Buying From Friends: The Act of Receiving AND Giving

I know I’m not the first or the last person to discuss supporting your friend’s ventures and businesses, but I’m gonna put in my two cents anyways. 

Here’s why, instead of going to the store or Amazon, you should support your friend’s ventures. 

That money is now going to someone you know, someone you care about.  That could be making their week easier by helping with groceries.  It could be going back into supplies for them to be able to make and create many more beautiful things to get a decent inventory for their business.

That money is now possibly going towards their electric bill or rent.  It could be being used to buy their own children gifts.  Now, isn’t that a win-win?  You get a gift off of your list for someone, and they can now buy a gift for someone on theirs, possibly even through another friend’s venture, thus supporting another small business.  Can you imagine how different things would be again if we went back to that?  How much that would improve the sense of community that so many communities now are lacking?
But let’s not even look at it as a ‘small business’ thing, because a lot of the times it’s not QUITE a business.  At least not yet.  Right now it’s a venture.  

Right now they’re trying. 

They could be desperate.  They could be struggling to make ends meet and this is a desperate attempt to bring in some much needed added income.  This should be celebrated and supported, not pitied, because this is not someone asking for a handout.  This is someone willing to work for what they need and want by creating things with their own two hands.
I’m not talking about selling for some company selling mass produced leggings, kitchen equipment, soaps, etc.  I’m talking about the people who sew, create things out of clay, make their own jewelry, paint, etc. 
They could be trying to work through something using their creative outlet to be cathartic.  

They could be just very, very talented and wanting to share with people what they can make! 

People can create some amazing things with their own two hands.  They really can. 

But those arts seem to get lost now and then.  Not because people stop doing them, but because people stop appreciating the time and energy that goes into creating things.  They want cheaper.  They want to go to Wal-Mart or Amazon third party instead and pay $10 instead of $50. 

I get it.
I do.
Half the time that’s all we can afford too. 

It’s the same argument I see at local farms and little shoppes.  Mom and Pop places are going under by big corporations because we quit buying locally.  Importing is an amazing things.  I’m well aware of all of the different things and foods and such that we have access to now that we otherwise would not have.  But it’s not just destroying our economy, that’s a whole other can of worms.

What it’s doing is also killing art.
It’s killing the craftsman. 

Now, I practice Heathenry, or Heathen Witchcraft.  Whatever you want to call it, I don’t care, but one thing about Heathens that I adore is how much appreciation they have for what one can make themselves.  Industriousness.  Self-Reliance.  These are important things, but they’re getting lost with how ‘easy’ things are now. 

They’re no easier somewhere else, you’re just not paying for fair labor. 

And when someone makes something and actually wants compensated for the time it took to make it, the education or trial and error it took to learn it, the years of practice, the failed attempts, and the actual materials themselves… nobody wants to pay that.  “It’s not fair!” people say. 
But it’s completely fair. 

We’re just used to unfair. 

For example, I could get some dinky bamboo back scratcher just about anywhere for relatively cheap.  Sometimes dirt cheap.  But I spent $25 a few years ago on a handcrafted wood one and I swear to all that his holy that It is the most amazing back scratcher of all time. 
Someone created the design.
Someone created a template.
And each one is hand made. 
I am happy to support that.  100%. 

Let’s face it, I would have had to replace a lot of those cheaper ones enough time in a lifetime that I’d be spending far more in the long term anyhow.  But now I have something that lasts and is far superior in design. 
If we do not support craftsmen working out of their homes, trying to get started, we are killing art. 

Not just that, it’s us also admitting that the American Dream is dead. 

I would rather buy from people than corporations.
I would rather have something well made, than cheaply made.

I would rather support my friends getting through the next week than to pay some rich CEO money that he considers pocket change. 

So as you fill up those stockings and finish up those holiday gift lists, it’s just something to think about. 
Perhaps think about seeing what ventures your friends are trying to get off the ground and support those to finish up those lists.  You might be surprised at what you find, OR what they can make if you simply ask them because you have some idea that you want that you think they can do.  Ask.  They’ll love it.  You’ll get those creative juices flowing and possibly give them another new arc for their venture. 

You just might find that when you buy from a friend instead of a corporation that you are giving as well as receiving..

And isn’t that what the holiday spirit is supposed to focus on? 
I mean, really it’s not supposed to be materialistic at all.  Especially not to the extremes that it is now. 

So why not give a little this year during the holidays by buying local or from friends?  It might not be that much money… but the support is priceless. 
Appreciate their art, their talent, and give them hope because I can promise you that every purchase you make makes a difference. 
What difference do you want to make?  

CHRISTmas: The Hissy Fit

There have been so many articles and studies done on what birth order does as far as effect the behavior of children.  I was the oldest of seven children.  There was me, my sister, and my brother that my parents had.  After their divorce my dad remarried to a woman with two young children and went on to have two more children with her.  So we were seven children in a blended family and I could go on for days about all of the different dynamics.

