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I got to wondering how my grandparents were as parents. My mom has 4 brothers. My grandmother was a closet alcoholic. Literally. Would hide her glasses of booze around the house and sneak and take sips during the day. 3 of her children were major alcoholics. Though they weren’t smokers, 3 of their children did get lung cancer (they all did smoke). The youngest wasn’t a smoker, but did get prostate cancer.
I was talking to my aunt last week about them as parents. What triggered the questioning was my cousin saying that her dad (who’s the eldest brother) said that my grand father was horribly abusive. Used to beat him all the time. When I asked my aunt (married to the youngest) she said my grandfather didn’t have a mean bone in his body. That’s just what people did back then, they corrected their children.
Here’s how their lives have played out: All are emotionally closed off.
1- eldest became an alcoholic and was verbally and sometimes physically abusive to his family members, ended up divorced. Had 4 kids, none of which are speaking with each other because they all fight. – Lung cancer
2 – 2nd eldest – disowned pretty much the whole family about 20 years ago
3 – my mom – I’ve given most of my life story. She did quit smoking when she found out she had cancer. When it was close to being considering cured, she started smoking again. Now she’s up to pack and half a day. Coughs non stop, already diagnosed with COPD and it’s getting worse. Struggling to breathe just walking from one room to the next.
4- Major alcoholic. Also the uncle that we avoided as kids. Always had some perverted remark to say to us. Especially once we hit around 8 – 9 years old. Still had issues with him drunk and making inappropriate comments and interactions with his nieces not too long ago. – Lung cancer
5- He’s the jokester. The bullshit artist too. Was always fun to do stuff with though when we were growing up. Couple years ago got diagnosed prostate cancer and diabetes. You can talk business or politics with him, but not much more than that. Similar to my mom. Both go into attack mode if you question them.If you ask them most will tell you how they had a great childhood. But I don’t get the impression looking at the situation that’s exactly true. None will even really admit to anything negative happening other than the eldest.
I only got to hear part of the spaces you posted yesterday. Did make me smile hearing you laugh so much and everybody sounding like they were having fun.
I’m stuck.
That’s the reality of the situation.Every day it’s a battle. My heart says go and my brain says no.
I was sad about one thing, got it off my mind by talking about other stuff, then got sad about another.
Spent most of today trying to get my sleeping arrangements made for December. Takes a bit to coordinate with where I want to go and what’s available. Did work it out to be able to see my half sister along the way for a couple days. She and her husband might even go camping for the weekend with me. Hopefully get to see my half brother too while I’m there. Running into a bit of a hiccup over New Years. have 5 days unscheduled till I get to where I want to go. There’s a rv park I have my eye on but no openings as of yet.
I signed up for a membership with Encore / ThousandTrails. Sounds like a pretty good deal but availability has been a little bit of an issue for the places I wanted to go to in Florida. Haven’t worked on my trip back from the keys yet outside of eyeballing somethings I want to do. Def going to see if I can use it though as I wrap around the coast. It was $590 for the year for the zone and another 300 or something for the trails. You don’t have to pay a thing for your over night stays in the majority of campgrounds, but you are limited to 21 days (if available). Southern TX has a bunch of them. Age restricted to 55+ but I called and they said I was fine. Going to hit South Padre Islands and probably hang down there a bit, dip into Mexico for some sight seeing. My passport should be here in plenty of time.
Something wonky is happening with twitter the last day or so too. I go to click on the post that pops to put in my picture and it takes me to a completely different post. Earlier, it was your post, Brain but that took me to different posts of yours. Now it was your post that took me to an add.
Got really sad this morning. Was pretty excited yesterday getting everything scheduled. Found some fun places to visit, coordinated time with the sis, saved some money with the places I picked.
The money triggered it today. I’m not making any, just blowing through it. The couple months here with family I thought I was gonna save some, and its been incredibly expensive with the RV repairs and Vet bills. So, yes, it’s a good thing I’m here to offset it, but it’s still draining the bank account.
The thing is, I loved traveling around and seeing places. Loved taking my pictures. Loved when the places I was at aligned with things that popped. Loved when the map jacks happened and I would up in cute towns, or on streets with names that made me laugh. See and go. That was the routine I got into when I got to the point of wining it. But, early days I stayed along time in each place. Florida last year cost between 6k – 8k per month. It’s a tourist trap for sure, but I had lots of things I wanted to see and did enjoy just about every minute of it.
