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Lately, life has sucked. My parents are dying in extreme slow motion and the holidays are coming up. You know the holidays -- that time of forced cheer that I despise. But, lest I get into a discussion about how much I hate Christmas and get off topic, I need to tell you all about how I humiliated myself at work yesterday.
Yesterday morning I got off work and came home, and my mother called as I was preparing myself some breakfast. I tend to panic a little when I see that my parents are calling because I figure it's one calling to tell me the other died. It wasn't this time thankfully. Just my mother in tears calling to tell me that she found one of her birds dead in its cage, plus she was afraid she was going to have to put her 12 year old cat to sleep. It has cancer, you see and had had a tumor cut out on Friday. By yesterday morning, the cat was following my mother around the house crying, and she had begun to smell awful, which made my mother think that it might be an infection.
That cat was very special (note the use of past tense) because in January of 1996 when my mother began to go blind, this cat just showed up at the back door one snowy morning with ice encrusted in her fur. My mother brought her in and fed her, and as she began to purr, my mother thought about here was this little thing that needed her and it gave her the strength to go on.
The cat paid her back later for that by saving her life. My mother had begun to slip into a diabetic coma and she told me that her last thought before she went under was that she hoped I would not be the one to find her dead body. Later, however, my mother woke up covered in cracker crumbs with that cat in her lap staring at her. Who got the crackers? My mother didn't.
But anyway... yesterday they took the cat to the vet and the last my mother saw of her, she was being carried off with her fur soaked by my mother's tears. And so, she same into our lives wet and left the same way, because my mother got home and got a call from the vet who told her plainly that it was gangrene and the cat was suffering.
And so they put her to sleep. My mother spent the day burning the cat's food dish and the box she slept in, and taking her litter boxes outside. She requested the vet cremate the cat because neither she nor my father, who is missing both legs now, could have dug a hole to bury her in. I heard about all of this when I called my mother on my way in to work last night.
When I got to work, several of the presses were down which meant that there wasn't enough work for the three of us visual auditors to do. We gather parts from the presses and inspect them. The two shift supervisors and us three auditors were in the central office and the supervisors told us this and asked if any of us wanted to go home.
"Hauntedheadnc?" one asked, and I replied that I wasn't sure I should because it would mean I'd be alone all night. I was starting to crack. They all looked at me funny.
And then I lost it. Had a fucking sobbing fit right there in front of both bosses and the other two auditors. That was a special cat, but it wasn't even my cat. I haven't lived with my parents in over four years and there I was losing my goddamned mind over a cat that wasn't even mine. I told them the story about the cat and the crackers while they stared at me. I apologized.
And then I went home, telling them that when we start the Christmas slowdown someone else can go home then.
Basically, my nerves are scraped raw here. I've had my parents on a death watch for years now. My mother is going blind. Her one good eye is leaking, and there's this problem with her spine that's causing nerve damage because it's pinching the nerves. There's an excellent chance she won't be able to walk anymore before too much longer. I'm taking her to the doctor today to get a shot for it. She waits until the pain is unbearable and then we go and we've been hobbling along like this for a couple of years now. My father is missing both legs, his kidneys no longer work, and they found out earlier this week that they can't move the dialysis port from his neck to his arm because the blood vessels are so damaged in his arm that if they try, he'll lose the use of that arm. I'm on edge and it doesn't take a lot to freak me out anymore. All I can do is go in again on Monday when I'm scheduled to work and apologize to the one supervisor who knows the basic details of what I'm going through.
But God that was embarrassing.
Yesterday morning I got off work and came home, and my mother called as I was preparing myself some breakfast. I tend to panic a little when I see that my parents are calling because I figure it's one calling to tell me the other died. It wasn't this time thankfully. Just my mother in tears calling to tell me that she found one of her birds dead in its cage, plus she was afraid she was going to have to put her 12 year old cat to sleep. It has cancer, you see and had had a tumor cut out on Friday. By yesterday morning, the cat was following my mother around the house crying, and she had begun to smell awful, which made my mother think that it might be an infection.
That cat was very special (note the use of past tense) because in January of 1996 when my mother began to go blind, this cat just showed up at the back door one snowy morning with ice encrusted in her fur. My mother brought her in and fed her, and as she began to purr, my mother thought about here was this little thing that needed her and it gave her the strength to go on.
The cat paid her back later for that by saving her life. My mother had begun to slip into a diabetic coma and she told me that her last thought before she went under was that she hoped I would not be the one to find her dead body. Later, however, my mother woke up covered in cracker crumbs with that cat in her lap staring at her. Who got the crackers? My mother didn't.
But anyway... yesterday they took the cat to the vet and the last my mother saw of her, she was being carried off with her fur soaked by my mother's tears. And so, she same into our lives wet and left the same way, because my mother got home and got a call from the vet who told her plainly that it was gangrene and the cat was suffering.
And so they put her to sleep. My mother spent the day burning the cat's food dish and the box she slept in, and taking her litter boxes outside. She requested the vet cremate the cat because neither she nor my father, who is missing both legs now, could have dug a hole to bury her in. I heard about all of this when I called my mother on my way in to work last night.
When I got to work, several of the presses were down which meant that there wasn't enough work for the three of us visual auditors to do. We gather parts from the presses and inspect them. The two shift supervisors and us three auditors were in the central office and the supervisors told us this and asked if any of us wanted to go home.
"Hauntedheadnc?" one asked, and I replied that I wasn't sure I should because it would mean I'd be alone all night. I was starting to crack. They all looked at me funny.
And then I lost it. Had a fucking sobbing fit right there in front of both bosses and the other two auditors. That was a special cat, but it wasn't even my cat. I haven't lived with my parents in over four years and there I was losing my goddamned mind over a cat that wasn't even mine. I told them the story about the cat and the crackers while they stared at me. I apologized.
And then I went home, telling them that when we start the Christmas slowdown someone else can go home then.
Basically, my nerves are scraped raw here. I've had my parents on a death watch for years now. My mother is going blind. Her one good eye is leaking, and there's this problem with her spine that's causing nerve damage because it's pinching the nerves. There's an excellent chance she won't be able to walk anymore before too much longer. I'm taking her to the doctor today to get a shot for it. She waits until the pain is unbearable and then we go and we've been hobbling along like this for a couple of years now. My father is missing both legs, his kidneys no longer work, and they found out earlier this week that they can't move the dialysis port from his neck to his arm because the blood vessels are so damaged in his arm that if they try, he'll lose the use of that arm. I'm on edge and it doesn't take a lot to freak me out anymore. All I can do is go in again on Monday when I'm scheduled to work and apologize to the one supervisor who knows the basic details of what I'm going through.
But God that was embarrassing.
Sorry, but I just had too *burps*, excuse me. Sends a snail mail to EQ, to let her know about your tasty cookies.
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