my dad has 4 sisters. my dad is the only one out of his siblings that is dead. (well, one of them we have no idea where the hell he is, alive or dead?) now one of his sisters is dead too. my grandmother had some knee surgery and one of my aunts was visiting for a few days to help out while my grandmother's knee heals. i was supposed to go over and visit today. i didn't make a formal arrangement of date and time to visit but i figured i would stop by after breakfast. i was in the middle of making breakfast when my cell phone rang, indicating it was a call from my grandparents' house. i was about to talk all cheery to my aunt, that i'd be over soon to visit. instead it was my grandmother telling me that one of my aunts was dead, died last night. i was surprised because that was obviously not the phone call i was expecting. i grew up with her but i didn't think i would cry. when i hung up i cried a little. i didn't even cry when people told me my dad died but i was just a kid so hey. i think then i got angry. what a stupid bitch to kill yourself! (please note we won't know for sure the cause of death until the autopsy.) and then i thought about how i stayed up late messing around on the computer. with the time zone difference and what my grandmother told me, we were probably up late at the same time. perhaps we both went to sleep at the same time. only i woke up.

my grandmother said one of my uncles was flying in this afternoon so i could wait until the afternoon to visit. after i ate and showered, i received another call from their house. this time it was my aunt asking when i would visit. apparently my grandfather's car alarm would not shut off and they had a lot of errands to run as they would be flying tomorrow for the funeral and stuff. i said i'd be there right away. twiddle thumbs asked if i would be flying too. i didn't even think about it. i guess i will. i owe it to my aunt because the last opportunity i had to see her, i did not take it. there was a big surprise birthday party for another aunt and a lot of people went, including my brother, which is just amazing. my brother took some video footage of my aunt that is dead now. that's the last image of her i've seen. i can't even remember the last time i saw her. it was while she still lived in california. i can't remember when she left though. it's been at least 3 years since i've seen her. i talked to her last year though. i said i wanted to visit. she said that'd be wonderful. where here i fucking am going to visit now! why could you wait a little longer! why didn't anyone tell me how bad your situation had become. etc. etc. the guilt creeps in. the anger is stronger. i am so not in the family loop for news.

i drive over to my grandparents' house and help my grandmother and aunt run errands. my grandmother's knee is doing well. i feel like she should sit down and rest but she's not that kind. she's from a different era. plus no one tells my grandmother what to do. we go to several places but seem to travel on only a few streets. i take them to the bank, the post office, their storage facility to get the suitcases, wal-mart, and a grocery store. i felt like a fucking commerical at wal-mart! "wal-mart was there for us when we needed them" kind of shit. we were able to take care of several things at wal-mart, including getting prescriptions filled, a new battery for the car alarm remote, in case that was the issue (which it was, i'm such a genius), and socks for my cousin (because he's not even going on this trip and it has nothing to do with the funeral so of course we must do this extra errand). i was really lucky with parking. i was worried my grandmother would have to walk a long way with her bad knee so i would drop them off at the front entrance and then look for parking. several times i was able to find parking right in front. my grandma is my good luck charm.

after that, we went back to my grandparents' home and had lunch. just before we got to their house, this jerk almost crashed into us. he was turning into oncoming traffic and didn't see me coming! i swerved a little bit and my grandmother and aunt screamed in fright because if he hit us, it would be on their side. don't fuck up my grandmother's knee! she just got that fixed! luckily we avoided collision and were safe at the house. i used their computer to buy my plane ticket. i might as well be on the same flight if i'm going because i've never been to new england and i'd rather just tag along and let them drive. once i saw the price of the ticket, i wanted to back out though. it was *whew*. anyway, i can't back out. i said i would go. then i took my aunt to go shopping for some cheap funeral clothes. she didn't want anything she'd keep because it'd remind her of her sister. also, she wasn't prepared for this because she was on vacation. a crappy way to cut a vacation short. meanwhile, i'm trying to get a hold of people from work so i can let them know i'll be out for a few days. we don't even know when the damn funeral will be yet. we're guessing tuesday. when we got back to my grandparents' house, my mom was there. we chatted for awhile. she said she wanted to go to the funeral too. then i went back to her house for a bit. if i'm going to miss work then there's some things i need to take care of so i went to work for about 1 hour. then it was back to my grandparents' house. my uncle was there now. we had dinner. they cleaned out their fridge of things that would spoil. it sucks but i have to do the same. and we just bought all this food last night because i was going to be home alone for a few days while twiddle thumbs was in tijuana for work. i went home to do laundry and pack, stuff like that. none of us have return flight tickets because we don't know when the funeral is. my grandparents might even stay longer to help sort my dead aunt's affairs. plus, they don't have to rush back to work, they're long retired. we are flying out of a local airport i've never flown from and with a company i've never flown with. we're going to states i've never been too. by that measure, it's something to look forward to. otherwise, this fucking sucks!

p.s.
i forgot to mention i called my dead aunt's cell phone. it went to voicemail of course. it was strange to hear her voice, saying to leave a message, knowing that she is dead. i recorded it. i'm saving that because it's the only sample of her voice i have. i don't want to forget her voice. it's a little weird though because she says her legal name and we always called her by a nickname. i guess that makes the audio file i have now even more eerie.