Twenty years ago I had a much different life, one that I walked away from, and I don’t look back all that often, but tonight I’m going to, so I can tell you all one of my gun stories. I’m not anti-gun, but I’m damn wary of ’em because none of my gun stories are pretty. I mean the ones I have personal knowledge of.

I used to have a very good friend who lived a few miles from me, in what I would call the boonies. What I mean by that is that there’s at least half a football field between houses and woods out back, sometimes some woods between houses too, narrow winding roads. I lived behind a shopping mall right off the highway, but the boonies weren’t five minutes away, she was divorced, living alone back there after, so she had a gun, a handgun. Well, who could blame her? Not me.

Now, she was a fun loving gal, and we used to party hard together, and before too long she started bringing a guy around regularly. They were a great couple, very social, except one thing–they would get into epic, crazy fights. Screaming, throwing shit, getting out of cars on busy highways kind of fights. Most of this happened off-stage so to speak, except the car one, I was in the car for that, and for a moment I didn’t know if she was trying to catch him or run his ass over.

I’m guessing at this point I don’t need to tell you she wound up shooting him, do I? I wasn’t there. They were fighting. She winged him. I talked to her on the phone, she didn’t know what charges she was facing or what. It was going to depend on what he had to say. Was he charging at her? Did she have cause to fear? She’s on the phone freaking out, and him? He wants to come…to her house. For some strange reason the cops don’t want him to do that. Huh.

The whole thing was a mess. The best thing I can say is that he wasn’t hurt bad, and her ass didn’t go to jail, but the aftermath still wasn’t pretty. From what I read, a good portion of the people who discharge their personal firearms wind up doing so on somebody they know. A lot of the times with much worse results than my friend. Hers is the best gun story I know, and it sucked.

This will be short tonight. There’s a reason I never say things like: what else could go wrong? or: it can’t get any worse! Because I’m a firm believer that the moment you say such a thing, it bites you in the ass. So I never even think it, yet it happens anyway. My kid is star student again next month. Me and Cleetus have to go into his classroom and “do something” with his class. Well…shit.

We nailed it last year. We really did, it went as well as I could have hoped, but my anxiety leading up to the big day knew no bounds. And I actually had a pretty good idea for that day, and was feeling pretty good, having just started to experience some good days from the botox. Now? I got nothing. No idea what I’m gonna do with these fifth graders, and it is killing me.

I have a general anxiety about going into schools just anyway. Even for good things, I get a mild “being sent to the principal’s office” vibe going. Now having to prepare an activity and submit it to his teacher…argh! It’s not like I can go all Bartleby on them and say I prefer not to, I have to come up with something. I’m trying to wrack my brain, but it’s throwing up blocks. I say: Come on, you’ve entertained kids, stop and think. But then no, it’s all: yes, but those were girls and their moms didn’t care if you wanted to make jewelry or make-up.

I’m just sitting here filled with dread. Every time I think about it my mind races and I start to panic. Why? Why now? WTF, man? I never even asked what else could go wrong! I know better!

I have a tendency towards getting a little depressed every fall. I know this and I have developed certain strategies to deal with it, generally they work well. This year it’s more of a battle, not all that surprising, really. Let’s face it, it’s been kind of a shit year here at chez triv. I’m sabotaging my own strategies now and I have to cut that shit out.

Usually when I feel like this I reach out to spend time with people whose company I enjoy, and who enjoy mine. I have been doing that, but it seems there’s only a few, and although we have a very good time, when it’s over I feel an immediate and drastic letdown. I know that’s an over-reaction, I’m a grown-up, every day is not meant to be a party. They’re coming back in two weeks, not never.

I have to remember to be more like my cat. Sit in that spot of sunshine, damn it. Why does he he get to hog it all? I need to start taking my vitamin D again, because yes, I did let that slide over the summer.

I have picked up my pencils and pens again and not put them down, I’ve even taken to coloring when inspiration will not come, but I have to stop being perpetually dissatisfied with whatever I produce. I almost crumpled up and threw away a perfectly acceptable piece the other night. That little bitch voice in the back of my head was just taunting me: not good enough, triv, nope, not good enough at all. Somehow I made myself get up and walk away before I did it. Not good enough for who? But that’s depression.

