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Thursday, Apr. 03, 2003 - 8:02 p.m.

They always say �Don�t speak ill of the dead�, but this will be hard to do�plus: try to read this one all the way to the end- the whole entry isn�t a total downer, I promise�.

My Step-grandmother died last night.

She is one of those people who has been �dieing� for about 30 years.

You know the type: they manipulate people around them by using guilt. �You don�t care about me, because you would spend more time with me if you did. I will be dead soon, you know!�

I think this woman told my Step mom this (or something close to it) a few hundred times over the past decade or two. Because of this, my Dad and Step mom�s marriage hasn�t been what it could have been.

My Step mom would succumb to the guilt like a battered woman stays with the man who slaps her around. I don�t think there is much difference between the two relationships: the one in power controls the weaker individual with threats, guilt, or the backside of a hand. The weaker one keeps coming back for more.

Don�t take this as an attack on my Step mom. She has always been a good person, to a fault. She is Codeman�s favorite �grandma�, and he still has his two �blood� grandmas to choose from, too.

I won�t go much into what this now-diseased person was like to live around. Codeman and I mowed her lawn for several years, mainly so my dad wouldn�t be stuck doing it for her. She was never anything but disagreeable whenever we did this job. At the time, she was confined to a wheelchair (due to advanced diabetes), and had convinced my step mom that she couldn�t even get out of the chair without her help.

I can�t tell you how many times I walked into the house quietly, only to find her standing at the sink, taking a drag on another one of her ever-present Newports . I played along, taking a step or tow back and calling her name. She would hustle over to the chair and resume her sitting position.

She passed away at the age of 83. Pretty long life, for someone with life-long diabetes, and who chain-smoked cigarettes for 65 of those years. Up until the end, she still went through a carton of smokes every 4 or 5 days.

Her WWII-hero husband passed away about 10 years ago. That was when she kicked the manipulation of my Step mom into overdrive. So, even while she was fighting cancer herself, her mom was still calling her at all hours, expecting her to come over and cook a pot of Mac and cheese or something at a moments notice.

So, goodbye, Mary. If there is an afterlife, I am sure you are in for some real surprises about now�.


I hope her passing away finally gives my Step mom some peace of mind.

She needs this, after what she has been put through for her entire 65 years.

Yeah, that�s another thing- Step grandma got pregnant when she was still in high school.

A big no-no back in 1938.

And she blamed my Step mom for being born the rest of her life.

Enough!

This has got to be the biggest downer entry I have ever written here�.


Lease�s workplace is taking a collection for supplies for soldiers serving in Iraq. She wanted to pick some stuff up after work tonight. She stopped by the house to take me along first, and we went to the local Walgreen�s.

She had a long list of things the troops are supposedly in short supply of. We narrowed our purchases down to H&B items. Disposable razors, lip balm, wet-naps, and liquid hand sanitizers.

Oh yeah, and a few bags of Starlight mints.

You can�t just be clean shaved and sanitized, can you?

Don�t forget- most of the soldiers are just kids (19 or 20 years old for many).

They are as much homesick as their classmates, away to college for the first time.

Except they have bullets whizzing over their heads�.


One positive item from my day:

I filled my wall-o-waters and placed them around 4 tomato plants I started inside about 4 weeks ago.

I had ripe cherry tomatoes about mid-June last year, and we had a cold spring. The rest of the crop didn�t start producing until mid July.

This year, I started 2 grape tomato plants (�Santa Lucia�, just like you get in the clamshells at the local Wallyworld) and 2 early tomato plants (�Siberia�) for these season-cheaters. I have read that �Siberia� is the earliest full-sized tomato available to the home gardener.

I�ll let you know how they do�.


Oh yeah- this link MIGHT take you to my photo of the Wall-o-waters that I took last year.

Then again, it probably won�t (if past experience holds true)���.

Antique - Futuristic


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