It’s a book. The title of a book, that is. One that’s, yes, a smidge on the nose now, I’ll give you.

But it is one of my absolute favorites and that looks like it’s coming back into print, albeit with a dogshit new cover. HERE

A Night in the Lonesome October (where is the underline feature, WordPress?! oh well) tells the story of a group of magical people in 1890s England, told through the story of their familiars, and the chapters are laid out by the days of the month.

So I (then my husband and I, and now back to just I) read a chapter a day through the entire month of October. It’s funny and unique and I get something new from it every time I read it these, oh, twenty years I’ve been doing it.

Here it is with damn near the best breakfast I’ve ever had: runny egg on a piece of 5 cheese Texas toast and some parsley because I felt like being fancy. It’s like an old friend, this book. And I mean that in the sanest and most serious way I can express it.

It’s been busy around here. In some good ways. And some bad ways.

Let’s hit some good ways first.

I decorated for Halloween a few weeks ago- I’m especially enjoying the bats swooping through the front window.

I had a neighbor text me that they were so impressed seeing me walk my youngest to school each day and do normal things like decorate for Halloween that it inspires her to keep going through her own hardships. (she’s going through a messy divorce.) That’s so nice of her to say.

But now I worry people see the decorating as “she’s getting back to normal” and that makes me feel weird. What it really is is a desperate pursuit of anything that can give me some dopamine hits and make me happy, if even for the briefest of moments. And that I do those things when I’m struggling and not when I’m not struggling makes me feel so… unseen and misunderstood. For people to be like, relieved and glad for me about it, or something.

Me to myself: “Let nice people say nice things, you.” Me back at me: *blows raspberry*

BUT. Count it in the Good category because the decorations still make me happy. Ish. Happyish.

It feels very similar to this, I guess.

Also this.

It is what it is and it’s just so entirely out of my control I can’t do anything about it, you know? Anyway.

Second good thing: Anyone remember this giant thing?

IT JUST SOLD FOR EIGHT THOUSAND DOLLARS IN A GALLERY! EIGHT THOUSAND!

And sure, the gallery takes half, but oh my lord I KNEW that painting had what it took, I just KNEW it. Also… as much of a hassle as that whole thing was I totally would do it again. I applied some of those earnings to getting some electrical work done we needed, a ring camera for the front installed, some motion activated lights installed in the back (safety and peace of mind things) and with getting the front door painted.

It isn’t my alma matter color, though it is burnt orange, for the simple fact that I think the University of Texas has the worst color orange ever… and also I wasn’t going for school pride with my door, anyway. It was originally a dark brown, and so it drastically changes the look of the front in a “significant refresh to the whole thing” way. Y’all will remember I originally got the paint and was planning to do it myself and then I totally didn’t. Is cool- I shall use the painting money for painting- it seems appropriate.

Third (forth?) thing is I also bought a purse I’ve wanted for it’s ridiculousness, forever. Say it with me now: “nothing means anything so why the hell not.”

It’s so stupid I love it. Call me Mick Dundee, I guess. I actually DO really love it. But it’s so incredibly over the top. Look at me- I’m just totally in the mood for that these days I guess!

And I cleaned out the shed. And I cut back the roses. And a ton of other plants. And I weeded. And then, because I found out that the compost pile was where the mice were and it was also the thing attracting the possums to the yard even without the chickens and maybe MAYBE what might have been a fox I saw without glasses that one time… I did this. Instead of composting.

Don’t come for me about air quality. I can’t send bamboo or rose branches to the green recycling center anyway. And three beers and watching a fire for a few hours was really cathartic.

In other good news I’m lifting weights again and on a bit of a health kick.

