h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I wanted to apologize for crapping on your "Today" journal convo. Aside from being a conversation killer, it occurs to me that I was perhaps more than a little insensitive when I mentioned someone else was refusing treatment. I didn't want to drag negativity into it, and I'm really sorry for having done.

Hey, don't apologise! It hasn't been a conversation killer - I just check back on that thread a little bit iregularly and sometimes don't bother, so I haven't got back to it yet.

And as for the "crapping" - well, don't worry. There's nothing worse than having the urge but nowhere to do it, right?

Ok, as long as I know I didn't bring anyone down. You're right about needing a place to do it sometimes.

Hope you're holding up all right.

I keep getting sucked into conversation here against my better judgement. I really ought to be doing some work instead.

God, it gets complicated, doesn't it?

Let off steam here any time you want.

I hadn't revisited this because I didn't want to depress or even worse, scare you, but my mother passed away a week and a half ago, so the hard part is over, for her anyway.

I really hope whatever you've got responds well to treatment.

God, I'm sorry to hear that!

How about you, are you ok?

I'm doing OK at the moment- I feel weird but not shattered or anything. We weren't close, but that doesn't make it much better, and I'm missing her. I preferred when we had the option of not speaking than having it permanent, if you know what I mean. And K and I had booked a rental car for today, and I took next week off work, planning to go visit my folks for a couple of days. I thought she'd be around a bit longer.

We'll still go down there in the fall, when the kids go back to school and my dad's going to suddenly be alone a lot. It will be weird without her there (even if all she did was holler at or ignore us last time).

Yes, I know what you mean. That knowledge that you won't see her again is very hard to get used to. My grandfather has been dead for nearly twenty years, but from time to time it still seems funny that he's not there to go for a walk or have a chat with. Rarely, but it does happen.

When my grandmother (my dad's mother) died last year, the first several visits back to the house (bequeathed to my uncle, who lived there and looked after her all those years to keep her out of a nursing home) were really weird. There are just some times I expect to see her there.

With my mother, I suppose the hardest part right now is that our relationship to each other was so conflicted- at least for me, it was, for her, problems were never her doing- and now that'll never change. I'll miss the person she wasn't as much as the person she was.

Thanks for letting me vent a bit- it's done me some good. I've actually found that a number of friends I thought were close, and even family members, have not only been alarmingly non-supportive, but some haven't even acknowledged anything. I'm not seeking empty platitudes, but people I've known only from hootoo, or K's friends and family, have been much kinder than people I've known my whole life. That's a bit hurtful, too. Must try not to pick up any new grudges.

Nah, grudges are never a good thing. Although grudges - when funny - are brilliant!

I'm piss-poor at providing empty platitudes, too. If I even tried it out of compassion, I'd look like I was waiting for an inheritance. I can't help it.

I think what you said there about "the person she wasn't", though, hits something deep in all of us, perhaps...Maybe you're just Human.

It's a bit overrated, huh?