I found out about grandma dying from a text message at 2am: “Grandma’s gone”. That was it.
Yesterday was grandma’s funeral. I didn’t go back because flights were over $1000 and I’d only be able to spend like 36 hours there. Also I don’t really want to face the cousins on that side of the family. Apparently it was a very small and very tense affair. My dad says that basically none of the cousins on that side of the family even talked to my dad or my mom. There’s a whole bunch of drama around grandma and her finances. The cousins, from what I hear, basically wanted her to just stay in her tiny little $600/month apartment by herself instead of getting the care and help she needed from an $8,000/month assisted living apartment and they are pissed my mom moved her from Carroll to Des Moines…
My cousin even texted me “If I hear one more snarky comment form your mother, I’m going to explode”.
My mom even said that the cousins weren’t visiting her the past few years, they weren’t sending her cards, calling her on her birthday, etc. Which hurts. They were all much closer to her then I ever was. They lived within miles of her (two of them were walking distance). They spent much more time with her. And yet they just “seem” like they are just in it for their inheritance, money. Greedy.
I dunno, it was hard when my Grandma Black died, we were all close to her. And when the “kids” (my parents, aunts) basically excluded all of us grandkids from the affairs it was a little annoying.
But my mom says she was texting my cousins, telling them about grandma’s finances, etc. Which I wasn’t included in (again a little annoying my cousins are getting more information then I was).
Which really brings me to the biggest point of this whole discussion around grandma. My whole life, I feel like mom kept us at arms length from her. We never really got to spend time with her, never got to get to know her and that kinda hurts. There were things in the obituary that I was like “Wait, grandma did that?!” I just wish we had known her better, that we had been closer to her. That we had been able to have those times with her the way we had with Grandma & Grandpa Black. Go spend weeks with them during the summer. Spend holidays together, etc.
With Grandma Sibbel, it was always just a quick 2-3 hours, go visit then go home. I was never close to her, but I always sent her cards. I tried to call her on her birthday, etc. Most of the time she was never home and I just always left voicemails. Her and I never really talked, never really got to know each other. And it makes me sad… She was my grandma. I haven’t cried at all over her loss.
On other topics. Things with Kellie are amazing so far. He’s so communicative, sharing his feelings and emotions, talking about things. Discussing what bothers him. It’s so refreshing. Last weekend I came down to his place and his best friend invited him out to dinner. I told him to go have a good time, but can you please be home by 10. He said “sure babe”. no argument, no discussion. he was home on time. Throughout the evening he was texting me what they were doing, asking me what I was doing. Etc. He made me feel incredibly comfortable.
The other night, I was kinda upset about something non-related to him. He knew exactly what to say, how to handle it. How to make me feel better. No just “Try harder”. he talked to me about what was upsetting me, talked about what we can do to change things. etc.
Every time we hang out, he’s just so sweet, so caring, so loving. He’s so into me. I’m so into him. I love that we can sit at dinner with our phones face down and just talk about shit. I love that he’s excited to do things together, to plan things together, to take time off.
I love that he remembers things. It’s only been one month and 10 days. But things are excellent so far. We will see how things continue to progress.
ONE thing so far that I don’t like though, is that sometimes when we are joking around he takes it a little bit too far. He will say things like “asshole” and “jerk” which I don’t really appreciate. But I have to just remind myself we’re just joking around, we’re having fun. But it does kinda sting a tiny bit.
Apparently Charles’ roommate saw Kellie and I in the gym the other day, he reported that to Charles, who reported it to Jim, who reported it to me.
I’m heading to the BVI’s tonight for a week. Charles is watching Astra while I’m gone. I texted him Monday and just asked if I could just drop her off at his place on Thursday. He said sure but then he asked if we could get breakfast. So we went to breakfast. It was hella awkward. I just feel like both of us didn’t want to talk about certain things.
It was funny though cause we were talking about where to go and he said “huckleberry or bear”. I said “let’s go to huckleberry, I haven’t’ been to one in years”. he said “Yes you have, we went to the one in Treat not long ago. You ate the biscuits and gravy and there was a semi cute boy behind you”. I wanted to reply with “How can you remember that but you fail to remember things like my birthday”. But I didn’t.
We did talk about things. He asked about Kellie and I could see tears in his eyes when I was talking about him. He said “If you had asked Kellie to watch astra instead of me, I would have been very upset”; He also said that when serge told him about seeing me at the gym with Kellie it made him “feel a certain way”.
I told him, “Yeah, I get the same feeling every time I have to fucking hear about you and Anthony”. I wish I had pushed him a little harder on that topic. What did he feel, what else did he want to say.
We walked out of the diner and I hugged him as we walked, shoulder to shoulder. And I told him: “Charles, after everything we’ve been together, you can tell me anything. There’s no judgement here.”
When we parted ways, we gave each other a big hug. He said “I’ll always love you”. I told him the same.
I really love him to death. I care about him, I want to see him happy and I want to see him achieve what he wants to. I want him to fly in life. I wish that I could have been by his side for it. I wish I could have been there to help him. But maybe my time with him was to just help him realize some things. I do hope we can continue working on a friendship of some sort. But I want him to take the lead on it. I’m debating if when I pick up Astra, I suggest “Hey, gym and lunch?”
I feel like he’s holding himself back at times. I wrote him yet another long ass note yesterday and I sent it to him. I hope he continues to grow and understand himself.
I’m excited to see where things go with Kellie, I’m excited to see where 2024 takes me.
I’m happy right now. Let’s keep it up, Christopher.
yay kellie