The Up and Down Week

With all of the stuff that was going on last week, I can’t remember how much, if any, back story I gave you about last week.  I know I didn’t talk about the event we went to so I’ll just start there.  Long story short, our family got together last week for a couple of things.

On Thursday, we were invited to this tea where this organization was giving out a small scholarship in Mom’s name based on the donations received at her funeral.  But my nephew was graduating from High School the Saturday before and my brother was having an open house on that Sunday.  So my other siblings came into town on Saturday and we all attended the open house.  That was to leave Monday as a day to do something here and then we’d road trip up to my Dad’s to spend some time there and attend the event on Thursday.

Of course, things don’t always go as planned.  On the way out to my brothers on Sunday, something either fell off the car in front of me or it kicked up something on the road.  Basically, a flat black square of something was suddenly flying at my car and I had no way to avoid it.  It hit low and we drove over something so I was checking the tire pressure and engine temperature all the rest of the way.

But we got there and back without incident and it was dark when we left so I didn’t notice until the next day that it had knocked out the front grill that protected the radiator.  And, of course, it was not as simple as just putting a new grill back in so I spent Monday going between the body shop and getting a rental car for the drive up on Tuesday.

It was great seeing everyone again although there were some bittersweet moments over the week.  To be honest, the toughest parts where when I was driving by myself around the town.  Because, when your alone, you’ve got way too much time to think and I had several random rounds of near tears just because I would see something that would trigger some memory and because of the whole “wrongness” of being in the town knowing she wasn’t there anymore.

Dad is doing a little better.  There are more people around and so he has more visitors and less time to be alone in the house which is a good thing.  We took him to dinner on Tuesday and we took shifts at the house because having too many people in the house at once kind of stresses him a bit.  Too many conversations that he can’t follow and then he starts wondering what everyone is talking about.  And he still worries and fusses about a lot of things – like needing to call the bank to verify that a check has been deposited.

Before the tea, we stopped at the local humane society which was another thing Mom was deeply involved in and that also received donations.  They had attached a little paw print plaque with her name on a board right as you walked in.  I think the rest of the plaques were in honor of animals that had been adopted but I think she would have been fine being there among the cats and dogs.

I should also mentioned that I stopped at the cemetery in the morning.  We had only been there once right after the funeral and my brother was driving so I didn’t remember exactly where she was.  Fortunately, I found a worker at the cemetery who took me right to the spot.  I don’t think she realized I was kind of a mess (think the sunglasses hid the tears) because she’s going on about the weather and other things.  I’m trying to thank her without really being able to talk and just hoping she’d get the hint and move on.

The tea itself was nice.  There were other scholarships and others being honored.  When they got to Mom, they brought up one of her good friends who talked about all the things that she had done.  Some of this we knew but Mom wasn’t one to talk about what she did so some of it was new.  It was nice to hear how much of an impact she had.  They also acknowledged us and we got to stand.  Talked to my brother later and we were both close to tears during that introduction.  OK, I was in tears but managed to hold it together.  It was a week of ups and downs.

And not to bring up another subject but if you were thinking that I might have overreacted hiding all my posts, it might help to know that there were a lot of strong emotions that week.

I do have a lesson tonight.  I don’t know how it will go since I wasn’t really thinking about dancing last week.  The other problem is I’ve got my workout on Tuesday afternoon.  This is with the younger guy (probably in his late 20’s) who is of course very fit and strong and he tends to push me a bit more than the other trainer.  Its all good but I usually come home worn out and then have to go back out to the study to try and maintain a good frame.

So that’s kind of what’s been going on.  Life will be back to a more normal routine for the next couple of weeks.