Only half of us didn’t have any ‘alternate’ birth orders.  I was the oldest of all of us so that makes me the classic oldest sibling.  And then Tori being the youngest of all of us was the definitive baby of the family.  My sister Rachel was a classic middle child because she was a middle child no matter which house we were at.  My brother Evan was the baby for my mother so he was a youngest sibling in our house, but he was a big brother and middle child of all of us.  My brother Tony was the oldest sibling at his house, but a middle child with all of us.  My sister Maria was the oldest sister at her house, the youngest sister out of her and her brother, but a big sister two the younger two and a middle child all together. Mae was the oldest sibling of my dad and his second wife but she was also a middle child all together.  So, yeah… dynamics galore! 

Fun!

Being a part of such a large family growing up I’ve read a lot of the articles I’ve come across on sibling dynamics and traits based on birth order.  Some are fascinating and others are absolute crap.  With no two people being the same and no two families being the same, that always made sense to me.  Maybe that’s why I’ve been saying for years now to my husband that I was going to write about why Christianity behaves as the youngest sibling.  That’s how my brain works.

Now, I’m not interested in getting into a whole bunch of accurate dates and time frames, nor am I interested in getting into a religious debate.  I have a lot of Christian friends and I have no issue with the vast majority.  They are well aware I’m a Heathen and they love me anyhow, just as I love them anyways.  I still go to church when there are family events that occur there such as baptisms, weddings, funerals, etc.  Just as some of them even showed up for the hand-fasting my husband and I had.  As long as you don’t try to convert me and you respect my beliefs, I will do the same for you.  That’s an across the board statement.

And I also don’t play that game of, “I’ll respect you if you respect me” type crap.  Respect is given freely until I have been given a reason not to.  My grandfather was one of the most amazing men I ever had the privilege to meet.  He was a huge role model for me and he had a large family of six children, a dozen grandchildren and numerous great grandchildren.  He was a devout Catholic and went to church every morning for years and years.  His Priest, Father Crowley, was one of his best friends.  He didn’t marry a Catholic woman and he caught some crap from his family for that.  With all of his children, all of us grandchildren, and anyone he ever met he always said the same thing when the topic came up.  “I don’t care what religion you are, what matters to me is that you’re a good person.” And that was all there was to it.  That was just one of the many great things about him but it’s something I carry with me. 

I’m not writing this to bash Christianity or any person in particular.  So, if you’re reading this just to get your panties in a bunch about another made up war on Christianity, please stop reading now. 

Still here? 

Great!

Let’s continue, shall we?

If we take a look at some of the largest ‘umbrella’ religions we come up with a few.

Paganism

Judaism

Hinduism

Buddhism

Islam

Christianity

I’m well aware there are plenty more.  There are folk religions, Shinto, Taoism, Sikhism, etc, etc, etc.  If I wanted to write this about the history of religion I might include all of those but that isn’t my goal here so I’m not doing that.  If I left your religion out I apologize, sort of.  I don’t have all day to write out every sub-genre or spiritual faith in existence. Sorry.

Let’s try to stay on topic here (barring the occasional ramble, it happens)

Okay, now before we continue further, know that I live in the States.  I know that different places have different issues.  I’m not stupid.  However, here in the states we get all sorts of excitement this time of year about the alleged “War on Christmas.”

EVERY YEAR IT MAKES ME INSANE!!!  >.<

Because, you see, nobody is trying to take the Christ out of Christmas.  The only thing people are trying to do is exercise their right to practice and celebrate their religions, too.

You don’t see Pagans screaming, “Stop trying to take the Yule out of Yuletide!”

I mean, you sort of do, but it’s almost always said as a joke in response to the ‘taking the Christ out of Christmas’ posts.

For as long as most of us can probably remember we grew up seeing holiday decorations in stores.  I knew from a young age that the Christian faith didn’t fit me very well.  I was too young to have found anything else that called to me yet but I still remember loving all of the lights and trees.  Never once was I offended by the sight of a manger or a Menorah or any other such thing.  Just because I saw something that represented the holiday of another faith, that didn’t affect me in any way.  I don’t see how it could?  I thought it was beautiful.  I don’t have to practice the faith to appreciate the beauty of the celebration.

Honestly, if seeing someone else practice their faith or celebrate their holiday offends you, that says way more about you than it does them.

If someone says, “Merry Christmas” to me I certainly don’t freak out like some people now see to think they have a right to do.  I say it back because I hope they have a wonderful Christmas.  I wouldn’t wish them a Happy Yule because they aren’t celebrating Yule, they are celebrating Christmas.  Them celebrating Christmas and me wishing them a Merry Christmas doesn’t make me a Christian, it makes me someone who hopes they have a nice holiday.  And that saying goes across the board as well.  Wish me a “Merry Christmas” or a “Happy Hanukkah” or a great Kwanzaa or a Happy Yule or a Happy Holidays and I’ll take it all the same way.  I don’t care what words you use or what holiday you are celebrating.  That is something where the thought is what matters. 

