25 to 50: 1985
Aug. 14th, 2010 12:34 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
vanillafluffyAt first, 1985 was business as usual. My dad had a buddy who owned an auto body shop, and he picked up assorted used cars and fixed them up. At that point, we had four or five that I can think of: the Comet, the Pinto, a Datsun truck, a Corvair, and I'm not sure if he still had the Mazda Rx-3 then or not.
One of my cousins had a step-daughter who was getting married, and Dad went up for the wedding. He started feeling under the weather while he was there, and when he got home, he went to his doctor and was diagnosed with lung cancer. He'd smoked, but had given it up more than 20 years before; exposure to asbestos in the shipyards during the war years was a more likely culprit.
He took radiation, but when downhill with frightening rapidity. It was an eerie replay of my 16th summer when Mom was dying. And somewhere in the middle, I had a Moment, the night I realized that if anyone broke into our house, I would have to protect him, rather than the other way around; suddenly the world was a scarier place.
While he was in the hospital, I took advantage of his absense to buy a set of vintage Deco bedroom furniture. The secondhand store wasn't far from the hospital, and there were no cell phones or pagers to interrupt my reverie.
From diagnosis to death, he barely lasted 90 days. Peter came down for a visit, and to get a straight answer from his doctor---an evasive so-and-so who blew off my attempts to get an honest answer about Dad's condition. He got back to work in New York on Wednessday morning, and I called him before noon to let him know Dad was dead. He sighed and said he had to work through the week.
I handled the funeral arrangements, including giving the funeral director hell for embalming him without permission. Dad had wanted cremation, no chemicals needed. They took that off the bill when I was through with them. Kat, S and her mom NL attended the funeral, and afterward, they and Peter and I went to IHoP for breakfast.
Peter and I talked a lot; during that visit, I discovered that we had both been molested by the same friend of the family.
At the same time, Dr Bizarre first showed up on my doorstep, wanting to know if he could use my VCR to record "Misfits of Science". (I'll let y'all IMDb that one.) Suddenly, I had the house to myself, a guy who was there most evenings because his dad could be a real jerk, and discretionary income. The first two were cool, but the last was downright dangerous.
Oh God, how often I wish I'd done things differently, especially regarding my inheritance. Too late smart, alas....
.
One of my cousins had a step-daughter who was getting married, and Dad went up for the wedding. He started feeling under the weather while he was there, and when he got home, he went to his doctor and was diagnosed with lung cancer. He'd smoked, but had given it up more than 20 years before; exposure to asbestos in the shipyards during the war years was a more likely culprit.
He took radiation, but when downhill with frightening rapidity. It was an eerie replay of my 16th summer when Mom was dying. And somewhere in the middle, I had a Moment, the night I realized that if anyone broke into our house, I would have to protect him, rather than the other way around; suddenly the world was a scarier place.
While he was in the hospital, I took advantage of his absense to buy a set of vintage Deco bedroom furniture. The secondhand store wasn't far from the hospital, and there were no cell phones or pagers to interrupt my reverie.
From diagnosis to death, he barely lasted 90 days. Peter came down for a visit, and to get a straight answer from his doctor---an evasive so-and-so who blew off my attempts to get an honest answer about Dad's condition. He got back to work in New York on Wednessday morning, and I called him before noon to let him know Dad was dead. He sighed and said he had to work through the week.
I handled the funeral arrangements, including giving the funeral director hell for embalming him without permission. Dad had wanted cremation, no chemicals needed. They took that off the bill when I was through with them. Kat, S and her mom NL attended the funeral, and afterward, they and Peter and I went to IHoP for breakfast.
Peter and I talked a lot; during that visit, I discovered that we had both been molested by the same friend of the family.
At the same time, Dr Bizarre first showed up on my doorstep, wanting to know if he could use my VCR to record "Misfits of Science". (I'll let y'all IMDb that one.) Suddenly, I had the house to myself, a guy who was there most evenings because his dad could be a real jerk, and discretionary income. The first two were cool, but the last was downright dangerous.
Oh God, how often I wish I'd done things differently, especially regarding my inheritance. Too late smart, alas....
.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2010-08-14 12:18 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-08-14 01:45 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-08-14 01:34 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-08-14 01:52 pm (UTC)* Peter went suddenly of a heart attack, although he'd been in poor health for a while. Sudden, slow---either way, losing loved ones just plain sucks!
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(no subject)
Date: 2010-08-14 06:04 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-08-14 08:10 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-08-16 03:30 am (UTC)XO
Donna
(no subject)
Date: 2010-08-16 04:36 am (UTC)But what the hell, it's not even that racy, yet.