I need your good thoughts. Also, your money.

We lived next door to my dad's mom until right before I started third grade, when we moved into a bigger house across town. While we lived next door (which was a street away from where Joe grew up, btw), she used to baby-sit me after school. At some point, I don't remember when because I'm old now and those memories are fuzzy, my Granny moved in. Granny was not blood-related to any of us, but had raised my Grandpa and so she was family. I think that's how family works.

Granny died a few years after we moved, and my grandma moved into the condo that Joe and I are now renting. Life hasn't been very fair to Grandma, and yeah, yeah, I know life's not fair but that's not going to stop me from being pissed off about it. Her husband, my grandfather, died before I was born. He was only 46. When I was in college, she was diagnosed with breast cancer. She beat that and was diagnosed with diabetes. And a few years ago, doctors found a cyst that was pushing on her brain, causing confusion and other physical problems.

I remember being relieved when I found out that it was a cyst and not a tumor. But now I think, "fuck that cyst," because it has been nothing but a pain in the ass (brain?) ever since it turned up. It's required two of the same surgery, a shunt, and a temporary-turned-permanent stay in a variety of nursing homes. And the surgeries? They seemed to work at the time but she's been in a spiraling state of confusion ever since. She became paranoid and was sometimes mean. Sometimes funny mean, like when she threatened to punch my dad in the gonads, but other times mean mean. Mostly she was just confused. She sometimes thought she was back in her childhood home. She thought she had more than one room at the nursing home and always insisted that we take her to it.

She did have moments of complete lucidity, where she was all there, all Grandma again, and she'd make a joke or tell a story from when my dad was a kid. My sister and I visited once, and I spent the majority of the visit pushing Grandma's wheelchair up and down the hallways of the nursing home because she insisted that we go to her "other" room and no amount of me telling her that there WAS no other room was going to dissuade her. We spent a good hour exploring the halls and we never found it, of course, but when we got back to Grandma's room, she looked me square in the eye, all there, and said, "You're a good kid." I laughed it off, as I do whenever anything gets too serious, and made a comment about how I hadn't been a kid in a very long time. Then we talked about the new Where the Wild Things movie.

That's the last time I remember seeing the Grandma I grew up with. Since then, she's only gotten worse. She was recently moved to a home that specializes in Alzheimer's and dementia patients. I won't go into details, but she's been a handful, to put it mildly, and this was primarily the reason she couldn't come to the wedding.

Last weekend it reached epically bad proportions, as her doctors try to find a balance in her medication. They need to keep her calm without over-medicating her. I haven't seen her yet in the new home but I imagine it's not good, as my parents have forbidden me or any of the other grandkids to go see her without one of our parents. She's not eating. My parents couldn't wake her up when they visited last, she was so over-medicated. So. It's bad. I feel stupid and naive for thinking it would ever get better.

This coming Saturday, I'm walking in the Making Strides Against Breast Cancer 5K Walk in honor of both my Grandma and Aunt Kathy, both breast cancer survivors. I've done a pretty piss-poor job raising money, so if you can find it in your hearts (and wallets) to make a donation, I'll be your best friend. Or say really nice things about you on the internets. Or write a post about anything you want. Hopefully not one as sad face as this one, though, I had to take a lot of DON'TYOUCRYRIGHTNOW breaks.

but the children love the books

Some of you may know that I volunteer with a group called Oak Tree Corner, a place for children and teens to go to when someone close to them has died. I've written about it here and here. And probably other places, too, only I can't find those other places. Anyway.

Oak Tree's big yearly fundraiser is on April 24. We are funded solely on charitable contributions from friends, family, and the community. So, if you think this sounds like a good cause or you have an extra $5 laying around, would you consider donating? Pretty please? If you donate, I'll write a post about whatever you want. Or I'll send you candy, which is probably more of an enticement than me babbling about killer zombie monkeys from space or whatever. Again, I say ANYWAY.

THIS is where you can make donations and become my best friend.

I also idolized Pippi Longstocking, if only because she had her own monkey

This morning, when I left for work, I was all, "booo, it's cloudy and looks somewhat thunderstormy!" I like thunderstorms, but not when I'm driving to work because once it starts to rain EVEN A LITTLE BIT everyone forgets how to drive. Thunderstorms are OK once I'm AT work, though, because the power might go out and the last time all the power went out I didn't have to work for two days.

It didn't end up thunderstorming on the way to work and EVEN BETTER there was the best rainbow. I'm assuming that seeing a rainbow means good luck. Which is good because Joe bought a lottery ticket (hey, why not?) although I'm happy to report he didn't play Hurley's numbers. I don't need any bad juju. Don't worry, I won't forget about you when we win (do you like how HE bought the ticket, but WE get the money?) because obviously I'll quit my job right away and have loads of time to blog. Or sleep. One of those.

Even if we don't win the lottery, rainbows are still pretty, right? I've always had a fondness for them on account of one of my two childhood idols was Rainbow Brite. The other? Punky Brewster. My mom insists that I dressed myself like Punky when I was little, complete with rainbow suspenders, a rainbow belt (this also doubled as a Rainbow Brite belt when I played Rainbow Brite), pigtails, freckles (those never came off), and red, heart-shaped sunglasses. I've never seen photographic evidence of this, so I'm not sure I believe her. I've also been told that I inexplicably spoke with a Southern accent as a tiny child, but I don't know if that's true and I have no idea where the accent went.

Anyway. Here is a picture of the rainbow I saw. It looked way awesomer than that IRL, I promise.