Book Review

The book written by the 19-year-old Great Granddaughter that I never knew I had – available on Amazon in Kindle and Paperback, started off as a quick read.

I don’t think she knows what a Blog is, but it reads somewhat like one -- reporting that this happened on this day, that happened on that day.

The first half of the book is raw, the portrait of a dark era when she didn’t know who she was, had little control of self and "I felt like nobody understood me".

This era was a revelation to me as it disclosed a side of ghetto life I myself have never been exposed to, with words I’d never heard but understood to be urban language … like "dukes" meaning "adopted parents/family".

The next half of the book is more lighthearted … details how she searched, located, connected with her biological family and, once again, this era was a revelation to me as I read about things happening in our dysfunctional family that were never disclosed to me.

Not all that surprising, because Twin 1 and Twin 2 both have always been very guarded as to what I was allowed to know, did not want me to be upset or disappointed in them. Would tell the grands, "Don’t tell grandma"; and, when someone would slip and tell me something I wasn’t to know, it was always with, "Don’t tell I told you", LOL.

Life is about choices and, as difficult as it is at times to have to stand to the side and let people make choices that look to be leading to hard lessons, we have to accept it's how growth and waking up works.

I’m just glad I didn’t know about the things I’m reading about now, and not all that happy about knowing it now; but I was okay/handling it until the book got to Twin 1’s passing … the press, conspiracy theories surrounding how/why she passed, cyber bullying of family members, and then the funeral.

Having not yet made peace with the loss of Twin 1, having not allowed anyone to bring it up, having bypassed all news and videos relating to a funeral happening, treating it almost as though it hasn’t happen, this is where I broke.

I’ve had to put the book down. Don’t know when and if I’ll pick it up again; but, next time I see Great Granddaughter, I will have her sign it.

Looking at what Great Granddaughter is doing with her life now, how she's come through what she had to experience, seems to have had a decent adoptive family, has been taken into the fold by her biological family (with two abstaining), I’m just going to leave things as they are, stay in the moment.

I don't know if I can say this book is for everybody, as I think, just like a blog, Great Granddaughter has written it for herself with the hope it reaches her tribe -- "adoptees, foster children, people who have been separated from their families, and anyone who has ever questioned where they belong".

The Game's Afoot

Outside yesterday was perfect walking weather, so I went three times around the complex for a mile and a half in thirty-seven minutes.

Nowhere near fast enough for a 5K, but not bad for my age.

Looking for Halloween decorations, as I walked along, I saw my Little Hispanic Friend has her patio decorated.

Doesn’t look much like Halloween, to me -- more like Fall, but okay … it’s something to see.

Today was a little warm, but walkable. So, I suited up. However, because it was warm, I only managed a mile in thirty minutes and spotted this ……

Lovely. Definitely Halloween.

Earlier in the day, I’d received a message from the Talker, asking that I post to the Residents’ Facebook page, photos taken at today’s Crafts session.

WHAT????

I posted the photos, but did not express my surprise to Talker that Crafty Lady had hosted Crafts today, because Crafty Lady had told me Crafts was suspended for the remaining Wednesdays of this month due to doctor appointments.

If you will recall … Crafty Lady cancelled the previous two weeks of Crafts Wednesday -- the first time for heart palpitations, the second time for a swollen knee; and not only did she say the remaining Wednesdays of this month were doctor appointments, but that Crafts might be switched to another day in future …… she’d let me know.

She said all this in a text message so, if the sh!t later hits the fan, which it may very well do down the road, she cannot deny saying it or write it off as a miscommunication/misunderstanding, as I've got the receipt.

Now there are a few ways I can take what Crafty Lady did today. One, she is a simple flip flopper. Two, for some very very very misguided reason, maybe because of her Deputy Sheriff days of being a bully and Di no longer around to screw with, Crafty Lady is trying me.

I think it's the latter …… deliberately done.

In my mind’s eye, I can see a smug manipulative look on her face, as she waits for a text message from me asking why she didn’t tell me Crafts was on today and/or expecting me to chase her down about next Wednesday.

She’s not as important as she thinks she is …… at least not to me. So, I’m going to chill …… erase her.

I can and have done that before with people who needed erasing. It starts with, whenever the person touches my mind, I say, "Erase, erase, erase".

If you do that long enough/often enough, the person no longer comes to mind. You forget them, forget even their name.

