When Does Tragedy Arrive?

Have you ever wondered what life will be like after you're dead and gone?
Will the flowers be pretty, will it be the casket you want, where will you be laid to your permanent rest?
Who will come to your funeral, who will cry the hardest?
Have you ever thought that you wanted to be in control of your destiny, deciding yourself on the way you'd go out?
The diseases and ailments that people die from today are vast and varied.
There is no way to "die beautifully."
Ever thought, "If I run the car off the road, right here, into those trees, it will all be over and I won't have to worry about ______.  The roads are slick, it will look like an accident and no one will be mad at me for killing myself."
Suicide is pretty vain every way you look at it..
It's selfish and rebellious.
I've thought about suicide not as a means to an end, but thought about whose hearts I'd break if I did.
(This is not a suicide letter by any means, I'm not contimplating suicide at all.
A friend's daughter's friend's mother killed herself this weekend over money troubles.)
I have too much to live for and most of my reasons are pretty selfish.
Well, they all are.
Rachel's Reasons for Not Committing Suicide: I don't want an autopsy, I hate flowers, I'll miss seeing so-and-so's ugly baby grow up, I'll miss seeing so-and-so get married, I'll miss seeing so-and-so get divorced, I'll miss my own wedding, I'll miss my own babies, I'll miss Boots.
On and on and on.
I'm not going to do it.
I am going to chase this thought rabbit that runs through my brain though.
(Has anyone else notice that my thoughts do kind of just run around from one thing to another?)
I think that most of us live our lives in extended anticipatory grief stages, bouncing back and forth between them and sometimes even repeating.
When we're teenagers, we think we're never going to die and we live our lives with reckless abandon.
That's Denial.
When we're a little older than teenagers, we start to realize that everyone and everything must die.
Live can't continue forever.
That's Acceptance.
When we hear about someone less than forty years old having a stroke, almost wrecking the car, and killing her family, but being saved by her youngest ten year old son, and being diagnosed with a brain tumor, we wonder why things like this happen in the prime of someone's life.
That's Anger.
And possibily some Depression.
We realize that we don't usually get a say in what happens to us.
We realize that whatever it is is going to happen to us and most times it's out of our hands.
Acceptance again?
Depression maybe?
The bottom line is, we all have to die.
It will be ugly, either tragic or debilitating.
We will die horrifically or either peacefully after long battles with various illnesses.
We never know when it's coming for us, unless we plan it.
I don't recommend planning your death.
Too many things can go wrong when humans start playing God.
Just let it happen.
Hope for the best and live life the way you want to remember it.

So this week was my last first week back at school and I missed every day of it.
I only go to school two days a week; its part of the program I'm in. 
I take 14 hours of classes in 2 days and then I work 40 hours a week at my job.
I missed Wednesday because it was Boots' grandmother's funeral.
It was a very nice funeral.
Its so different attending a funeral rather than working one.
I don't know what to do really, so I spent most of my time watching Boots like he was going to run away and leave me!
I wasn't scared being around these people that I don't really but kinda know, I just wanted to be with Boots.
Hold his hand everywhere we walked.
And I just like looking at him.
Observing.
I like watching the way he walks and watching him laugh at jokes while he's talking to other people.
I'm missing school today, Thursday, because of the snow.
My school's in Mississippi and they are scheduled to receive 4 to 6 inches of snow today.
So no school.
And now its starting to snow here in Alabama.
Ugh.
I hate snow.
Why does it ever have to snow in the South?
If we wanted snow that bad, couldn't we go up North to experience it?
It only creates headaches down here.

New Quarters

I'm not talking about money.
Guess where I'm sleeping tonight.
At the fun house funeral home.
Guess why.
Read this next part really fast just for kicks.
Trust me, it sounds better inside your head that way.
And imagine the voice that's saying it is really southern.
K?
Here goes.
Cuz I got a horrible gas leak and I almost woke up at work instead of coming to work because last night before I went to bed I almost left the gas logs on and went to sleep but I got up to turn them off because I was afraid that the extra heat would catch my couch (lovely couch!) on fire and then burn our  house stupid apartment where 8 dogs live upstairs nice apartment down but instead I might have prevented us from dying in our sleep of carbon monoxide poisoning!
Whew!
Out of breath now.
And that's quite a string of prepositional phrases.
OK, fast story slower.
The roommate came home from work, smelled gas, called landlady, no answer.
Proceded to hunt down call maintenance man.
Maintenance man arrives, says, "Ya gotta gas leak!", procedes to shut off gas, pops back in his truck with his lady friend and speeds away.
OK.
Now what?
Roommate decides maybe still not safe to breathe there, packs up my dog and since I gotta be on call for the "Hotel California" tonight, I'm sleeping at work.
In the dorm.
On one of the old twin beds.
Excellent.
I don't mind sleeping here, but I'd rather be at home sleeping in my bed because I KNOW whose cooties are in that mattress--mine!
And I gotta get ready for school here in the morning.
And Boots' grandma died last night.
Which really sucks.
I never even knew the lady.
He cried.
Which was really sad but I can't wait to see him cry Wednesday at her funeral.
I want to wrap my arms around him and squeeze him and love on him.
Is that wrong that I'm eagerly anticipating seeing the boyfriend cry?
It just occurred to me that I might be a tad bit excited.
Geez Louise, what kind of sicko am I?
Oh!
Aaaaaaaaannnnnndddddd......I'm up to 9 followers!
Yay me!