Sorry, been a tough week.

Since my last post, it has been a tough week. It has taken everything I can muster to hold it together, and I am doing a lousy job of it. 

Last Thursday evening I get a call from a dear family friend, Aunt Judy. She is not really my Aunt, she isn't related to me in any way, or to my foster-mom, but she was my foster-mom's next door neighbor for a long time. Well, anyways, we keep in touch. About once a year she will take me to dinner and we will catch up, and because she works where I bank, we will see each other there.

Judy doesn't really have anyone. Her husband left her when their only daughter graduated High School, and with her daughter now living in Tennessee with her own family, she only has her friends to lean on. So, anyways, I get a call at about midnight, and if not for the caller ID on my cell phone, I wouldn't have known it was her.

I know if she is calling me this late, there is something wrong. So that is kind of how I answered the phone. I said something like, "Hello, Aunt Judy, what's wrong?" She answered my saying that "something is wrong with me." But her words were slurred horribly and really slow. BOOM! I went in to panic mode and had to keep myself from scaring her more by showing my panic. I told her that I was going to call 911, and I would call her back in 2 minutes. I knew what it was, a stroke of some kind.

I called 911, explained what was going on and hightailed over to her house. She lives in a tiny house on the numbered streets, and I live at least 5 miles and 15 stop lights away. I kept her on the phone the whole time, telling her to stay sat down, and not to talk, only to say things like "huh uh" or "uh huh". I was only a mile or two down the road when she stopped answering me, and less than 2 minutes later, I could hear the ambulance and fire truck over her phone. The sirens were followed by pounding on the door, and some muffled yells before someone broke down her door. By the time I got there, she had passed away.

That was fucking tough.

So, her daughter comes back with her kids and husband and make arrangements for a funeral, which they held on Monday. So I go through all that, and am still pretty shaken up, but I am keeping my emotions in check, and I am doing okay.

So, now it's Tuesday morning. I go to the gym, work out for a couple of hours, swim for a half an hour, spend time in the sauna, spend time in the steamer, take a quick shower, spend some more time in the hot tub........Yeah, I have been at the gym since 4am, and after my final shower I leave at about 7:30. Get in my car, and go a different way so I can get gas at a gas station I like because they have good drip coffee. Light turns green 2 cars ahead of me, first car goes through, car ahead of me starts through and they are hit by a big jacked-up Chevy Duramax doing about 50 (thinking he can beat a light that has already turned). The car in front of me is hit so hard that pieces of the car come back and hit my truck, the car flips twice before coming to rest on the drivers side leaned up against a steel light pole.

I am out of my truck before the smoke has even cleared and I am running up to the car. I didn't think about when I was behind her, but I knew I saw a car seat in the back of the car. I am the first one actually to the car, and I start to crawl through the broken back window. There, in an old outdated car seat, was a baby of maybe 6 months old. The baby was hanging by it's legs through the car seat and I start screaming that I need a blanket, call 911................I don't even really remember what I said. I gently free the baby from the seat belt of her seat, and I slowly back out of the car, using only my elbows (on the broken glass). It just so happens that where this wreck occurred is less than a mile from the hospital, so I have this older lady telling me that she is a nurse, and she can help. I didn't want to let that baby out of my arms until the ambulance got there. She was screaming and crying and had little cuts all over her, and I knew I just couldn't give her up. The ambulance got there right away (the wreck was 50 feet from a fire-station), and the paramedics took her from me. The mother wasn't so lucky, she didn't make it. I find a little bit later from someone who knew her that her husband was in prison for something or other, and the baby was placed in foster care because she had no relatives that were "able" to take her.

It broke my fucking heart, knowing that baby was probably going to spend her whole fucking childhood in foster care just like I did. So, I went home and finally just cried. I think I cried for an hour straight. I actually cried for so long that I couldn't stop. 

I haven't seen Michelle in more than a week and a half because she is visiting her mom. I talk to her every night, and although we are just "fuck buddies" right now, I still don't feel like I can tell her what I am going through emotionally. So I have been sitting around, watching TV, and feeling sorry for myself.

Okay, well, here is the kicker. Remember Lacie from my story about Las Vegas? Well, I get a call last night from a mutual friend who just found out that Lacie killed herself that afternoon by overdosing on Ambien (or one of those sleeping drugs). She didn't leave a note, and didn't leave a hint about shit. She just upped and fucking killed herself. Lacie has always been one of those girls who was always just on the edge of depression. Even in high school, there were times where is was so bad it was manic. (She was a cutter). Everything that happened bad to Lacie was the worst thing ever, and you knew that someone was going to have to help pull her from her gutter and get her back on her feet. Michelle and Lacie were the closest, and by the time I called Michelle back, she had already heard and was absolutely devastated. I mean, I am too, but to hear Michelle be that devastated was really hard, and when I hung up the phone with her, I totally fucking lost it again.

I slept in this morning and didn't go to the gym. Michelle called me at about 9 to tell me she was catching a flight back home. I talked to a dozen different people on the phone all morning, and sat around waiting for Michelle to call when she landed at 3:30. 4 comes and goes, then 5, then 5:30............I lost it again. Michelle doesn't want to call because................Michelle doesn't want to see me because.................................yeah, yeah, boob boob boob. I pulled myself up at about 6:30, showered, and went to Starbucks on the west end to get a frappacinno. She called me about 8 and said that the second she landed, her phone was overloaded with messages, one being from Lacie's mom who wanted Michelle to come over right away. So, that's were she was. I was a boob for nothing. Well, not really nothing, it has been a fucked week.