In addition, as soon as I can figure out how to do it, I’m going to block her from my phone contacts.

I want to unfriend her on Facebook but, if I do that, she might lose access to the Residents’ Facebook page, not see the photos; so I’ll leave that alone and, instead … I forgot what you call it, but there’s a way to suspend her posts from appearing on my page.

People like Crafty Lady don’t like not being paid attention to … not chased. So, my guess is she’ll eventually try to contact me out of guilt, find herself blocked, panic and try not to exactly smooth things over about not letting me know about Crafts today, but pretend it didn’t happen, just go on as before.

There is and will be no before. She’s erased.

Inasmuch as she won't be able to contact me, I doubt she’ll see me until Management’s Halloween Party, where I fully intend to avoid/not see her, because she’s erased.

BTW, the photos Talker sent show the Baker attended Crafts. She’s brave/strong, handling the loss of her husband well …… at least in public.

Columbus Day ???

Would you believe that, the day of the Celebration of Life, it was 100◦ and that later that night it rained. It’s been raining every day since.

That’s not a complaint. We desperately needed the rain. It’s just that the switcheroo in weather was so extreme … from excessive heat to dark gloomy wet cold.

While at the Celebration, I learned we came thisclose to losing another member of the Usual Suspects.

While on a cruise that included 85 church members, she became deathly ill, unable to walk or breathe. Ended up hospitalized for 40 days, where it was determined she’d contracted a respiratory infection. They think it had something to do with the recycled water on the ship.

Saying, "I almost died" she added that while hospitalized, she’d been asked to step up on something, twisted her foot, broke her ankle.

That was some vacation, and out of the 85 on the cruise, only she and one other were impacted by whatever bacteria caused the infection.

She fortunately survived, is back now wearing a cast from the broken ankle; saying she feels okay, but I can hear a difference in the way she speaks … her voice has a raspy sound to it.

It wasn't long ago when, one other of our Usual Suspects left the complex to take a vacation, fell, broke her hip, ended up in rehab.

It's kinda spooky.

I forgot to ask if the other lady, that contracted the infection, had survived.

On the dysfunctional family front, the Great Granddaughter that, until last year I never knew I had, has written a book, available on Amazon in Kindle and Paperback, about growing up adopted.

"Everyone knows what it feels like to start somewhere you never expected to stay, to look at your circumstances and wonder, can something beautiful really come from this … when everything around you seems determined to keep you small. We call it struggle. But sometimes, struggle is where strength takes root".

"In From the Concrete, Alanah Jones explores the journey of becoming through seasons of uncertainty, growth, setbacks, and transformation. Like a seed forcing its way through concrete, this book speaks to the courage it takes to grow when the environment around you was never designed to make growth easy".

Recap

"I’ve been married for 52 years", said Hoochie Mama who was sitting next to me at today's Celebration of Life.

Hoochie Mama is the resident who moved in 2019 and quickly earned herself a reputation of being desperate because she’s so aggressively came onto the men, made a not PG-rated cupcake at a decorating event, couldn’t have a conversation without mentioning that three-letter word that starts with s and ends with x; and, more recently, came to an event as a moocher, tried to cut in line and, once in line, began grabbing chicken, eating it as she moved through the line grabbing at the other food.

Her behavior was disgusting, embarrassing and discussed at length by everyone who saw it, prompting me to provide the Baker with meal tickets for future events.

So, anyway … Impressed at 52 years, I said, "I don’t know how you guys can do that ─ Stick with one person year after year. I couldn’t stand being in a committed relationship for more than 6 months".

Then she held up 5 fingers, saying 52 years with 5 different husbands.

Laughing, I said, "It doesn’t work that way. You can't total them up". Whereupon she got a little miffed, said, "It does for me!".

Okay. Whatever. My instincts were right when I saw her walk through the door and heard myself say to myself, "OH NOOOOOO!".

Then, when her eyes landed on me, it was "NOOOOOOOO" again.

When she walked over, placed her hand on the back of the chair to my right, asked if it was okay to sit, I just kinda shrugged my shoulder while in my head I heard myself say, "It’s okay to sit anywhere but here".

She sat.

I was reluctantly polite when she engaged me in conversation, but I shut down after she got miffed over "It doesn’t work that way".

Fortunately, I saw Hell on Wheels (HOW) at the door. She was being escorted in by her daughter and her daughter’s drop-dead handsome hunk of burning love boyfriend, who had all of us ladies breaking our necks to get a good look at him.

