nixtress's Diaryland Diary

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bodies r us

Nonchalantly this afternoon, my aunt asks if I'm aware that I'll probably be the person who finds my grandmother dead.

Am I aware? And if that happens I'm to call her first and then 911 secondly.

The ENTIRE family had a pow wow to try to figure out the best way to broach this topic with me, the proper way to prepare someone to find their grandmother no longer alive. Like I need prepared. I go up there to that apartment building for the elderly twice daily and sometimes more, to see my grandparents and talk to them, to monitor their meds and make sure that things in the overall view are ok. Of anyone else in the family, I think I'm probably the MOST aware that I'll find her. I wake her up most mornings, ringing her damn buzzer (feeling like a jerk for doing so). I'm fully aware that there will come a day when she won't get up to buzz me in.

It almost made me laugh (in a really horrified way), the manner in which my aunt said this all to me. As if it were the most natural thing in the world to offhandedly discuss the finding of your own mother's body with your niece. It was all just so..bizarre.

The general consensus seems to be that I'm a GOOD person to come across this situation, because they all seem to think I'll keep it together until I don't have to anymore. I guess it's nice to see that my family has faith in my composure in the face of loss. I'm really not sure if this is a backhanded compliment or what.

***

My sons are in the pool making noises like seals and dolphins, the most ungodly shrieking anyone's ever heard. And I remember,when I was a kid, watching reruns of Flipper on our old black and white, tiny screened television (we weren't wealthy folks) and thinking there was no way dolphins and people interacted that way.

Sort of like the old Lassie reruns as well..."Lassie, go get help!"

It always made me laugh..not as much as my sons are now, however. They've got the best imaginations and come up with things I'd have never thought of at their ages.

Pretty flippin' cool.

N.

3:26 p.m. - 2003-07-16

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