in the General Hospital there as a Registered Nurse. She often remarked that working on the maternity ward was one of her fondest assignments.

In 1965, Donna married her former husband James William Logan in Sioux Lookout. They spent their honeymoon in Vancouver, BC and loved it, prompting them to make the move to the west coast the next year. They lived in Vancouver for a short while before settling in North Vancouver. Donna worked at Lions Gate Hospital where she was tasked with managing the hospital’s first Psychiatric Day Centre in 1970.

Donna left nursing when her only child, Heather Shannon, was born in July 1972. One year later, she opened a bookstore called Readers Retreat in Westlynn Mall in Lynn Valley; running it for five years before selling the business to return to nursing. Tragically, a workplace injury compounded by a car accident shortly afterwards prematurely ended Donna’s nursing career in 1983. Struggling with chronic pain and limited mobility thereafter, Donna was medically retired in 1999.

In 1991, Donna decided to get out of “the big city” and moved to Parksville, BC, where she lived for the remainder of her life, enjoying the lack of traffic and proximity to family.

Donna was always the life of the party and had the biggest heart, laugh, and curiosity about life. A life-long voracious reader and hobby knitter, she enjoyed her time with friends and family sharing stories, playing Scrabble, and trying her luck at the casino. She will be fondly remembered for the joy and compassion she brought to all her relationships. Her daughter would like everyone to know that she lived her life on her own terms and left it exactly how she would have hoped.

There will be no public service. Anyone wishing to honour her memory is encouraged to have a big scoop of their favourite ice cream, an even bigger belly laugh, and consider making a donation to an animal rescue charity in their community.

The Sioux Lookout Bulletin

yup, i’m back. hi. hello.

seventeen days in and, yeah, i’m jonesing pretty hard for some internets. the longer i go without, the more i realize i miss the sharing part more than the consuming part (except for tiktok – i miss consuming ALL that tasty junk food).

i mean, look at this:

that shouldn’t be kept in google photos never to be seen by the world! it’s total new-parent stuff, but still. HE’S THE CUTEST. and so floppy.

also, we were contemplating going to the island this long weekend to visit our moms, but realized we’d need a cat-sitter due to the current cat-situation. normally, i’d just shout out on the socials: “hey, anybody want to house/cat-sit for us for a couple nights? all the snacks & wifis you can handle!” that way i could invite acceptance instead of having to ask anyone specific for a favour. (yeah, i figured that out after the fact.)

i’ve almost quit a bunch of times. i mean, it’s MY challenge, right? i call the shots. i can disappoint myself if i want to.

then, i saw a comment from jodi on my last post and it reminded me that writing and clicking “publish” on it felt really good. so, here we are again.

***

i used to pride myself on being an optimistic, sometimes Pollyanna-level so, person. i truly believed in the good in people and that right would prevail and the human race could accomplish miracles.

maybe it’s just been the last two years, but that’s almost entirely beaten out of me now.

it’s difficult trying to describe these moments i have of zooming back out of myself and taking a wider, larger look at the world/planet/humanity and just dismaying of how fucking shitty we are to each other and everything around us. when i start to contemplate the weight of setting things right, the sheer amount of things which would need to change on fundamental levels and that nothing can even start to be repaired without a near-global buy-in…

i just exhale, a little more deflated each time.

seeing the point of any of it is hard.

having a hand in raising children who will have to live in this future is also fucking with me. at least before, if i even did feel this way, i could easily not worry about it so much because i would probably sneak off this mortal coil before it got really bad and be done with it. now, i have to think about how they’ll manage with the ramifications of all the fuckery going on and what kind of people they’ll be and how they’ll participate in the world.

***

the snowdrops and crocuses are blooming. i’m excited, but also annoyed because that means i’m going to have to start yard work. ugh. weeding sucks.

***

going to get some x-rays of my hips & lower back today because i’m an old lady with chronic hip pain now and my new doctor seems to be proactive. fun times.

you missed this, right?

i made the long-brewing, yet weirdly rash, decision to give up social media for the month of February. no twitter, facebook, instagram or tiktok. it was getting too much – too much time, too much hate, too much angst, too much frustration. i wanted a reset and to just not feel fucking bad all the time.

at first, it felt pretty good. i had a SHOCKING amount of extra time. i mean, i knew my tiktok scrolling was getting bad, but yikes.

then, the kitten* did something cute and i couldn’t share it. after that, i finally got a photo of my pink hair which looked good and there wasn’t anywhere to post it. next, i found myself jonesing for some Elyse Myers stories, gregisms and wondering what was going on with Andrew’s rock saga.

so, now i’m here. writing on the blog i told y’all i was shutting down. THAT’S how desperate i am to scream into the void.

ugh. i feel dirty.

well, while i’m here…

***

i got married! we had to cancel the wedding we’d planned due to Covid, but Brad & I wanted to keep our date (5.10.20), so we had a socially-distanced, micro-wedding in a park with just us, our witnesses and officiant. the idea was we’d just bump the big wedding/reception to the fall when we could gather again… that was almost two years ago now and, well. we’re still married at least.