They located HOW at the other end of the table where I was seated, to my left. So, I slid down to the seat nearest HOW, leaving two seats open between myself and Hoochie Mama.

Hoochie Mama noticed, seemed to know I wanted away from her, let out a little laugh about it.

I was really surprised to see HOW, especially since she was sitting upright in a wheelchair after being told she’d be bedridden for like the rest of her life.

She said she’d been through it but was "tough". Then she looked at me and said, "You’re tough too".

Interesting that, having not seen me in a couple years, while she was in care facilities, bedridden in her unit surrounded by nurses, and then in and out of the hospital, that she could look at me and see something that made her say that.

Anyway, Hoochie Mama was forgotten by me and HOW and I had a pleasant conversation about what’s been going on around the complex.

Just before the speeches began, and a slideshow was shown of the life of the Baker’s husband (They'd been married 40 years), HOW’s daughter and her drop-dead handsome hunk of burning love boyfriend sat in the two seat that were open between myself and Hoochie Mama, with the boyfriend, lucky for me … or so I thought, sitting right next to me.

He generated nothing, no heat, no aura. I felt no sense of anything. He felt empty and, when he spoke/commented on anything being said by speakers, his vocabulary seemed limited to "That’s awesome". He told a passing woman wearing Frankenstein earrings, "I like your earrings; they're awesome". Then, when clapping was done, he went overboard … big arms overhead, big hands coming together slow and loud.

I wrote him off as an empty vessel, a big dumb, clumsy oaf, delicious to look at but good for one thing.

I’ll leave it up to you readers to figure out what that one thing is.

Di was in the room.

I guess management lifted the ban, allowed her to enter the Community Room, attend the Celebration of Life.

At the end of the slideshow, it was announced the show would be on loop, everyone was invited to eat. So, once people started getting out of their seats, moving, lining up, I took it as my opportunity to do as Bob suggested, pull an Irish Exit and did.

The hardest part of the Celebration for me was when I first walked in, the Baker walked up to me, I hugged her and asked how she was doing. If she had fallen apart at that time, I would have done likewise; but she said she was "Okay, for now" and actually seemed to be.

In fact, during the entire Celebration of Life, the Baker seemed the one to handle it best, even said that the activities she spearheaded would continue.

Talker and Crafty Lady told her not to worry, that they had her back. That she should take it easy and they would continue the activities for her.

I know she can count on Talker. I’m not so sure about Crafty Lady as she’s prone to start/stop, have heart palpitations, a swollen knee.

Do I sound snarky … bitchy? Probably because, though I maintained during the Celebration of Life, I came home with a migraine and I don’t get migraines.

I don’t know if I picked up something from the big dumb oaf or Hoochie Mama.

Endings

Yesterday’s crafts session was, once again, cancelled. Last time, it was heart palpitations. This time it was a swollen knee, with Crafty Lady saying she has doctor appointments scheduled for the remaining Wednesdays of this month.

She said she’ll let us know if she decides to switch to another day, but I sense she’s losing interest in hosting the class and, truth be told, by the time she decides what she wants to do and when, I probably will have lost interest, found something else to do with my time.

Hearing a knock knock on the door just after noon today, I took a look through the kitchen window, found Head Maintenance Guy standing there.

Opening the door, I blurted out "Don’t tell me there’s a surprise inspection".

He didn’t smile.

With a serious look on his face, he handed me two pieces of paper – one an envelope, which he said had already been attached to my door.

Because he looked so serious, I opened the envelope and found an "In Loving Memory Of" card, gasped and teared up as Head Maintenance Guy said, the Baker’s 88-year-old husband had passed and, instead of Bingo Friday, there will be a service in the Community Room tomorrow at noon.

Since Head Maintenance Guy said the envelope had already been attached to my door, before he came up with his Notice, I checked the camera and saw the Baker’s daughter had brought it upstairs the day before, the 7th, at 10 o’clock.

Inasmuch as I’ve been housebound to escape the heat, if Head Maintenance Guy hadn’t had his Notice to deliver and had he not knocked on my door to let me know of the card having been attached, there’s a good chance I’d not have opened the door today or tomorrow, would have missed the service.

Actually, I would have preferred to have missed the service because I really don’t want to go. I empath and it’s going to be an emotional event that I’m already feeling, am working hard to maintain.