And here’s where we get to the meat of it. 

How Christianity is the youngest sibling. 

Let’s start with the older ones, shall we?

Pagan is a rather old “religion” if you need to refer to it as a religion.  I’ve found it’s more of spirituality and I prefer that one, but like I tell my kids “a preference never guarantees you get your way and to expect such makes you naïve, not the other person thoughtless.”

Anywho, Paganism can be argued as the oldest of religions since it was around before there was any type of organized religion.  The worship of nature itself, the magic of the unknown, and the worship of deity as giving us that which cannot be otherwise explained. I’m not here to give you a lesson on Paganism but there have been many Goddess like carvings and cave paintings and such because before we had modern science and knew that sex with sperm and egg combining created children, they likely just thought women were magic at creating life.  So that makes sense.  You don’t have to follow that spiritual path to understand the primitive logic there.

Pagans in general (in my experience) don’t seem to care much what the other religions are doing unless it directly affects them.  If you want to bring up the Witch hunts, there are some Witches that are going to feel a certain way about it because that is something that happened, was historically documented, and with the amount of extremist radicals around anymore, could also happen again.  I don’t know a whole lot of Jews that get all butthurt about what religions other people practice either unless it directly affects them.  But you mention the Holocaust and they’re going to feel a certain way.  There is something that will cause each religion to get defensive or feel a certain way about.  Something personal that has to do with their beliefs.  Their hot button.  Don’t push it and then you have a total ‘live and let live’ mentality.   (It’s not that hard, folks)  And most of the time even if you push it you’re more likely to get a history lesson than an argument.

There’s this quote I adore by Bill Nye.  “Everyone you will ever meet knows something you don’t.”  I tell this to my kids all the time when they’re acting like they know more than someone else.  They might, but it’s unlikely given that they’re still rather young.  I tell them all the time that if you act like a know-it-all all you do is piss people off and make them get defensive or worse, make them feel stupid.  That is not the right way at all to treat people.  If you know something that they do not, teach them.  You just might make a new friend.  And if they know something that you don’t, don’t pretend that you know it already just to not feel stupid.  Ask them to teach you and they will more than likely be happy to explain it to you.  Then you have either learned something new or taught someone else something new.  If more people did this, geesh, I can’t even speculate.  It sure would be a lot nicer to talk to people though. 

The same goes for religion.  If you need to put down someone else’s beliefs as silly or stupid just to make you feel better about your own beliefs, then you’re doing it wrong.  Again, that says a lot more about you than it does them. 

You can claim that some Pagan faiths are “new age” and therefore a newer ‘religion’ than Christianity all you want.  While Wicca is definitely more new age, the Paganism umbrella it falls under is anything but.  Even the new age ones are following beliefs that have been around for an incredibly long time.  Too long to measure. 

They are not the baby here, at least not in my story. 

So I’m going to consider Paganism as the oldest child.  You don’t have to agree.  This is my article, not yours.  I’m going to say it’s the big sister given how matriarchal many of them are and how much Goddess worship is involved in many (even if only to refer to “Mother” Earth for the non-deity worshipping Pagan faiths)

Older children tend to be more responsible and less assuming.

I know many Pagans who are perfectly comfortable in their faith.  They do not proselytize because they don’t see the point.  If someone asks them about their faith, however, they’re more than happy to discuss it and have a nice chat. 

They tend to be more responsible about their practice of faiths, more emotionally aware of themselves, more socially aware, environmentally aware, etc.

Responsible.

They had to set the example but they don’t need to prove themselves.

Jesus was a Jew.  We all know this.  It’s in all the stories.  It’s rather common knowledge. So I expect zero arguments that Judaism was around earlier than Christianity. 

I also expect the same (zero) amount of arguments about any of the other above mentioned major religions having any sort of valid argument to whether those faiths existed prior to Christianity. 

We’ll refer to those as the middle children.  They tend to be more easy going. 

They are aware that other spiritual paths existed before them but they don’t allow that to concern them.  They are aware the other paths exist and they’re okay with that.  You leave them alone to do their own thing and they’re cool with that. 

“You do you, I’ll do me.  Whatevs.”

While the middle children can often be attention seeking it’s not in the direct “spoiled” way of the baby.  It’s in a more muted way where they’re more likely to just go off on their own rather than stay where they are not appreciated.  Find their own clan, so to speak.

You don’t find any proselytizing from them either. 

Now, I’m aware that there are people from ALL spiritual paths that will attempt, on occasion, to tell you about why their religion is better or try to convert you.

I’m speaking about the majority here.

They are the middle children; they are more adaptable and more likely to do their own thing without worrying about what you think of them or worrying about what you’re doing.

And then we have Christianity.

The little brother.

I’m choosing brother simply because it’s a very inarguably patriarchal religion.  If you have a vagina you are here to listen and obey and wear dresses and look pretty and get in the kitchen and make me a damn sammich.  Be pregnant while you’re at it, pop out those babies and put that vagina to work!