I wanted to reduce my time in Florida but I keep feeling like I have keys to collect. So Im trying to work that out and get out of FL as soon as possible while still enjoying my time there. Not having a car and trying to figure in Uber’s costs sucks. Trains/shuttles/buses are cheap, but scheduling is an issue. Travel time to and from has to be accounted for, which is much longer than a car, because I still have to worry about getting back soon enough so the dogs can go out.
Then I got to thinking about Rich, and how he lost his job but within 30 days of the hospital stay got a new job. His dream job actually, and got a great salary too.
I haven’t had any dreams about real money coming in. Just the one about lighting the pile of money on fire, then putting it out, and then keeping what we need and giving the rest away.
Which is fine, but what replenishes the pile? And how do I know how much I need if I don’t know what the goal of all this is or what I’m supposed to be trying to target?
I know I shouldn’t worry about the money aspect and most days I don’t but it hit me this morning.
What I want to do, and what I can afford to do, may very well be two different things. And that made me cry.
Only message I remember that had to do with finances is the article I wrote about only financing 65% of your approved mortgage amount for your home.
The 35% was supposed to pay for household and travel expenses. I already passed that 35%.
My time at the Night Lights festival was a little bit of an emotional roller coaster. When I first got there I was having fun roaming around taking pictures. Roamed through the crowd too to decide where I wanted to sit. Got to the front and decided there’s where I was going to stay.
All was good till I sat there and had an hour to wait. Then I got sad that I was there by myself. All the people were in couples or groups chatting and laughing together and I didn’t have that luxury.
So, I tried to occupy my time. Took pictures awhile. Then decided to draw my lantern. The last time I did a space theme. It was at the beginning of the process. I drew Jupiter and then Saturn with an asteroid crashing into it. I was upset and confused then, and even though I had a group of people with me, I had to try really hard to keep it all together. The weather was interesting too. Very windy, so when the lanterns got released they were a bit chaotic.
I did the tree on the front. And then I did the surfer on the back. The surfer for two reasons. First, cause I was definitely riding the waves during that countdown but also cause I wished Brian was with me to see it.
A little knife to the heart happened here.
The final couple minutes of the countdown they started giving instructions. I was getting excited when the lanterns started going up. Then the instructions came and they said it was easier done with two people. Someone holding it close to the ground while the other lit the flame. And I was there trying to do both and take pictures too. Wasn’t working out very well.
I had to turn it sideways to light it, then lower it and what for the heat to fill it up so it could lift. When I put it close to the ground and straightened it up, I saw it had a hole in the top. I realized then it probably wasn’t going to rise, but tried anyway. It went up to about eye level, that’s when I got the picture. Then it just started to drift. I got upset at first and started following it across the grass to see if I could get it up. Nobody was in that area so I just kept toying with it a bit. Then I turned around to see how the field was looking.
Even though I didn’t have much success with my lantern, I did get great pictures and video of the evening. And I was in the perfect spot to film/photo it all. The wind was even blowing kind of diagonally so the lanterns all passed in front.
I immediately forgot about my lantern and started taking the pictures. Perfect weather for a beautiful display. The sky was filling up and it was gorgeous.
The situation did remind me of some of the happenings on my travels. I don’t tend to stay long in places, buzz in and buzz out. Get my pictures and go on my way. Since there was nobody to hang out with, or talk about things with, it was pointless for me to linger.
I did enjoy doing the group activities I found on trip advisor. Then I had people chat with while doing the activity.
Did have one though that got me pretty upset. It was a go-cart tour around a city. (don’t remember where) That really peaked my interest. Go-carts were fun and we used to go as a family outing every week to this go-cart track when I was growing up. We’d all race around. I won a lot 🙂
Anyway, this go-cart tour charged $75 a person. That’s what the ad said anyway. So when I went to register it was $150. The car held two people. So I’d have to pay double to go by myself. That was shitty. Felt like I was being punished for traveling solo.
My eye was drawn to it so then I thought well maybe Im supposed to do it. Then I said out loud, this like pouring salt in an open wound. Then I went to click on it, and the adventure was blocked out. Couldn’t register. Even though 5 minutes before I had full access to it. So I didn’t go.