I try to count my blessings, and I have many. I don’t fall into this total cult of positivity some practice here in the US, because life ain’t like that. The constant admonitions to always look on the bright side in and of itself is just too much pressure. But taking the time to stop and appreciate the good things I do have? That’s important.

I am staying far away from people and things that piss me off or make me feel bad. As much as I can, anyway. So, needless to say I didn’t watch either Republican debate. I’m watching marathons of Drunk History or stand up comedy, stuff like that. As for people? I don’t want to deal with folks who drain the life out of me just now, so I’m not going to if I don’t absolutely have to.

I don’t know if I’m going to beat it this year. I know I’m not alone, that there are many of us strugglers out there. I know I’m going to keep fighting it. I’m going to keep reminding myself that depression is a filthy liar trying to take me down, and that I’ve beaten it back before. I’m going to forgive myself for thinking it’s my own fault for letting it get so close this year. It’s really not, that’s just another lie depression tries to tell me.

I honestly don’t know what to do with myself. It’s bad enough that I’ve never had any driving ambition to actually be or accomplish anything “big.” Now that I have time on my hands I find myself both overwhelmed by some of the responsibilities I have, and at a loss for how to best use the time I’ve recently regained. I really should be cleaning and clearing out the house, and that’s happening in fits and starts, but did I mention overwhelming? Oh, on many levels.

I’m trying to take a step back, assess what’s important to me, what matters. Especially what I do online. Does it matter? I want to believe that it does. I want to think that the time I put into certain things counts for something. The  Snowden supporters facebook group I took on tests that belief more often than I would like. I think it’s important, I don’t want to walk away, but it is disheartening as hell to see the fan boy posts outnumber the privacy activist posts–to see the number of “likes” pile up on the 25th repost of the Snowden statue vs any given post on domestic spying or trying to restore our forth amendment rights. Or how many people join simply due to their rabid hate of government or Obama, misunderstanding core issues, what has been done, and what needs to be done. It’s frustrating as all hell, Edger threatened to walk away more than once, but now that he’s gone–well, I don’t think I can.

I’m trying to spend more time on art. I’ve done a few pieces I’m happy with. My well has run dry for the moment, so I am working with various media to color in other people’s work. I think it’s good. I’m learning new techniques, how to blend alcohol markers, how to use several different mediums on one piece, stuff like that. Until it fires up a spark of inspiration the color itself makes me happy, and it’s something I can do with a clipboard propped her in front of me while that group keeps me tethered to this computer. Although, I have to admit that I’ve been (and this may be somewhat irrational) spending every spare dollar I get trying to amass some quality supplies for that time down the road when there will be no spare dollars.

I’ve been cajoling the kids to spend time with me. Just get their butts off their computers and do something, anything else. Come color with me, I’ll let you use the good stuff. Let’s play a game, I have some good ones…but they don’t suffer this same yearning for time and meaning as I do. They have other interests now, the allure of that is too strong to set aside for one of mom’s whims. Time feels short for me, it stretches out endlessly before them, and may the Deity grant that be so. I will not browbeat them, but I will continue to invite.

This is about as close as I get to an existential crisis–which for me has always just boiled down to anything that makes one seek meaning or purpose. I don’t find my life completely bereft of either of those two things, I just feel like it’s inventory time. That’s a healthy thing, I think.

My Mom would have been 79 today, and I am surprised at how not okay I’m doing on her first birthday not on this planet. I’m trying to not think too  much about it, but that’s ridiculous because it just makes me think about it more. I tell myself to save some of this shit for later because I have a whole year ahead of me of firsts without her. This ain’t even the first first, that was dad’s birthday in July. But this one is hers, it feels big to me.

I sit here and tell myself that she’s free now, she’s not crazy anymore. She’s not living in a house with people that she doesn’t quite know who they are most of the time, eating the same foods day in, day out because she can’t remember liking anything else. She isn’t looking to go home when she’s already there anymore. All of that’s true, but when I think of that now, today I find too little comfort in it, I feel so angry at what dementia stole from her, from all of us.

I worry that my kids will remember the scared, difficult mommom  she became in the end, rather than the woman who spoiled them rotten, and loved them to pieces. They were so little then. I know they remember going to the beach, but not many particulars. Today this breaks my heart. The certain knowledge that they will not remember who she was. Dementia stole that too.

