Where to begin...I know let us begin with a ending.

Hi! I am another friendly voice in cyberspace adding my two cents to the collective hive.
Now that the greeting is made let us get to the pockets of brimming truth I promised you.

  Let us begin at an end....My parents both passed this summer.  My father on May 16 and then my mother followed him on July 25th.  Now mind you their passing has been a real challenge for me, but at the same time a relief.
My father was born blind and my mother was a dwarf, no I am not starting a joke.  They were both simple mountain folk who worked their asses off and tried to just fit in.  Me and my older brother practically raised them as they raised us.  When I was little it was not odd for me to read their bills to them, organize things so my dad always had the same path to walk, and chop wood, carry water. I never minded the help I had to give cause kids my own age bored me.  I can remember not relating to anyone that was not older then me. My folks listened to me and what I said was always fact.  Since I was the learned one I had to explain movies, politics, history, basically all of life to my adult parents.  They kept to themselves and were WELL loved by the whole town.  Mom cleaned houses saying that making someone's home livable made her feel good.  Dad washed dishes for a campus for 47 years, he loved his co-worker's like family.  He always said that if he had his sight he would have been a astronaut, I like to think that he is now.
My parent's were rare in today's standards, they never divorced oh they fought...they cried..they raised all hell..but they both believed in marriage.  They loved each other more then anything oh and THEY DRANK. LORDIE did they drink...hell they let me drink as a kid which leads me to not care so much for it as an adult.  I can remember going to the bar they were members of they drank and partied while I danced to the juke box and swindled old men out of their pocket change for candy.  They were happy drunks til the got older.  Then the sadness and sorrow came to live at my house and never left.  They later in life quit but only in the past few years, sadly the last drink I got my mom was a bloody Mary but she loved it so. 
All in all my parent's loved me so innocently.  I was never grounded, when I was younger I was spanked but as I got older and more wordie there was no punishment.  They worked all the time and when they were home me and my brother would prank them or drive them up the walls.  They would be red in the face angry but they would laugh it off at the end.  We were poor, but in American standards...month to month unsure if we were going to have a roof over our heads, sometimes no food on the table, sometimes no power or water.  But we survived. When I was a teen my mother learned of the magical concept of credit cards, why I have none today, she placed her and daddy in over their head in debt.  She bought things to make us happy, she just bought things to feel better.  Right now cause of all the debt we are losing their house to the bank.  There is so much damage to the house, so much debt from a house they paid off years ago, is now hirer then before since 2 liens on it.  The house needs to go.  My brother and I are weird by most I talk to who have decided to let the house go.  Let the fucking bank have it, let them have the ghosts and the weeping walls. Let them have my time capsules in the yard, and my tunnel fortress I dug as a kid.  All mom and dad ever worked so hard for was that house.  And now that they are gone, they can rest NO MORE working to death for a home.  No more fighting over money.  No more.  Over the summer almost all the money I made paid for their funerals.  I am glad I could at least pitch in there.  When I was younger living at home and working I would pay their bills before they knew about them.  To make them not worry, not stress so much.  Mom had no concept of money, and poor dad just made it to hand to her.  But in the last five years I walked away...I admit this huge feeling of guilt to you all.  I stopped helping 5 years ago, put it all on my brother.  I went home a few years ago to help my parents, consolidate their debts, get them out of a lawsuit, and live for a minute,  Home is never home again, once you leave it changed shape and form.  I tried to help my parents but they were really bad off and very mentally unstable.  Mom was diagnosed bi-polar and paranoid which explained some odd episodes in my child hood and dad had three strokes, beat cancer, and was having heart issues.  I could not stand it.  I was angry, violent, almost gritting my teeth helping them.  I hated being home cause now all the sudden I had rules and curfews.  It was like they decided I was 14 again.  I tried so hard to help, and then I broke down, and came back to my home and city I adore.  I left my brother to the rest, even signed over all rights to him, when I should have been more supportive it was like I was shoving it in his full hands.  Him with a cra cra wife and son who is a handful.  But he took over like a trooper.  He knew for years even when I lived 100 miles away from home, I was on the phone helping mom with bills, or on the phone with dad just talking to him.  Even when I was not at home, I was still in some ways.
But now home is gone, mom and dad are gone.  Who am I?  I am free in a sense, missing them so much since I was so used to their weird calls and strange ways. Free? I mean my whole life I lived as close as I could to where I was born to get to them if they needed me.  I even started driving at 26 so that I could give them rides and visit them.  For years several friends would be my ride, one friend helped me the most, she helped me learn to drive.  Now, there is just me.  I mean I keep in contact with my brother, nephew, my awesome redneck gay uncle, the rest on daddies side vanished not a peep.  But now there is only me.
Ummmmm...I fantasized about so many lives I could have while I was taking care of them, and now I can.  Still having to sort my unemployment thing out and the whole not sure what next week will bring but if I can get my shit together I could leave? Leave the country, leave the area I live, I mean if I could I can now.  That concept is foreign to me.  My phone never rings anymore, mom would call and call, and then sometimes not for weeks.  The whole world feels different.  I lost the people who had sex and made me.  The people who knew me from day one til now.  It is a odd feeling grief.  sometimes you are sorting out day to day things and go go go then WHAM you are in tears over a commercial, or even a smell.  I see things they liked everywhere, I hold a coke can and think of daddy, I see knitting supplies I think of mom.  It is weird not knowing if I will bust out cry from one minute to the next.  I have been hermit for these reasons.  I want to have a good time as much as anyone, but I am never sure when I have to disappear for the sake of others and their reactions to death.  When I saw I am happy my parents are dead but miss them.  People get judgmental...they tell me that I should be happy they passed not happy they died.  But I am happy they died.  They suffered from so much their whole lives.  And when I was little til now I can remember mom or dad separately telling me they wished they were dead, away from the bills and pain and judgment. I am HAPPY they are free.  I know that is a huge downer to think of a kid hearing her parents talk about dying, but it was my life.  I loved them it hurt when they said these things and trust me I argued with them and even served more drinks and jokes to lighten the mood.  But it lingered.  Becoming a challenge for me and my own life, but that is another blog post.

