About grandma

I'm thinking (about life and death) and how awfully we dread the end and how tragic it seems that some who have seen and learned so much, would simply vanish, their brain instantly lost.. Since accidents and disease are mandatory (but then even if we all had an exact fair amount of time to live in, most would complain) and as terrible a thought as it is that my grandma hasn't got much left to live, she has a really good life - only the last few years were messy, as she is lonely BUT refuses to be friendly and bored, BUT refuses to take on any interests and vital BUT refuses to go uphill to my parent's place to tend to a garden or something, something that would make her feel happy.. As an insane bitch as I may sound saying it, she is living too long. It is sad to watch her hate it.

            In childhood we're suppose to stick to our parents and nourish ourselves and learn the skills in order to stray from the cave. In teenagehood we are meant to begin reproducing and serving the benefit of the whole community, hence the crazed need to be noticed, different, independent and hyper sexual. Hating the parents is first on the list. Around 2o, that settles down and most breed and perform crafts while others take another 10 years. From 3o to 4o, the purpose of an evolved species is to tend to the young. Women shelter while males provide. At fifty, you're already old and alone again, but in modern age, that's just the means to a second start. You start over: change the job, the house, the car, the friends, the philosophy and many find this to be amazingly rewarding. At 6o you've better settled yourself in nicely to be able to retire in relative calm and spend the remaining years in comfort. By 7o, you're wise and out of time and mostly folk comes to you for stories and money. You watch grandchildren graduate - or not - but mostly nothing really original happens around you. 8o and 9o you're just something in the warm corner, something delicate and silly that drool - even if you're not really, that's how people treat you. Understandably that pisses you off and several old people panic and start acting out, accusing their kids of mean treatment and starving for their proximity but in truth they're annoying and invasive..

                  What the fuck to do? For a long long time I went for a walk with my gran every morning, before I went to work and we would talk and talk. I got married and we continued to do it, though because I was often unhappy, I'd rather bicker than talk.. Every time I'd leave for a lengthily travel, gran would have seizures and fits and attacks and several other medical emergencies and obviosly she'd get really good at them with time, as we wouldn't fall for them anymore. She was literally capable of making herself badly ill because we refused to come rushing for the sevenhundredth time. But then I grew up I guess. I stopped being so interested in how people around me are feeling and started putting my own stuff before, which confused and offended most greatly. No, I don't wanna go for another coffee in which you'll just say 'I told you so, I knew it will never work since day one' about my marriage, looking down on my need of money as 'you shouldn't have given it all to that stingy faggot'... Sorry. I wanna be alone or go to the movies with my friends.

                Course she didn't have many other mates. Several of her lifelong friends have passed on already and at one point or another she's be in a fight with others in the family - she has the superb tendency of telling people why she never liked them.. Then she's confused why they don't forget that and go out with her. She moved out of the downtown apartment and into retirement home for several good reasons, prime one being she'll have more company now should she yearn for it. And of course the retirement home is like 5 minutes away in this town. And I give her things to do and call her and meet her for coffee and it always leads to shit till nobody wants to talk to her anymore and she calls Picek at work. He's too polite to turn her down. What the fuck she's up to now, I don't know, but since last time she wanted to sue dad for making mum miserable (there was a big fight and mum got drunk - the women of our family are melodramatic that way - it's why every man in this family needs oooooooodles of patience), I imagine now she'll sue mum for taking away her royalties (nobody knows how financial affairs in this family actually run, but almost all run through mum and since we always have mum to handle paperwork, I'm fairly certain they entered a mutual agreement at some point, which gran forgot about or changed her mind several years later and is now convinced mum stole from her.

I understand completely the stories now, how children kick old folk out, take their things, etc... It actually goes like this: Old folk offer stuff and for a while everything is honky dory, up until the first fight. Then out come the accusations "I gave you everything I had and this is how you replay me?! By denying me this one small thing I ask of you?...." and those soon start to cook amidst other old folk, how the things were stolen, blackmailed, conned, etc, out of their arthritic hands.  Grandma supported me when I was in college and since she had lots of money, I bought lots of books and painting material (Some of which I STILL use ten years later), but she now believes I demanded that money and gave it all to my ex husband to support him so he would like me. All the stories are partially true, but things taken out of context make for a pretty grim history. Either way, when she says stuff like that about me to her morning walks buddies, I feel pretty damn bad about it. And when then she materializes on my doorstep to bring me cake or something, and I refuse to take it, I am ungrateful and mean and rude and should see a shrink because I obviously have many problems with myself  which I all take out on her, who has only ever done anything to make sure we're happy..

And

so

on

For the last 15 fucking years of trial and error.