Totally kidding. 

Or am I?  (I totally am)

The youngest sibling, the baby of the family, tends to get doted on.  Oh, look how cute.  Oh, look at what they’re doing!  Oh, blah blah blah blah.  Whatever they can do to get some attention, they’re more than happy to do it. 

But now, the youngest sibling can vary.  If it’s an especially large family the youngest will just be used to the attention going elsewhere and keep to themselves, which I’ve found many of the sub-genres of Christianity will behave like.  I’m not naming names but you know who you are.  Keep up the good work, you’re doing it right.  

But then there’s the baby of the family, “Look at me! Look at me!”  I can do it too!!! 

Anything you can do, I can do better.  (feel free to sing along)

They want to be as popular as their older siblings but they’re extremely immature.

“If they can do that, why can’t I?  I’ll show them!” type shit.

Well, they have attempted to emulate their older siblings in SO many ways.

I mean, really, just about every holiday they have can be argued as stolen.

Christ wasn’t born at Christmas yet for some reason they celebrate it then.  They didn’t want the older siblings to have their holiday there without them so they just made his birthday at the end of December right around all of the older siblings’ holidays.

It doesn’t matter that since it has been proven as to have not been the month of his birth, or even the correct season.  They don’t care.  That’s when it is and that’s all there is to it.

Nuh uh

Ya huh!

Nuh uh

Ya huh.

Fine, whatever.  Think what you what.

I will!  We celebrate his birthday in December and you can’t stop us!

We don’t care, go ahead.

See what I mean?

I can go through every single holiday and do this but I don’t wanna and you can’t make me. :P

And then, when the youngest child does not get their way or things don’t turn out as planned, rather than admitting they were wrong and moving on.  They dig their heels in even if there is proof that they are wrong and refuse to admit it.  Or they pitch a hissy fit like a 2 year old who didn’t get their way. 

The oldest child is always irritated by the youngest child’s annoying tendencies.  It’s ingrained in our DNA.  Just roll your eyes and walk away because as every parent and oldest child knows… you do not give attention to a toddler throwing a hissy fit.  You do not feed it ANY attention or it just gets worse and grows.  You walk away and they learn that they do not get attention from behaving poorly and pitching a fit.

Now, there’s also this other saying that I like. (I like a lot of sayings and whatnot)

“The squeaky wheel gets the grease.”

So while the older siblings ignore the outbursts of the baby, they are not squeaking.

The baby is squeaking.  Like a child in a grocery store pitching a fit.  The parent knows they have to ignore it so it doesn’t continue at every store forever.  But the other people at the store look and think, “Oh, that poor baby.  What an uncaring mother just ignoring it.”

OR

And that’s a big or.

Or, they think, “God, shut that kid up.  That’s SO annoying. Make them leave.”

How does this tie in with Christianity? 

I’m getting there.

Bear with me.

So, the media completely makes up this “war on Christmas.”

Really?

It’s a “war” on Christmas?

From who?  That is what I would like to know.

Who is the aggressor in this war?

Who is attacking Christianity?

The people who want to uphold this country’s constitutional right to freedom of religion?

You see, because that is not a valid argument to any of the things I have read about.

It’s bad if someone tries to remove a religious anything from government property, even though based on the constitution it should never have been there in the first place

It is made up. 

Youngest children always make up stories to get attention and everyone else just rolls their eyes. 

Now I see memes with things like “Christmas Trees for Sale $10,  Holiday Trees $15”

Like… seriously?  Decorating trees is a pagan custom.  You don’t see anyone bitching at you for having stolen the idea and calling them Christmas trees, do you?  So why do you feel you can not only steal the idea but then refuse to let the founders of the custom still keep their own?  Like… c’mon now.   That doesn’t make sense.

There isn’t a “War on Christmas” there’s just a bunch of people using that as an excuse to be dickheads.

You took the holidays of many other religions, made them your own, and then bitch at the religions you stole it from for still wanting to celebrate their holidays.
Nobody is trying to take your Christmas or take your Christ out of it.

All they are trying to do is continue to be able to celebrate their own holiday.

You are the ones who are trying to act as though your way is the only way.

Just like a little kid.

So what happens next in complete youngest child fashion?

A hissy fit is thrown.

“Look at my, CHRISTmas tree.”  Ummm… no thank you.  The minute someone says CHRISTmas… I stop listening.  It’s nothing more than a demand for attention and for the focus to be on THEIR holiday. 

Over a holiday greeting said with good intention and love.

Over the stupid ass color of a cup that they were served coffee in.

Over what you call a tree.

Boo fucking hoo.

This is every damn year.  And guess what? 

Nobody else cares.

None of your older sisters or brothers give a shit about you throwing another hissy fit this year because you’re making up this entire attack on yourself that never happened.

This is every year now. 

Every year nobody cares except you.

Every year everyone else still continues to do their own thing and ignore you.

You just get louder and make less sense and now nobody is taking you seriously anymore.

You just want to have your way and make sure nobody else gets their own.