I know this is just part of it, part of grieving. I recognize on one level that this is that, even while it’s hitting me in waves hard enough to roll me ass over tin cups on another. I held it together while Dad was in the room, it’s hard enough for him without me blubbering and blowing my nose in front of him. Then I just let it roll over me. I thought about my mom and told myself to knock it off, that she wouldn’t want me to cry. But that’s not entirely true–she would want me to cry a little, because I loved her, then she’d want me to stop and carry on.

Both my boys went back to school this week, and both were met with assignments with some demands for information about their summer. For the first time ever, they don’t want to share that. Their grandmother died. No, it wasn’t the only thing that happened, but it dominated. The aftermath made for a slow, muted summer, and also made for the fist time I didn’t have one picture to send back to school of Dan doing any summer activity at all. My bad.

Dan will say it, but I’m pretty sure he doesn’t want to write about it, maybe he would, but I’m not going to make him. He spent his free time this summer mostly on art and the computer. I have to say that I wasn’t happy with everything he drew, some of it was dark, but he was processing the first death he’s ever experienced, and we talked, he’s okay. He does miss my mom. I hope they just let him say his summer was fine and let it go.

For Baboo it’s worse, I think. He’s expected to write something for several different classes, and he’s trying to do that without mentioning the big event. It’s easy enough to write about the books he’s read for summer, he always reads more than enough and there’s plenty to recap, but his summer? Oh, there’s slim pickings there. Stoogefest, visiting Aunt Sissy, and….? Not a helluva lot more.

We didn’t spend our entire summer draped in crepe, wailing and crying, we just took things slow. We did stand out front and watch the fireworks, but like everything all summer, it was the first time without Mom, and we all felt it. I have a hard time writing about it, why would I want them to have to do it?

Aside from that, some things are theirs. Some things are personal. Their grief, their feelings, and this year–how they spent their summer.

I’m probably going to be getting a precious little boy to watch for a while. He’s nine months old and just as cute as can be. His mama is an old friend. She used to help babysit my boys when they were little, she was a good kid, really, I always thought so anyway. She lived with my niece for a while, due to a conflict with her mom I was told. I never nosed into the details, I’ve seen a lot of kids whose parents were too busy off living their lives to be there for them in the way they need, I just assumed it was something like that. Eventually my boys got older and she moved to Texas, but I kept in touch.

She moved back here a couple of years ago. She again briefly lived with my niece, then she didn’t. A little later I saw her on facebook with her belly growing big. I was happy for her, she looked every bit the glowing expectant mommy. When the baby pictures came it was joyous. She beamed with love for that beautiful boy, but it seemed to me there was something missing. Yes, she was with her baby’s daddy, but he was never in the pictures, and I didn’t see many family kind of posts coming up, I worried, and I was right to worry.

When she got in touch to ask me if I could help her out, maybe watch her boy for a few hours a day, I didn’t ask her any questions. She said she was right down the street staying with my great-niece. I said I had to clear it with Pop, but yes, yes I would be willing to help. Bring that little fella up here to meet us. Let’s see how he likes Aunt triv.

She brought him up yesterday, and yes he is a cutie pie. She was sitting here telling me how thankful she was that I would help her. I said, “Look, you were in a bad situation, you had to get out, that’s all I need to know.” She did tell me more, that her mom thought she should stay in that bad situation, not willing to help her, not willing to let her come home. That she was willing to do anything to get out and make things better for herself and her little man, work two jobs, whatever it takes. So we sat and tried to look for a place for them to live on craigslist, not a lot of prospects there. I wish I could help her out on that score, but I can’t.

But I will do what I can. On her way out I tried to tell her that she’ll get through this, that some folks do care about her. She turned around and said, “Only you and K****.” I went back inside and cried a little. What the hell is wrong with people? I don’t know her mom, but I can tell you this much, I never thought she was there for her, and it’s not like she was any more trouble than the typical teenager. And now? Wow, I don’t don’t even know what to say.

So, I’m hoping she gets that second job, and I get to watch her baby boy. That she finds that room to rent and is able to save the money to get where she needs to go. Because I have never found it easy to be hard.

