This is a sample of what has been going on since I last posted. It may be a bit boring, but hopefully it makes someone laugh. Instead of names I'll use initials to keep everyone guessing.
July-Dec 2011: Mom found out she had throat cancer. She was worried, but tried to live her life like it was no big deal.She's always been a handful and had to have things her way. My siblings and I took turns getting her to and from treatments and help her out. She was in and out of hospitals a lot and it sucked. In Nov. I took her cat to my house and J found a nice nursing facility for her to stay in. It sucked, but it was working out.
Jan-Mar 2012: Mom got herself tossed from the care facility. Her less savory friends had a bad habit of bringing her things she shouldn't have. She wound up in the hospital again, under isolation for a while until they could get her reasonably healthy again. This hospital seriously sucked and her pcp didn't even know where she was. needless to say her cancer treatment was on hold. finally she was moved into a new nursing facility and all seemed better. I even reconnected with an old friend who was one of her nurses.
Meanwhile in Feb. my boss pissed me off and I put in my notice at the CC salon I was working for. I went off to open my own salon studio Slivers Salon. I opened on March 7 and it's been hard, but worth it. My former boss didn't even let me finish my notice and I had to wait over three weeks for my last check. Totally worth it though. E didn't even last two months before she was fired for being lazy and rude. Without me there to pick up the slack she was totally screwed. I do hope she's found someplace more suited to her work ethic though.
Owning my own business has been great, I live week to week scraping just enough together to pay my bills, but its starting to pick up now. My advice to all those who want it: Save at least a little money before you go off on your own. This starting out with $1500 is not smart! It would have been better if the place had been opened on time, but the building wasn't even finished when I quit my job.
April 2012: My business was taking off and Mom was improving. I went to see her on the 4th and she was so happy that she had runny eggs for breakfast and how good they tasted, and the egg salad she had for lunch was the best ever. Mom always did love her eggs and would eat them every chance she got. She kept going over insurance paperwork while I was there, but all she talked about was how good the food tasted. It was great to see her looking so much better. The treatments were working and she just looked so great. I told her I would see her that Sunday for Easter gave her a hug and left.
April 6 2012 was the best day my salon had seen yet. I made almost enough to cover the rent for the week on that day alone. I met some of the nicest clients ever and I finished off the day with one of my favorite clients. My phone rang while I was finishing the cut, but I ignored it when I didn't recognize the number. It's rude to answer the phone when your doing someone's hair after all.
I had just walked them out and was smoking with a friend before I went in to clean up for the day when the stupid phone rings again. When I answered it my whole world changed.
My sister was on the phone in a panic Mom had been found unresponsive and was rushed to the hospital. That is one call no one ever wants to get. I told her to come get me and gave her directions then ran inside to get my things together. Then I said screw it and left it all where it was, locked the door and went to wait. Waiting is not something I'm good at so I called my brother J and made sure he was on the way to the hospital too.
My sister T drives like a crazy person, but she got us there in one piece. We were all ushered into a little waiting room while they worked to save Mom. A sad looking nurse came and talked to us for a while, but she had no idea what had happened and then Mom's brother UM and his wife AC came in. T was a wreck and so was I but damned if I would let anyone see it. My husband Z had left his phone at home that morning so I couldn't reach him and I was alone.
A doctor came in finally and explained that Mom was totally non-responsive and unlikely to ever wake up. That it was only the machines keeping her alive. T wanted to keep her on the machines in a vain attempt to save her. I took a while but we finally agreed that the right thing to do was to let her go. We went in and saw the husk that just two days ago had been my happy and excited mother, who had been looking forward to Easter and seeing my new salon studio. She really was a husk and looked like she was already gone.
I gave the order to pull the plug myself. When I gave the order I thought I saw a tear form in the corner of her eye. It took twelve minutes for her heart to stop beating after she was unplugged. It was the hardest and the easiest thing I have ever done.
I finally got a hold of Z through his boss and he came over as fast as he could. That was nice of him. T made a scene as we left the hospital, it's a habit of hers so I ignored it. I found out later that she went to the nursing facility and was going through Mom's things before to police kicked her out. J swears she got money out of it. I personally don't care.
I learned from J that Mom had snuck out of the nursing home with one of her less savory friends and emptied her bank account. The bank had called him while she was there to verify and he said no, but they gave her the money anyway. J called the home and they didn't even know she had been out, if they had she would have been kicked out of another place because she wasn't supposed to leave except with family.
Mom had problems all her life with drugs and the official cause of death is methamphetamine overdose accidental. It hurts me to type that and pisses me off. That is what is on her official Death Certificate. Sucks!
At least she got to pull one over on The Man one last time; I hope she's happy.
In May we took her ashes up to Mt. Lemon and placed her there. We couldn't even afford a funeral, luckily UM was able to pay for cremation. It was a beautiful day. Afterwards we all went to Chili's for dinner.
I hope whoever took Mom out that day knows what they did. I hope it makes them look at their life differently. They should be ashamed of themselves, but they didn't force her and I know that, but they killed her just the same. I guess the moral of this story is: Drugs are bad!
April-July 2012: Life goes on. I'm still living week to week hoping to make rent. I really wish it was charged monthly, but I haven't failed yet. I don't intend to fail ever.
Like I said: It's been a Wild Year and it's not over yet!
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