Freedom of religion includes ALL religions.

This is NOT a nation founded on Christian principles.  Quite the opposite.

It was founded by people who never wanted one religion to take over the others.

Who never wanted to see the word “God” in the government at all.

Not on their buildings, not on their currency, not in their national pledge.

None of it.

Learn your history.

And while you do so, your older siblings will continue to do their own thing while they wait for you to figure out what the hell you’re doing.

And when you finally figure out they’ll have enough grace not to rub it in your face that you were a complete asshole and scream “I told you so” in your face.

They’ll just be grateful that you finally realized what a dickwad you were acting like.

You are what you hate, little brother.

You have become that which you despise the most and yet you do not seem to notice it.

You are attacking anyone that CHOOSES to say “Happy Holidays” instead of “Merry Christmas.”  You don’t want to have your greeting taken from you so somehow that makes you feel that you can try to take it from someone else?

You choose to get all angry at a time of year that is supposed to be about joy, celebration, family, love, and peace.  You are going out of your way to find reasons to be angry and disrespectful instead of just giving all other faiths the same respect you want for your own.

This is hypocrisy at its finest.

Respect someone’s right to wear a Mjolnir, Pentacle, Star of David, etc. just as much as you want your right to wear a cross to be.

Respect someone’s right to say Happy Holidays or Happy Hanukkah just as much as you want to feel free to wish others a Merry Christmas.

Think of someone other than yourself because until then all you’re doing is making yourself look like a ridiculous selfish jerkwad who needs to grow up.

Nobody is going to take you seriously until you start behaving.

Nobody is trying to take your toys away from you.

We just want to play with our own, too.

Pull yourself together, little brother.

Grow up.

We’re waiting.

Doing

As I said in my last post, I recently lost someone who meant the world to me.  And I had also mentioned how this isn’t my first rodeo.  But even if you’ve been through the grieving process a hundred times or more, it’s still going to be new.  It’s still going to be a new loss.  It’s going to affect you in different ways, sometimes unpredictable ways, and that can be a really good thing… or a really bad thing. 

There’s always some things that hit you harder than others, but different each time.  This most recent loss has just really thrown me for a loop.  She was part of my normal and my normal has to shift again. 
One thing that’s hitting me really hard is that we had plans. 
Lots of plans. 
We were going to do this.
And as soon as this other thing happened we were going to do this thing.
And then we were going to do this.
And then someday we were going to do that. 

Just as soon as I can get to it. 

A few of those things were things we’d do together.  But mostly they were just personal goals. 
Projects… ventures… ideas..
Things we planned and worked towards, but didn’t get to the doing part as quickly as we’d like. 
Her fibro and recent surgeries had been her very valid reasons for putting things off a bit more.
I have a teen, a toddler, and a husband.  Life gets busy sometimes. 
But now she can’t do any of it.  Not the joint ventures or the personal ones. 
She won’t figure out for sure where she was going to move to, because she didn’t get there. 
She won’t know if that new idea would pan out, because it hadn’t had time to be created. 

It’s easy to talk about doing.  It really is. 
I think a lot of what holds us back is fear of failure.  Honey badger might not give a shit… but it kind of does.  Failure sucks, whether you think of it as each rung on the ladder to success or not, it stings every single time.  It can make you feel defeated and each time can make you hesitate to put yourself out there that next time.  That can apply to a million different things too. 
We hold ourselves back.  We make excuses, and we justify those excuses. 

Yes, I have a husband and kids and a house to take care of; bills to pay, meals to plan and prepare, schedules to keep with appointments and routines. 

But when a friend writes me because they need to vent or they need some advice… I don’t even hesitate to listen.  It doesn’t matter what I was planning on doing for that next chunk of time, I found the time.  I made the time.  They matter to me and so I didn’t hesitate. 
So why do I hesitate to make time for myself?
Why does it feel so selfish? 

I should be doing this.  I should be cleaning that. 
I think being a stay at home mom contributes in that I’m always at home, but I’m also always at work.  There’s no feeling of coming home after work that day.  So my to do list is always in my face and that makes it really difficult to relax.  And with kids it’s very easy to get sidetracked.  And with a family it’s very easy to put yourself on the back burner. 
But what advice do we give other people?  A lot of times when people ask me for advice I just ask them that question.  If they’re a parent, “What if that was your kid, grown up, asking you what to do.  What would you tell them to do?” Because it’s often the thing you know is the right thing to do, or at least what you truly believe to be the right thing to do, even if it’s not what you want to hear or do.
If they don’t have kids, their spouse or their best friend; someone that they want nothing but the best for. 
Then you know what you truly feel you need to do. 
I would tell my friends that you cannot serve from an empty vessel.  That it’s not selfish to take care of yourself, it’s necessary.  You cannot do the things you need to do for those you care for if you have nothing left in you to give. 
You can only run so long on fumes.  Eventually you’re going to break down. 

