Ah, Life!

It loves to throw a curve ball now and then. Yesterday morning I received an e-mail from a friend asking for people to hold both of her grandfathers in their thoughts, as they had both ended up in the hospital at the same time (one in a diabetic coma and the second after having a series of seizures). I wrote back, sending my love and letting her know my grandmother had just died. I also wrote "If anything were to happen to my other grandma right now I just don't think I could take it."

So it's my own fault, really. I was tempting fate. I thought I couldn't take it and fate thought, "I bet you can. Watch." It's nothing horrible, really. She's still alive. It's just that within minutes of sending that e-mail I received an e-mail from my cousin that read:

It's been a while since I've emailed....how are things? Dennis [that's my biological father--we only speak to each other if we have to] had to move Grandma Nolie to a full care facility this weekend. Her demeanor has really changed just recently [dementia--apparently she had a shoving match with one of the servers in the cafeteria]. The new place she is in is smaller and already furnished so I wanted to know if there were anything that you would like to take home. I am planning on having the sofa and chairs shipped here to Texas along with a mirror. If you don't want the china that she has I would take that too. I just want to keep some of her things in the family. Hopefully you can get back to me today as it is costing $1000 / week to keep the apartment until we can empty it. Call if that would be easier. Hope to hear from you soon.

So even though my plan for the week was to wallow in self pity (Why did I delete Grandma's last voicemail message?! Why didn't I go over her estate with her while she was alive?! Why do I have a sinus infection now of all times!? Why do Grandmas have to die anyway!?) while getting together the newsletter that I edit for a writers group (Why did I say I would edit their newsletter!?) I've had to shift gears. Yesterday I met my dad at my grandma's and packed up some of her stuff. Today we are renting a truck so we can bring some of her furniture up to our house. Today we are also taking Jerry to the orthodontist and going on a field trip to the Long Beach Aquarium. I'm not sure how we'll fit it all in but I'm not complaining. I'm not going to tempt fate to throw anything else my way.