I’m just not ready for it. I was unhappy when they first started sending the kids back to school before Labor Day, and since then it’s grown into a seething hatred. Not only because the last week in August used to be the week we got vacation, but because…why? What for? This is stupid and inconvenient. They don’t seem to get out much earlier, I can only remember one year where they had to shorten a break or add a day because of snow, so wtf?

First of all, I love summer, and I love it when the boys are home with me, so I am never anxious for that to end. Really, I always get a little depressed as back to school time nears. The minute August hits that first letter shows up with that huge list of supplies they want you to buy. Yeah, that’s what I want to do, go fight the professional parents in the aisles of the local Mart of Wal over the dwindling supply of Duo-Tang folders. one thing I really liked about that little Catholic school Baboo attended, they had a list, but theirs was filled by them at a bulk discount and we got a bill. No worries over crap being picked out, getting the wrong thing, or over-priced garbage. I guess public schools are too big to do something like that? I don’t know, but I would think they’d get a great discount if they did.

This year the kids aren’t half as unhappy as I am. Hell, Baboo seems eager to go back. I don’t remember ever feeling that way…whose kid is this? Sure, I missed some of my friends, but getting to see them, for me, was consolation for having to go back, not just another “great thing” that was going to happen before Labor Day. I don’t get it, but school was never my favorite thing.

Summer is the only season whose end can bring me down. That was true before I ever had kids. The other three seasons can end and I don’t give a hot damn. That’s not quite true, I do feel a little happy when winter is done, but it almost never feels like it is, so it’s not like I throw a party. I don’t want to soft nights and sunny days to end. I don’t want to not be able to float around that silly little pool we have out back. Fall is a bummer, and that’s what I call it, never autumn, because it feels like a dark thing that falls right on me.

It hasn’t been an easy summer, my mom died, Cleetus followed that with a epic case of gastritis that lasted a couple of weeks, and we never did get our income tax return. All the things I promised the kids if and when it came? November, kids…they promise. Pffft. Still, it’s over too soon. We didn’t get to do half the things we wanted to do, or I should say I didn’t. I wanted to give the kids some fun, some good times in spite of everything else. I failed for the most part, not for lack of trying, things just didn’t work out. The kids are so resilient, they’re okay with the summer they had. Me? Not so much.

Most of my friends have long ago moved away from this podunk I call Hellpeckersville. I don’t really know many people who still live in their childhood home towns, but Pew tells me four in ten stay put. Sure, it’s dull, and small, but it still has neighborhoods, and tree-lined streets, and for me, familiarity never did manage to breed the kind of contempt that would make me want to leave. It’s the kind of place I’m happy that my kids are growing up in.

I like to travel, love to see new places. I used to do quite a bit of that, and hope that in the future I can take my kids traveling too, but I was always happy to get home after. I never got anyplace where I looked around and thought I could live there. Not because it wasn’t beautiful or warm, and not because I wouldn’t want to go back, (because I would!)but because it wasn’t home. I don’t know what makes a person a homebody, I just know that whatever it is I am overflowing with that stuff.

And it’s not that I’m not social, I am. But even then I would rather host the party. Even if that means cleaning first, making all the food, and cleaning up after. It makes me happy as hell to host a crowd. I thought I was snagging some new game people on Saturday night and I was excited like a little kid. Sadly, the wife got sick and the new couple didn’t make it, but next time, baby, and there will be snacks.

When Cleetus used to play out, I remember always being happiest when he played at the Pub that my sister owned. Home base, as it were. Yes, we did drive all over hell and play in strange places, and sometimes I sat alone in a crowd giving him the old “Nancy Reagan Gaze” as he played. I was okay with that. But playing regularly at the Pub? Oh, good times! I never sat alone, I knew everybody. I took my position at the end of the bar and all night long was music, friends, and lively conversation. Maybe some folks can feel that way anywhere they go, but not me. It broke my heart when she lost that joint. Because it was home too.

It used to worry me that I was like this. For a while it seemed that everybody but me had this wanderlust, maybe I was defective in some way. Now it doesn’t bother me. I don’t know why I prefer to stay put, or prefer the familiar, and I’m fine with that. The only thing I worry about now is being able to stay put, but that looks like it just may work out too.