If we can so easily make the time for those we care for, we need to do that for ourselves too. 
We find the time to peruse social media.  We find the time to play a game or two on our phones and crush some candy, dashing through diners, playing god, and tossing words back and forth with friends.  And I think the issue, at least with me, is in large part because I can do those things because they don’t take up long periods of time.  They’re short bursts when I find a minute for myself. 
Some days I can have hours to get things done while she naps.
But other days she just outright refuses to nap, because… toddlers. 
You can take a toddler to bed, but you cannot make it sleep. 
But then there’s time after she goes to bed.  There’s an hour after the toddler goes to bed where we hang out with the teen for some solo time.  And my husband and I make a point of spending time together each evening, alone.  We don’t have a lot of help nearby, hardly any really, so we don’t get to go out on date nights or anything.  So we feel that time together is important.  But I joke that at least half of it is spent doing parallel play.  He’s writing his music and half the time I’m laughing about memes on the interwebz.  So it’s not that I don’t have the time, it’s that I don’t make it for myself consciously. 

Writing my first blog post was a big deal.  I’ve had that blog up for years without a single post. 
But I’m trying to work on doing instead of talking about doing. 
So I did it. 

And I’d like to keep doing this, at least from time to time.  The goal would be some type of regular basis but for now I’m just content that I did it.  I got the first post up and here goes a second one. 

But I’m going to do the next thing, and the thing after that, too. 

She didn’t get to do those things she planned.  I don’t get to do the things I planned with her, at least not the same way.  And that realization is what is motivating me to start my own doing. 
I’ve planned enough. 

I had done a tarot reading for her just a matter of weeks before she died.  The main theme ended up being about doing instead of planning. 

It was something we had talked about a lot in recent months.  It was something we touched on regularly, but it was really something that dominated our conversations this year.  So I guess if I’m to honor her, it would be to do what she wanted for me. 
She wanted me to write.  I used to write for her and we had been working on getting her site back up to continue that.  I wasn’t going to blog for her again but I had agreed to occasionally guest blog to appease her. 
So write I shall. 
She wanted us to motivate each other to ‘do’ more.  Now it’s just a different way of hearing her cheering for me.  I have no doubt she’ll spend a lot of her visits here to cheer for the people she loved.  She was such a great cheerleader. 
She loved my crafts.  I have dozens on my to do list that I just haven't gotten to yet.  A lot of that is that the toddler likes to play with my craft things so things end up lost before I can use them.
But craft I will.  One thing at a time, starting with the things I have the supplies for already, I will do them.  They will get done.

How do you honor the people you’ve lost?  How do you honor their memories and the impact they made on your life? 

What are the things that you talk about doing that you want to just do? 

Let's make the time.
Let’s do them.  

Another one bites the dust

I remember a lot of funerals.  I’m on a first name basis with a local funeral director just because of how many times I’ve been in his building.  What a difficult job they have, dealing day in and day out with people at their worsts; during the saddest days of people’s lives.  Asking them questions that they may or may not know the answers to, and if you don’t know the answers it makes it even more difficult.

Sometimes I knew the answers.
Sometimes I didn’t.

Sometimes there were funerals with people spilling into the street.
Sometimes there were graveside services.
Sometimes there were military honors and 21 gun salutes.  Taps had never sounded so sad.
Sometimes there were just a handful of close friends and relatives.
Sometimes they were in churches

Sometimes they were memorial services in the funeral homes.

Sometimes there wasn’t a funeral at all.
Sometimes they died of old age. 
Sometimes they died far too young for random reasons.
Drowning
Drug overdoses
Car or atv accidents

Fires

Sepsis

Heart attack

An idiot with a gun

An idiot with a walking stick
I’ve seen a 14 month old in a casket.  A baby I loved.  You never forget that.  Ever. 
Sometimes there was a lot of crying. 
Sometimes there was a lot of laughter.
There’s always one person that says all the wrong things, but well meaning.  So you feel bad when you get so pissed off about it, but you still want to tell them to shove it. 
Tell them to shove it.
Tell them to fuck right off.
And you know what they’ll do?  Get pissed.  But then later on, down the road, they’ll say, “Oh, that’s okay.  I know it was the grief talking.” And then you’re just like, ‘whatever’ and move on. 
But it’s not really the grief talking.  It’s what you want to say.  You’ve never had a better excuse to just say it.  And it’s a very short lived excuse because …
People want you to move on.
They want to see that you’re okay so they don’t worry. 
You’re not okay though. 
You have moments of okay.  You even have moments of better than okay, good, and awesome. 
But you have moments of just… darkness blanketing around you because you remembered that they are gone.  You were telling some story, or listening to some song, or smelled their perfume or aftershave.  It hits you out of nowhere and there goes that rug again, right out from underneath you.
I frequently compare it to getting hit in the chest and having the wind knocked out of you.  Because it can take your breath away and you can feel that pain in your heart.  You learn that heartache isn’t just an emotional thing… you can physically feel it. 
I’ve wondered more than once why it doesn’t kill you.  How can you heart hurt so bad and just keep on beating.  It shouldn’t be possible. 
I had thought I’d felt that pain before so many times.  But when it’s a forever person, it doesn’t get much worse than that. 
We all know that as we grow up we will lose those older than us.  Death is a part of life.  We know this.  We expect to bury our grandparents, and even our parents.  I don’t really consider them forever people because we know from birth that they won’t be.  They will be large and very important parts of our lives, but not our forever people.  Our spouses are our forever people.  Our children are our forever people.  Our best friends are our forever people.  Our siblings can be our forever people but sibling dynamics are odd things so sometimes they aren’t, sometimes they’re just your childhood people. 
I’m not trying to diminish other types of loss, but these losses can be so catastrophic that it alters the course of our entire life. 
And people want you to be okay. 