Since I have now thoroughly bummed everyone out, I want you to remember one thing.  Through all of this I survived, they survived, and they are at peace.  I am still in life and struggling, no health issues KNOCK ON WOOD, but other issues abound.  But I am here, I am there for everyone I love as much as I can, and expect the ones I love to be there for me, no matter what.  When you lose someone be it sudden or long coming, you feel so alone, but you are not.  Death is around us everyday what we can see and even what we cannot see.  I just wish more people understood death and stopped making it a reason for awkward hugs and the ever tired "sorry" you get for something WE WILL ALL FACE.  When dad died, I cried but yelled FUCK YEAH over and over...cause he was done hurting.  When mom died I was at a festival and I saw a double rainbow, and then saw a gospel choir raise the voices.  When I was hiding in the audience the woman singing came off the stage and placed her hand on my shoulder.  She said "are you needing god baby" and I said..."not sure"....then she looked me in the eyes and said "whatever god you got reach out to him, I can see you need a hug" it was so wonderful.  I am not a gospel person, but my mom was.  She would have loved to see that choir and to have the woman single me out and then return to stage made me remember we are not so alone, even around strangers.  She said at the end of the music, "never forget to love the folks you got and the folks you lost no matter who much they hurt you or you hurt them..."  I am trying.
So here is where I am going to end this post...something more uplifting.
You and by you I mean all of you actually reading this need to think about the people who have touched, tormented, or left your lives...think of them and forgive them.  I know WHAT fucking forgive that A HOLE or that cunt. YES forgive them. We are all on this strange planet, with different stories just trying to relate to each other and if you can forgive the others traveling here too, then you can forgive yourself.  I am trying.