I’m happy I didn’t either. Cause that would have been a bitter memory. I may have had fun on it, but that situation would have still bugged me.
One of the things I’ve realized lately is that there’s a lot dreams that I forgot. I say “dream” but frequently they are a series of different clips of scenes that all play in one session. When they happen they are usually too long for me to remember or get a grip on what it’s trying to tell me. I may retain a few highlights but the rest goes poof. I just figure my high mind will handle it and I don’t worry about the details.
As to the ones I forget, that’s been interesting too. Some of them come back, in a different wrapper when the situation is right. Then I’m like, hey! that was that dream but different!
I remember when I first asked Brian about them, I didn’t know what they meant. Or what they were supposed to do for me. He gave me instructions about writing them down, something about a few key words with my left hand. I tried it at first. Wrote down all the details about the dream, then did the few words as a title.
Still didn’t know what I was supposed to do with it. So I quit writing them down.
For awhile there I wished I had. Now that I know they can be reproduced, don’t think it matters much that I missed a chunk from the beginning. They can come back if they’re needed.
Bath time was all over the place today.
I was thinking about my eye sight. I needed glasses from around the 3rd grade. I couldn’t see what the teacher was writing on the chalk board. It kept getting worse over the years. Then they came out with Lasik surgery. Back to 20/20 sounded fantastic to me. I was -9 in both eyes. Everything was blurry. It had to be directly in front of my face for me to actually see it.
I guess I was around 27 when I got the surgery done. It was amazing to be able to actually wake up and see again. Didn’t have to fumble around to find my glasses to go about my day.
The side effects of that though was that my night vision took a downturn. Struggled with any lights in my eyes. On coming traffic just had big rings around the lights.
It also didn’t stop the progression. Was great for a little while but my eyes gradually started getting worse again. I would say it reset the clock but didn’t stop the tick.
But that got me wondering. If you can heal various organs by working the chakras, can you still do it if a surgery had intervened and altered it’s natural state?
I seemed to have stopped or slowed the progression, but need glasses when I drive. Especially at night. With the RV or with door dash, didn’t drive when it was dark. Not in familiar territory so didn’t want to risk it. Just stick with driving in the day. Usually had fun things to do by moon light anyway.
I should have said “other” fun things.
Cause I had fun driving. I wasn’t a fan of long drives before. Once I had a destination in mind, it all became fun. I loved the different landscapes I saw. On the way home from the Night Lights it was a beautiful ride. I left around 7 am so the sun was just coming up. The trees were all changing, and there were lots of rolling hills. A bit of fog coming up from the land. When I crested this one mountain, it was gorgeous. Wish I got a picture of it then. Kinda hard when you’re driving though. And pictures don’t come out as clear through a windshield. But I tried to get one further along my ride anyway.
Was thinking about my teeth earlier. I’ve had one cavity my entire life. Remembered the cave photo of the teeth, and the story was that people took pieces of them as souvenirs. That’s why they were cut down.
I did grind for awhile, so I did get damage and some wear and tear on the backs of my front teeth.
And thinking about that reminded me of my trip to the Poconos to visit my friend. She was saying how she kept having this reoccurring dream about needing to clean her teeth. We moved on from that topic and a bit later she showed me some photos she had of us. And that’s the funny part! The picture of our camping trip she had was of me brushing my teeth 😀 I was around 12 or 13 in the photo. Had my own style of mullet too back then.
Forgot to link the site I pulled up in the teeth post
We used to have dance competitions that were very fun between local studios. Each would send their team to compete in specific dances. When we left the Fred Astaire franchise chain we teamed up with a school in Delaware, so we were both Crystal Dance Clubs. The Delaware studio was quite a bit larger than ours and they hired quite a few top pros from the competition circuit. We had a smaller number of teachers and all of our teachers that were trained from scratch by us. Other than myself, none at the time were competition pros either. We had some team cheers going and poked fun at the other side. They told us we’d win when pigs fly. By the end of the afternoon we were carrying hand written signs “Home of the Flying Pig”
We kept that tag for the next one too. Even got flying pig balloons to decorate our tables. Don’t remember the result of the next one, but the memory of that first win brought a really big smile.