And my recent bloodwork had come back as all normal again after FALLING OFF A CLIFF NO WONDER I THOUGHT I WAS DYING back in June. My thyroid has never been better. My cholesterol (never very high to begin with) is now even lower (no more breakfast tacos in bed will do that to a person). My estrogen and testosterone are back to normal after insanely cratering a few months ago. Like… I thought grief had just catapulted me into menopause, honestly. But my cycle is now back, after a 4 month hiatus. And my incontinence/leaking issues (Sorry, TMI) are gone with my hormones coming back up and leveling out. Weird how the body knows something was so very wrong and responded accordingly I guess. But all of that (ALL OF IT), during the summer, felt like just one more thing betraying me in a world that had already done so. ET TU, bladder?! Anyway, I can wear light colored denim shorts and jeans again and that’s cool.

But also… when it all went haywire and wrong I felt like my body was a traitor. “When I have nothing, now I don’t even have you, you jerk?!” And now that my levels are better and my hip pain is gone, and my bladder is fine and I can sneeze with impunity… it is ALSO a traitor. “It’s all not better so why are you, you jerk?!”

But it is getting better. And I can say that knowing it is nowhere near fully better and also it won’t ever really be better better. But I am, most of the time, when I’m not buying crocodile purses and lots of Halloween decorations at 11pm that is, predominantly peaceful. And that’s so different from the “predominantly happy” I was in the before time. But it isn’t “predominantly unhappy and unpeaceful” anymore like it was in June and July, at least.

I guess I can accept peaceful. I actively work for it, anyway. And now I will add healthy to the peaceful and this also feels like an okay spot to be. Oh, I also bought a bike I haven’t ridden yet but it’s taller than my old one, which I needed. Maybe today, she tells herself, again…

And the cats are a constant support. (the dogs are a trial though yall. I’m so not a dog person. They’re great and all… they’re just not cats, you know?)

SOMEONE finally remembered he’s not a stray and started coming in again. Alabama did this last summer too- he and Lacey must like the intense summer heat because they both didn’t step foot through the cat door from June to the end of August, the weirdos. But he’s back to his spot at the foot of the bed for the last month.

And Asher is just full on hilarious. I did not put the covers on him like that. He burrows underneath to do it himself. He’s so hilarious you just have to smile.

And Sally is ALREADY flouting the “No cats on the kitchen counters at least when I’m looking” rule. She is so little. And is already taking no guff from the dogs whatsoever. They better watch out for that one.

But in the not great bucket we had this:

The county fair. I entered nothing, I just couldn’t muster the energy. But I went. And I wore my cowboy hat. And the girls enjoyed it. And it was hot, and dusty, and good to see it and be there again. But I’m not sure it counts in the good pile. Because while I wasn’t on the verge of tears the whole time, I was on the verge of the verge of tears the whole time.

It was a special place for me and my husband. I felt the lack of his hand in mine the whole time. When I could, I filled it with an eight year old’s hand… but it isn’t the same. I took many pictures. But this one kinda sums it up to me.

What of it.

Some things are hard.

It’s as it should be.

And then… this next thing.

I’ll say this exactly like I said it to my grief group two weeks ago:

Y’all I don’t want you to worry about me when I say this next thing, I really am alright, but my Mom died on September 18th.

So here’s how that all happened.

She fell asleep on Saturday night, my dad couldn’t wake her up on Sunday morning, she never regained consciousness at the hospital, and was gone by 2am Wednesday morning/Tuesday night.

I went up on Tuesday at 9am to listen in during the doctor’s rounds (Dad had little news to say from his meetings with the doctors for us, so I wanted to hear for myself) and heard them say “All we can do is supportive care.” I said: “I hate to interrupt but can I ask if supportive care is the same thing as palliative care?” And they said they’d be back after rounds to explain. I then immediately called my brother to come in from Houston as this sounded all more dire than we were led to believe- he left work 15 minutes after that and was in town by that afternoon.

My Dad was just not capable of hearing it. It didn’t process to him until much, much later in the day that she would not be getting better. Not this time.