They put time limits on it.  It’s been weeks, you have to stop crying all the time.  Pick this day and be better by then.  Chin up, feet forward, move on.  Or a thousand variations thereof.  And they mean well, I know they do.  And I let them go because I know that they have no idea what they’re talking about. 
9 times out of 10 it’s someone who has never lost a forever person.  They have no perspective on it. 
And I genuinely hope that they never gain any perspective on it. 
I hope they never have to lose a forever person because every year on the anniversary of the day I learned what that felt like, I still remember it.  “This moment, 5 years ago, was the last moment that I had where I didn’t know what this felt like.  I didn’t even appreciate it because I didn’t know…”
Everything was so different. 
I had had so many losses already.  I had memorial tattoos and people whose deaths really, really affected me in a hundred different ways. 
But nothing like losing a forever person. 

I was the oldest of 7 children.  I still don’t know what to say about it now.  Am I still the oldest of 7 children?  Or was I?  Who knows. 
3 of them have already died. 
1 at 26 years old in his sleep.
1 to suicide at age 30 leaving behind 2 small children.
1 was murdered in her own back yard at 25. 
All younger.  All people that were still supposed to be around when I died. 

But my sister, the one who took her own life, was so integral to my life that it was her death that changed my entire world.  It was the night of her death that I mark as the last moments I didn’t know what this felt like.  We were 16 months apart in age.  Best friends or worst enemies our entire lives.  We could fight like the best of them, but when one of us needed the other it didn’t matter.  We were there.
It was pretty common knowledge in our social circle that you couldn’t say anything shitty about her in front of me, ever, even if it was true, without me getting pissed.  That was a friendship ending mistake on more than one occasion.  I could say whatever I wanted, because she was mine. 
You could not. 

Her loss devastated me.  It completely altered my normal.  I had gotten married just 6 months before she died.  I had moved into my first apartment with my husband 6 mos after she died, had another daughter.  A daughter that will never get to know what a hug from Aunt Rachel feels like. 
I had spent months trying to save her.  Years, or maybe a lifetime, but months of actively trying to help her not kill herself. 

I try to catch my breath, but my forever people just keep on dying. 

Rachel was a forever person.
Maria was a forever person.
Jen was a forever person.  She died in a fire at 21.  She would have loved my kids and she’d have been at every birthday party.  I frequently wonder what her own kids would have been like, had she had the chance to have them.  What kind of mom she’d have made, because it would have been an amazing one.

Gigi was a forever person.  And her death is just destroying me.  Just over 2 weeks ago, unexpectedly.  I know that I left my kids with my husband and drove to Detroit.  I knew it was bad, but I didn’t know it was goodbye until I got there.  I know I gave her her last rites.  I know I said everything I could possibly think of and read her messages from everyone else.  And I know I wasn’t ready.  I’m not even close to ready to lose her, and that choice was taken from me.   I feel like I’ve been thrown back 5 years and I’m exactly where I was then, except this time I don’t have Gigi here to help me through it. 
That familiar hole in my chest. 
The screaming every time I’m alone in my car.  That’s the one place I feel you can get it out.  You scream at the top of your lungs in your car driving down a highway and nobody can hear you so you can really let it out.  Because with grief often comes anger.  And with a traumatic loss, rage.  I screamed at least half the way home from Detroit.  6 hours in the car.  But you can’t scream for that entire time.  Your voice gives you and you run out of breath.  That’s why I get it out.  The first scream might feel silly but then it just pours out.  Until it’s out, you have no more breath left to scream, no more voice.  And then there’s tears, so many tears, until you run out.  I didn’t know until losing my first forever person that you could run out of tears or breath or …. hope.
With Rachel I remember screaming, “WAKE UP” over and over and over.  I knew she couldn’t.  I knew she was dead.  But that’s what my mind wanted to scream and so I let it.  Everything else felt so difficult right then so I didn’t want to make it harder on myself.  If that’s what my mouth wanted to scream, I let it scream.  I was alone in my car, so what does it matter?  With Gigi I still screamed, it was just more like why you?  Why you of all the people?  I needed more time.  I can’t do this again.  I can’t lose another forever person without you.  I don’t know how to do this. 

