Going Away

This blog hasn't been updated since my father died. Just about that time, I switched to using LiveJournal instead, and that's where the recent posts can be found. Access my current journal at http://www.livejournal.com/users/bfebear/.

Good Night, Daddy

My last posting that was published dealt with my next trip to Toronto. I should be arriving back in Raleigh in just a few minutes from now. The trip never happened. Instead, I arrived back from my Mom's in Virginia around 8:30 tonight.

As some of you may know, my father had been ill recently. I started a post that I haven't yet finished on Tuesday relating that my father had died. I will eventually finish it, along with many more. I have so much to relate. I'll try to seperate it into seperate postings and not fill this one too full. For now, though, I feel the need to put into writing something that happened Friday evening. It doesn't have any significance in the scheme of things, but for some reason, it sticks with me more than any of the other events surrounding my father's death.

My father's funeral was held on Friday at 2PM with burial immediately afterward. I cried a little during the service. I don't usually cry in public, so I guess my efforts to be more in touch with my emotions, and to be more honest with them, must be working some. Again, I got a little choked up at the graveside service, but I was a bit out of it by then. Numb, really. After the service, I visited with people that were there. The funeral home took us on home, and many aunts, cousins, nieces, nephews, etc all joined my sisters, Mom and me at my parent's home. Some of my friends also joined us, but more on that later.

After everyone was gone, my Mom, sisters Kathy and Debbie, and I went back to the graveyard so that Kathy and I could take pictures of the flowers. I did a bit of silent communication to my Dad at the same time. It was more of meditation and reconciliation within myself, honestly, than it was actual conscious communication to him. There was no real consciousness to any of it. It was extremely windy, and as a result, bitterly cold. My Mom succumbed first, and returned to my SUV to wait, followed by Debbie. Finally, Kathy went back toward the SUV and I started to follow. As I walked past where I imagined the head of the coffin to lie, it just came out. "Good night, Daddy. Sleep well."

My next trip to Toronto

until I am once again with the most wonderful man I know.

Your Anonymous Author 

Next trip to Toronto...

The day I'm looking forward to most now

Throw Caution to the Wind?

You hear all your life to be careful what you wish for - you just might get it. Well, today was a repeat of Monday, but with an extra half-day thrown in on top. I had a service call this morning at 9:30 in "the Park" (Research Triangle Park for those who don't live in these-here parts.) I got there early and found that they had nothing for me to do. Woohoo! I maybe get to go home and work on the 2 machines that I have from clients that need to be fixed. First, I have to call another client who wants me to fix her home PC to connect to her office and to get email remotely. I call her, but get her voicemail. In the meantime, the client that resulted in me travelling for 4 months this summer left me a voicemail and said they were having some problems. I stop by another customer site to drop off a cable they needed and find out they need me to help with a server. I ended up staying at that location all day, leaving at 5:30.

In the meantime, travel-causing customer calls a second time, get a call from a customer whose machine I worked on yesterday asking me to come back, still have to try to call the customer back about the home service...and then I get told by this customer that I am needed back at his office tomorrow at 9AM. My boss said that to send him out to the customer who wanted a re-visit would set a bad precendent, so I had to tell them that it would be emergency rates (1.5) if they wanted someone today since I was already booked and they didn't want my tech to come out there. Argh!

The good thing is that I got home in time to change clothes and now I'm headed to church for a special World AIDS Day service. I'm so proud of my church - they are not a gay denomination - or straight, for that matter. They don't care what or who you are - read the web site if you are interested in learning more. Well, off to church for now. Hugs to any who make it this far!

World AIDS Day

I just returned home from the World AIDS Day service held by our church. I am so grateful to have such a wonderful group of people. We had more people attend the AIDS service than we had for Ash Wednesday. It was a good service.

The service was held in the office of one of our church members. We sat in a circle, with the musicians at one side and the pastor (Rebeccah tonight) at the other. Shortly after I arrived, the service started. After a few minutes, I started smelling just a whiff of something unpleasant. It quickly went away though, leaving me to wonder if someone had a touch of the vapors, as we used to say in the South. The service proceeded through another prayer, and then we stood to sing. As soon as I stood up, there was something much stronger than a whiff...and it became recognizable as that distinct aroma produced by our 4-legged companion, the dog. Since I was the last to arrive and thus was sitting on a sofa by myself, there weren't many likely other sources for the smell, so I looked down and sure enough, there are leaves sticking out from under my shoe. Apparently, the near-freezing temperatures kept the dogshit from becoming redolent immediately - only after the warmth of the interior did the smell start to waft.

Well, I don't know about you, but I couldn't handle it. I walk out of the service (waiting for a break in the "action" of course). As I walk by, Pastor Rebeccah whispers "It's at the end of the hall". lol I go outside, take my shoes off and then come back in and finish the service in my socks. She must have thought I peed in my shoes or something.

Lopsided Life

I've become increasingly aware that my life is much too lopsided.

In my work, I bill clients on jobs that are 95% on-site work. I inherited the schedule from my boss. We're still growing the business, so for right now, I don't have enough billable hours to come close to filling my available hours. What I end up with is a week that is non-stop all day on Monday, and then from slim to no work the rest of the week. I know that the rest of the week will eventually fill up and I'll be looking back with nostalgia on the days when I didn't have that much to do, but in the meantime, I end up yo-yoing being being too busy for words to being bored out of my gourd.

I've been having more success in the rest of my life in finding balance and that is a good thing. I'm occassionally getting enough sleep. I am trying to be better in what I choose to eat. I have to still get back to the gym, though. I've lost almost all of the gain I had made body-wise.

I find that I am having WAY too much fun to worry too much about life overall. That might be another sign of imbalance, but damn, it feels good right now.