2 Helluva Things

It’s that time of year, folks. The lite (or soy) egg nog is flowing and twinkle lights have gone up across the land, all backed by a soundtrack of premature Christmas music.

Oh, and Auntie’s seasonal affective disorder started a week and a half ago.

You all know how Auntie is estranged from both sides of her extended family. I say this having been told that my sweet and seriously stunning cousin-in-law reads this blog. (Hi, honey! Hug!)

She’s not related to me via biology, so my thesis stands.

You know what? My thesis doesn’t just stand, it rears back and roars. To wit:

Once upon December 16th 2012, there was a seasonally affected post about “my aunt who was never an Auntie.” We had an interesting and rocky relationship, dependent upon her (occasionally desperate) needs and her (verbally voracious) disapproval.

As anecdotal as the details are, I’ll spare you. (You’re welcome.) The point is that eventually we drifted into semiannual phone calls and cards.

A week or so ago I got a group email from a friend (please note that it was from a friend) with the subject line “Zelda’s Obituary”. Yep, Zelda was the aforementioned Aunt.

That’s the first helluva thing.

She died last July. Neither of her kids, their spouses, or their kids bothered to send as much as a text. Yes, if I had known she was seriously ill, I would have visited to say good-bye. Bad times aside, I would have shown respect.

For the record, the sweet & seriously stunning cousin-in-law is on the other (albeit equally estranged) side of my family and had nothing to do with any of this.

It’s a helluva thing to find out about the death of a family member months later from the subject line of a group email.

The second helluva thing is that I’m telling you about it.

Or shouting it, rather, from the far side of the burned bridge.

Part of why is the whole “what you can’t fix, feature” thing, but part of it is that Auntie is looking out for you. You’re still in the early pages of the Choose Your Own Adventure™ book of your life. I’m here to tell you that even if you jump from page 26 to page 174, all the stuff in between will still happen. Prepare yourself and plan accordingly.

I’m going to have some soy egg nog now.