I don’t want to do this…
But of course we don’t want to. 
We have to.

People check on you, for a while. 
It’s not the funeral that’s the hardest. 
It’s the day after. 
Everyone else goes back to their normal, but your normal is gone. 

I think that some people can really use extra bereavement leave.  But I also think other people do better without it.  Sometimes work is a great distraction for a while. 

I tend to hop from one thing to another; thoughts, projects, etc.  The only thing I’ve learned to do over the years is keep my hands busy so my mind can try to process things.  Sometimes it really feels impossible to wrap your head around it. 

Until that rug get pulled out from underneath you again. 

Sometimes music is cathartic, other times it can just completely gut you. 
Same with writing.

And here I am.. going through it.
Again. 

It feels surreal.  I feel like, I don’t know. 

I know this routine.  It’s so familiar now. 
Like old hat, but not old hat.  I know the routine, yet the losses are different and you’re never ready. 
Either no energy, or a shit ton of it. 
Either you’re starving, or no appetite.
Either you sleep a lot, or not at all. 

Don’t wipe every tear or you’ll rub your eyes raw. 
Stay hydrated to balance out the crying.

But cry. 
Get it out, because holy fuck.  They’re some really big emotions. 
Be patient with yourself.  Fuck everybody else telling you that you need to get over it.  They didn’t lose the person you lost even if you lost the same person.  Each person is someone different to everyone else.  You can lose the same person, without losing the same thing. 
And geez, the amount of people that try to make it a contest. 

I loved them more than you.
They loved me more than you.
I was closer to them than you were.
I knew them longer. 
I spent more time with them. 

The list goes on and on.  I wish it didn’t, but it does. 
There’s ALWAYS that one person. 
I tell that person to fuck right off. 
It’s not a contest. 
You lost someone, you ALL lost that person.  Be kind to each other and try to make it easier for each other.  Think about what the person who died would have wanted you to do?  Would they have wanted you to try to belittle someone they loved?  To make them feel like they were an afterthought compared to you? 
I don’t know about you, but I sure wouldn’t want my loved ones doing that to each other. 

I also think it’s super important to always remember that everyone grieves differently.  It’s a really mindfucking process.  Something that makes you feel better isn’t going to make someone else feel better, it might even make them feel worse. 

I’m only 36 years old. 
I thought I’d make it to at least 70 before I lost this many people. 

Let’s see, the things I tell myself. 
I tell myself to be patient with myself, while not being patient with myself.
I tell myself to live the type of life I know they wanted me to.  To do the things we talked about doing.  To honor them in little ways throughout my life. 
I still talk about people all the time, I don’t shy away from conversation about them.  I love talking about them.  It keeps them alive. 
Some days it’s easier than others to honor them. 

But I guess that’s all we can do, isn’t it? 

There’s 5 stages of grief, or so I hear.  Each one can last different lengths of time and in different orders and such, but I do tend to go through them all. 
Denial
Bargaining
Anger
Depression
Acceptance

I’ll tell you one thing though, especially with the ones gone far too soon…  acceptance is the one I struggle with the most.  The only part I’ve managed to accept thus far is that I can’t do anything about it.  They’re gone and I can’t bring them back. 
I can still talk to them, sometimes I can still hear them. 
But I can’t bring them back. 

And it kills me. 

They take a part of you when they go.  And sometimes I wonder if there will be any of me left. 
But there is. 
I find it at some point, every time. 
Of all the things for me to be a pro at, did it have to be grieving? 

Sometimes it is day to day.  Sometimes it’s one breath to the next. 
One foot in front of the other is how you do it. 
My kids get me to do it.  My husband. 
I do it for them even when I don’t want to do it for me. 
I had seen a quote years ago that I had printed out and keep nearby. 
“Find what you would die for, and live for it.”

And so I do.  I live for what I’d die for. 
I do those things to honor their memories.  It’s so easy to lose that though… but you get it back at some point, when you’re ready.  Eventually it doesn’t make you too sad to do because at some point it starts to make you feel closer to them.  So you do it. 

You honor them by continuing to be the person they loved. 
You keep them alive by continuing to talk about them.  To keep their stories alive. 
It always hurts me when I mention my people and people look at me with pity. 
I was telling a fun story.  Don’t make it sad.  Let me still enjoy my stories with them.  Let me still laugh about them, because the person I lost is who I laughed at them the hardest with.  Let me be sad when I’m sad, but let me be happy when I’m happy. 
And don’t ever pity me for losing them.  Because to lose them means I got to have them. 
I have been so lucky to have loved so many, so much.  To have had them love me and be such an integral part of my life that their loss hurts so much… that’s an honor.  That’s a privilege and that is not something to pity. 

Death is a part of life and grief is one of the hardest.
And I don’t even know why I’m going to post this except that maybe someone who has lost a forever person will read it and they will be able to relate to some or all of it… and they will realize they’re not alone.  That it’s okay because someone else gets it. 

And if not, that’s okay too. 

Because I would rather you not get it.