***

*as previously posted, Amy Pond passed away in November. i’m still utterly heartbroken with grief and am prone to full body-wracking sobs if i remember her dying in my arms. but, listening to the universe when she speaks, we now have new cat energy in our life in the form of Penguin, a (now) 9-month-old male kitten of the brown tabby persuasion.

i didn’t mean to, but one day found myself looking at adoptable cats online. when i saw his face, i immediately felt full Amy energy coming from him. i didn’t plan on applying – kittens were a hot commodity over the holidays and this guy was way too cute to not already have a list of applicants – but i did it anyway. i got a call back from the rescue less than an hour later. oops!

during my phone interview with them, they mentioned that they’d give my info to his foster mom – Amelia – to make contact. Amelia?! are you freaking kidding me? kismet.

long story spoiled: we went to meet him, fell in love and brought him home on xmas eve.

he’s a lot, but he’s absolutely delightful. Rose isn’t so sure about him, but we’re taking things slowly and eventually he’ll figure out that no means no and leave her alone when she’s done. we hope. right now, they’re not vicious to each other, but Rose sure SOUNDS like she’s being murdered by him whenever they scrabble. she’s a total drama queen.

it’s weird having a kitten who both snores AND farts, though.

***

i guess that’s it. thanks for listening, void.

Amy Pond 2010-2011

when amy started coughing last year, we put her on steroids.
when her thyroid numbers kept going up, we put her on felimazole.
when her belly started filling with fluids, i took her to get drained like a car getting an oil change.
when she started peeing outside the litter box, i put down pee pads everywhere and bought enzymatic cleaners.
when she stopped jumping up on the bed to sleep with us, i bought her stairs so she could still join us.
when she stopped eating her regular food, i poached salmon and held it up to her mouth until she ate some.

every time something got added to that list, i knew the time i’d need to choose when she took her last breath was getting closer.  it was agonizing, even when i knew i’d be choosing to spare her pain and misery.  it was still my choice. my responsibility.

at her last vet appointment, i was having this very conversation with the doctor as she was draining over 800cc of fluid from amy’s distended belly.  after the last syringe, amy felt like amy again – my tiny kitten.

i cuddled her on my lap while the doctor went to get some medications which would hopefully increase her appetite so she’d maybe stop losing weight so quickly.  it wasn’t long after that she coughed, began panting and then started to die.  in my arms.  on her own terms. hopefully, feeling relieved of all that pressure of the fluids in her abdomen.

i held her and cried.

i told her what a good kitten she was.  how much i loved her.  i thanked her for all the bonks and the kneading and the purrs and the silly tricks.  and, finally, i thanked her for not making me have to choose when she left us.

i will never forget it.  the smells, the sounds, the sensations of her death.  i’m overcome with the sorrow and regret and worry that i fucked it up and that’s why she only lived 11 years and 2 days in my care.  she was supposed to live longer and grow into her old lady whiskey voice.

i will always love and always miss that tiny kitten face.

i love you, Amy Pond.  so much.

hey, look!  it must be August 10th because i’m actually blogging.

happy 20th existence anniversary to this here blog!

as i wrote in my anniversary post back in 2010 (oi!), this is pretty much the only time i ever come to write something here anymore.  honestly, you could just take that post, change 10th to 20th and christopher to brad and it’s all still entirely applicable.

the blogging world as it existed in the 2000 is long gone.  if you’re not selling something, a personal weblog isn’t the place where you spill your guts on the internet anymore.  i haven’t used this space as anything more than a way to remember things which happened from 2000-2010 in, well, 10 years.  even that’s been replaced by an app (hi, timehop).

i will always be thankful for the people which were brought into my life because of this, the adventures i had, the things i learned; but, i think it’s time to stop pretending that i’m going to ever use this as an actual repository of my life again. yeah, i did briefly think about pivoting into making this a sewing-centric space since that seems to be my jam these days (@whatheathersews); then, i had to be honest with myself about the amount of time and energy i actually have to pursue that kind of commitment.  i’m not motivated to spend the time required to make something like that worth it.

so, yeah.  after today, i don’t expect there to be any more new content on fubsy.net.  i’ll see what’s involved in locking it down into a searchable archive, but that’s about it.

thank you all for playing with me these past two decades.  you all have permanent places in my heart and i’m thankful for every memory we share.

if you’re looking for me:

@hessiebell – twitter – mostly retweets
@hessiebell – instagram – mostly cats
@whatheathersews – instagram – mostly sewing
facebook – mostly arguments with racist relatives
linkedin – mostly crickets
email (how retro) – mostly spam
i still like presents july 3rd

2019:  (i missed that whole year, it appears. was i asleep?)
2018:  old enough…
2017:  sweet seventeen and all the gruesome details
2016:  
sweet sixteen!
2015:  fifteen is a nice, round number
2014:  shit, sorry
2013:  lucky number 13
2012: it’s not goodbye. yet. maybe.
2011: time files (and so do i!)
2010: pass the cake!
2009: well, fuck me running
2008: belated, like always
2007: (it looks like i was busy trying to buy car, and forgot)
2006: trolls and stalkers and spam, oh my!
2005: belated blogday
2004: four fucking years!
2003: (there were technical difficulties of some sort, it seems)
2002: time flies
2001: who woulda thunk it
2000: the post which started it all