My mom had her struggles and I had my struggles with her. But I sent her out of this world with a message from me that I thanked her for everything she did. And I forgive her for everything she couldn’t. And to please not hang around me, but if she wanted to do something for me she could watch over the girls and nudge them away from danger occasionally, should they need that.

After she passed I looked at the full moon on the drive away from the hospital and I wished her good luck on her journey, and that whatever the next place was I hoped it was more gentle for her. I then rolled down the windows and threw salt in the corners when I got home and I don’t have a mom anymore.

In the days since I’ve hit a few days where I was mad at her. Mad for always telling me when I was a kid how dramatic I was for things that I should have been allowed to be mad about. For how she could never seem to get a handle on her vices. For how she treated me differently from my brother. Etc etc.

And grief anger is new- I never had it with Lucas’s passing. But oh I almost didn’t know what to DO with it, the anger. I tried to explain it to my brother and my best friend and they both told me to not be bitter. Which… wow did that feel like a slap. But they were both mourning my mom and, as most people do, they were at a stage where they were putting her on a pedestal and turning her into a saint- so they didn’t want to hear it from me. It isn’t their fault.

My therapist though just said: Yeah, that’s normal. You’re being mad about things you were never allowed to be mad about, from childhood. And it’s dredging up some of the more recent stuff with it. That’s normal- just don’t get stuck in it- that would be bitterness. (I paraphrase, of course.) And I didn’t get stuck in it, thankfully. Once expressed- poof, the anger was gone. It just needed to be acknowledged before it went, is all.

And I’ll never exactly know why things were as they were. But for me I just go:

I look a lot like her. There were many similarities between us i guess, (the sound of our voices is a big one) that I guess her own self-loathing just bled over to me. The issue she had with me (I can say after YEARS of therapy) was all about her and not about me… and so I don’t own it in the way I used to.

And yet after so many of her friends and acquaintances telling me in a one week span how much I looked like her I did still freak out and dye my hair. That’s normal, right? lol.

“I am not my mother” is a sane thing to want in a haircut, I promise.

That’s because I am, David Tennant- shut up. The makeup can only do so much.

Anyway.

Here is a funny thing (IS IT?!?!)

As my mom’s body was shutting down her body stopped processing the fluids she was on at the hospital… so her abdomen was super swollen when she passed. (funny story upcoming- hang in there). This was of concern to my dad the next day as he didn’t want her cremated naked, but none of her clothes would fit. And sure, they offered to cut them up the back and place them around her, but that didn’t seem right.

And then I said: “Hey dad, this may be weird…. but I was at this estate sale one time and…”

And so that’s how my mom was cremated in an authentic Mauritanian funeral shroud from Africa that I got for $10 at an estate sale and was intending to turn the 13 yards of fabric into a multi tiered circle skirt but just never got around to. Is that a funny story? hell, maybe I’m not the best to judge! But I find it (kinda) funny so there is that. It was a good solution though- thanks estate sale.

At her ashes dispersal mini event we went around and shared some stories.

And I remember at her mother’s (my meemaw’s) ashes scattering that she had said “thank you for sewing my prom dress”- and so I said that same thing to her. As she had made me a beautiful prom dress.

And I also said that I hung on to a note she sent me when I was struggling in my first year off at college in February of 1999. The note said: “Spring is here, good things to come.” And I cried as I told that little story. But not for the reasons most would have thought. It’s always been true, those words, and I have hung onto them as a mantra ever since. Hardship does eventually pass. There is always hope. And in that first instance she was so, so right.

Because spring did come.

And I met Lucas just a mere month later.

And he was my good thing, back in 1999, that appeared in my life, and it was just right around the corner and I could never have seen it coming when she mailed me that note in February.

But now it is October. And 2024.

And the fall isn’t even really here yet, and we have to get through winter too.

But one day, there will be a spring.

And inexplicably as it seems now, I know there will be good things to come.

So thanks for that Mom.

It meant a lot to me.