Considering what happened earlier this year, I don’t think I can handle it. However, being close to the Baker, her granddaughter, my not attending would be clocked. So, I’m going to have to at least make an appearance, show my respect without associating it with what happened earlier this year, try not to let the room full of grief get inside me … end up falling apart.

I don’t see the Baker recovering from this loss. Maybe she'll leave the community, move in with family, maybe stay in the community but be forever changed … because I now know from experience that a loss like that does change one.

Inasmuch as the Baker is the Cheer Captain around here – the one spearheading bingo and events, with the rest of us as supporting characters … me doing the flyers, taking pics, others cooking, setting up, providing prizes, whatever she needs doing, the bell is probably going to ring on Bingo Friday and future events.

It’s going to be very sad and very boring around here for a while. I may have to start popping into Kesha Tuesdays for tea.

What Head Maintenance Guy had come to my door to post was a Notice indicating "Annual Certification Letter, First Notice". The paperwork I’m required to submit, proving that I’m still poor enough to continue living here.

My last recertification was just this past January … we’re only in October, so it’s way soon for another round.

Some of you might recall I blogged about my getting through that last recertification by the hair of my chinny chin chin, because they added up what I had coming in monthly through sources of income, THEN they added to that what was in my savings account AND my checking account, essentially adding the same money twice, which made me look well off. Plus, because the automatic bill payments for rent, utilities, etc., had not yet been processed, my bank accounts had been flush with cash. Once the Assistant Manager totaled everything up, I came across as a rich b!tch and qualified by the hair of my chinny chin chin … less than a hundred dollars under the cap.

I’ll have to make sure not to recertify this time until payments have processed, brought the accounts down to reflect reality and for sure not until closer to January, even though the notice says "I strongly urge you to not put this off".

Me thinks that, now that office staff no longer accepts checks and money orders for rent, everything now goes through Rent Café, they probably don’t have enough to keep them busy, so are creating work to do.

At any rate, we’re supposedly having a Residents/Management meeting on the 20th. I’ll ask should I ignore this early notice and recertify in January per usual or not.

Keep it Simple

Other than the three days of doable outdoor walking weather early last week, it’s been a steady climb and excessive heat warnings.

Summer just won’t let go, so I’ve been pretty much housebound, A/C running 24/7.

News did reach me about an incident in broad daylight about some random guy walking behind one of the old ladies, pushing her down, running off with her purse.

It’s unknown to me if he followed her in from outside the complex, or whether he was already inside waiting for an opportunity to victimize, but I was interested in seeing how management was going to warn residents this could happen here or if they were going to address it at all.

They kinda sorta did address it in wording on this month’s Activity Calendar, issued yesterday … "Safety Reminder: Please be aware of your surroundings and help us keep our community safe. Please keep all pedestrian gates closed at all times. Do not open the gates or provide access to anyone you do not know. If you see suspicious activity or someone attempting to enter without authorization, please contact the appropriate authorities".

I’m assuming "appropriate authorities" to mean don’t bother the office or maintenance guys, call the cops.

So, anyway, more reasons – besides the oppressive heat, to limit walking to the indoor walking pad rather than the great outdoors.

Speaking of which, manager of the indoor walking gym stocked the coffee bar with chocolate muffins yesterday, but made them healthy by adding chopped walnuts.

The resident organizers had me design/print, and they’ve already distributed and posted, flyers for this month’s Bingo Days, plus a Halloween Party on Friday, October 30.

THEN, I find included in this month’s Activity Calendar, a flyer indicating management is hosting a Halloween Costume Party, Friday, October 30.

I’m assuming the two groups will combine their efforts

As you all know by now, I love cosplay and, at the end of Halloween last year, when it seemed I kept running into people who wanted to unload their problems onto my listening ears, I came up with a great idea for this year’s costume that I kept to myself at the time.

That idea was to wear blue leggings, a blue top, walk around with a sign indicating “Psychiatric Help 5¢ … The Doctor is In” ala Peanuts character Lucy Van Pelt.

A lot has happened since last year. I am no longer pumped -- not even Skelly is bringing me the joy it once did. Besides, based on past cosplay around here, clever costumes are lost on this audience. So, if I cosplay at all, I'll keep it simple with my regular skeleton leggings or the red/white Minnie Mouse leggings and Disneyland ears.