life doesn't stop

when i first found out about dad, i told one of my business contacts i talk to on a almost daily basis. he at some point has lost his dad and told me something i didn't really grasp at the time. he told me the thing that surprised him most was that life didn't stop. the whole world keeps turning and you feel like it should have surely stopped by now. i mean, you have a crisis to deal with. shouldnt the universe shift a little so you can take care of this big, life altering event. when he said it i thought to myself, of course it doesnt, life doesn't care what you're dealing with. duh.

but now i feel it. sometimes i feel like screaming, don't you remember what i'm dealing with!? emails and calls still pour in at work. i still have classes to schedule and customers to take care of and a team to manage. i still have a boyfriend at home waiting on me to come home for dinner. i still have dogs to feed and take out. i still have myself that i need to bathe and feed and put to bed. and then i have my dad. we have a seemingly never ending list of doctors appointments and tests i've had to take him to. prescriptions to buy. family to deal with. "just in case" arrangements to be made. but nothing slows down so i can take care of the hard stuff. i run on auto pilot through the week. i dont sleep. well, i lay in bed and move in and out of conscious, but i wake up so often i never really rest. and i get up and barrel through the next day.

and i struggle with leaving dad to deal with all the doctors and appointments himself and going back to my life that's not so patiently waiting for me. but he needs me. my family's always depended on me for the important things. i mean, the two appointments dad handled ended up with us having two appointments 30 minutes apart (which obviously didn't work). i helped him find jobs, i made his resume. in college i would come home on the weekends and clean his house and buy their groceries. when he had his own business and secretaries quit or screwed stuff up, i cleaned up the mess and trained the new one. i take care of things. thats what i do. but right now im being pulled in so many directions i feel like im really just disappointing everyone because i can't do enough for anyone.

so in the past week we've met with the cancer drs again and we started radiation. theyre doing radiation on his back to try and shrink the tumor on his spine to make him more comfortable. they also had a port surgically implanted in his chest for when he starts chemo.

last weekend i made a trip over to longview. when my granny died, my dad's mom, i remembered my dad saying she had bought the plot next to her for him. i remember because it grossed me out at the time (i was 11). but i wasn't sure. so we went over to the cemetery where she and a lot of my family are buried. i hadnt been there since granny's funeral. i spoke with the people in the office and she did buy the space next to hers for dad. it was and is a very surreal moment for me. i went by her gravesite and she and my great grandmother both had flowers in their vases. that made me feel good. i'm guessing it was one of her brothers but i'm not sure. it made me feel good to know they were taken care of since i'd never been back. heck, i had to have a map just to find them then.

dad didn't know i went over there and talked to them. i don't like talking to him about anything like that. im trying to be the message of hope to him. its hard to talk about overcoming something while you're talking to them about their funeral. but then on the way to his appointment thursday he said my mom finally called him. he was telling me about their phone call and then he said "your mother told me i have a plot over in longview?". i think i stopped breathing. i just said "what?". he said she told him he had a plot in longview next to his mother. i told him he told me that when granny died. he said he thought her husband had screwed him out of it just to be spiteful. i told him no. its still there. and left it at that. two days before when we were sitting in the cancer doctor's office he told me he was thinking about being an organ donor. i didn't have the heart to tell him i didn't think he could be. i just told him its a great thing to do and that i was one myself. then he told me he just wanted to be cremated. i told him me too. then i told him about one of my coworkers donating her body to science and we laughed about that and moved on. it feels too soon to be having these talks. he's still "too healthy." that seems really final. im not ready to accept that yet.

i did however go apply for life insurance this week. this has made me realize that someone would have to take care of the "final" stuff if something happens to me. anything could happen at any time. it made dad a little upset that he doesn't have anything to leave us with. i told him kyle and i didn't care, all we want to do is spend time with him, that matters more than a check. money makes people crazy anyway.

and then there's my grandpa. when they took dad up to ICU a few weeks ago they asked about his medical history and the history of his immediate family. when they asked about his father he said (and i quote) "he's the meanest person in the whole world and he will outlive me just to spite me." clearly, its a sensitive subject. while dad was in the hospital my brother called to tell him about it (before we knew how bad it was). grandpa i guess knows now and wanted to see dad. we all had to brace for that. tuesday night we met at outback for dinner. craig and i got there first and talked with grandpa candidly about everything until dad and kyle got there. then it was awkward family dinner time and grandpa swooshed back out and down the road, leaving my brother with $100 to help out. i really believe that he cares about dad but doesnt know how to show it. he had to have some degree of concern to even come over. he didn't have to do that. he's just never been the "throwing the football in the front yard, going on a father son fishing trip" kind of dad. dad has the bitter, they didn't want to be a part of my life before so why should they now thing going on with, well, everyone, but he still loves his dad. its just difficult. he cried when grandpa left. i havent heard from grandpa since dinner so i guess we'll see...

kyle and i have been trying to get the word out too. dad has half brothers and uncles and cousins, all people i havent seen in years and years. thank God for the internet! oddly enough most of the "family" i talk to isn't even technically family anymore, they've all divorced my actual family member, haha. they're kids are still related to me so they're still family as far as i'm concerned. also been trying to track down my dad's friends. i called one of his best friends from longview last week. that was difficult. i'm trying to get people together for dad's birthday this weekend. we're going to grill out on saturday and i want dad to have good time with everyone he holds near and dear (or everyone who feels that way about him). of course it may just be us. who knows! i hope its a special day for him no matter what.

last night i got a welcome cancer break. it was my boss's birthday. he's part boss, part friend really. he's a huge blessing in my life, that's for sure. he's the only one in the office who's always stood by me (of the old people) and believes in me. i go to him for advice a lot too. his wife threw him an awesome goodfellas casino night at their new, not moved into house. they had gaming tables set up to play poker, black jack and craps. i played some black jack with craig at first then ryan talked me into playing craps. he got into this game one night when one of our distributors were in town and we took them out to the boats. i watched him learn but i didn't have a clue what was going on. i learned last night though and it was really fun! i'd like to try it for real some time. it was a really nice night!

today craig was off, which hardly ever happens on a sunday, so we both went to church. i love going to church with craig not just because he's my partner, but because he asks questions. i like peaking his interest in church and the bible. after church i told him "thank you for coming to church with me" and he said "of course!". then he really surprised me. he said "i prayed for you and your dad." it really touched my heart. craig is from up north and church isn't a normal part of life up there and he and i obviously don't go very often (because of his work). i've never heard him talk about praying for anything or anyone. it was one of the sweetest things he ever could have said.

so that pretty much brings us up to date. thank you again for all your love and support. you have no idea how much it means to me.