It's faerie day. Yes, you guessed it; it's Solstice. When I get home from work, I'm going to the back yard. When twilight comes, well, I've got my Rue, drop some on my eyelids and I can see the faeries - that is, if there are any around. *clutches his bag of Rue* I so looked forward to this time last year. But this year? It just sort of snuck up on me out of nowhere. Where did the time go? *sigh* With all that's been going on, I didn't even notice that it was getting close to that time. "Uh ... Seth? Why are you writing an entry at this time of day? Don't you have class?" Yes, yes I do. *pauses, shifty eyes* I'm cutting class. Shh. I like Chemistry and all, but I can't sit through class today. I didn't get any real sleep last night - maybe about fifteen minutes every two hours - and I just knew I would fall asleep in class, so I'm skipping. *smacks self on the hand* "Bad, Seth." I know. And I'm thinking on sneaking into a practice room again and taking a nap. So ... Saturday night, I watched Degrassi for the first time in a long while. "Uh oh, here we go." No, seriously, that show is so ... teenage drama. It's "ANGST!" everywhere you turn - God forbid they have an episode where everything ends happily. So, like, Ellie - the punky goth girl who cuts and had the gay boyfriend - is now dating Sean, the guy that Emma used to date who steals shit. That was a pairing I didn't see coming (that is, if the commercials hadn't had it plastered everywhere) and suddenly Toby, the resident geek, is cool ... wow. Oh, and so, like, Terri's in a coma now because her abusive boyfriend, Rick, made her fall and she hit her head on a rock - so now Paige is blaming Spinner for convincing her to bring Rick along on the trip in the first place (when everyone knew he was abusive to Terri), and Spinner's blaming Paige for telling Terri to go chase after him - and everybody's blaming Rick, who might be going to jail and Terri's father is blaming himself for never catching hints that his baby girl's boyfriend is abusive and TERRI MIGHT DIE!!!!!! *breathes* God, this is such a soap opera ... *pause* I can't wait until next week's episode. I don't know how I got started on it, but I am and now I'm one of those people who are like "NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" when the commercials come on. Damnit all. Damned Canadians and their addictive teenage dramas. "Uhhh ... anyway, so, Seth ... how did it go yesterday?" Well, there was much bickering at the funeral. Two of my aunts where bickering with my grandmother about how one of my other aunts (Mom had a LOT of sisters - she was the youngest) didn't show up for the funeral or even visitation or anything because Aunt Violet didn't leave her anything in her will. "You know, she claims to be a good Christian woman, but she can't even show up for her aunt's funeral." Damn, even at a funeral, those Cole women can't get away from bickering and gossiping - even about each other. I'm glad that's one trait I didn't inherit from my mother's side of the family. Oh, and I didn't mention this in the previous entry, but Robert (a friend of the family) killed himself and everyone was like "why?" because he had a wife and two little children that he needed to take care of - and he just up and killed himself. So anyway, his wife - Karen - was at the funeral home and David just fucking goes off on her in the kitchen. Just totally fucking BLOWS up - and he blames her for Robert's death ... says it was her fault because she told him a week before that she wanted a divorce. Yeah, I'd say that might drive a man to suicide - but I thought there was more to it than that - I thought that the fact that Rob had lost his job because he'd been out too much with back problems and surgeries, that he couldn't support his family anymore ... maybe he thought that the insurance money from his death could take better care of Karen and the kids than he could. Once again, I played mediator at a family gathering ... and, of course, no family gathering would be complete without at least three relatives mentioning either A) that I'm too feminine or queer-ish, or B) that I am a Heathen Pagan shit and not a good little Christian boy. Yeah, it means the WORLD to me when Uncle Randy says, "You're like the daughter I never had." "Uhhh ... thanks, Randy ...?" Anyway, I remember sitting in the viewing room during the funeral and staring at Aunt Violet's face - she was my great aunt, 93-years-old ... and I never really knew her, you know? It's too late now - you know, she was old, she lived through a lot of history - but now it's too late to talk to her about any of it. I mean, I'm sure she had LOTS and LOTS of stories to tell, but now she's gone and those stories will never be told to me ... ever. The way the funeral went, you'd think that the way everyone was talking about her, that she was the greatest woman EVER. But when I was present for the reading of the will ... I thought ... damn, I was wrong about this woman. I heard stories from my mom's sisters about how Violet had made the comment at Uncle Gordon's funeral (when I was in 4th grade) about how "the Cole women will never get anything." And that my great-grandfather HATED the Cole girls. And I heard a story about my mother, about how when she was in first grade, she sat on my great-grandfather's lap and asked him "Hey, grandpa, can you spell dog?" And he said "no" - he wasn't educated, I don't guess. And she said "Well, if you can't spell dog, then you ought not have one." He apparently got a kick out of that. I heard a lot of stories about my mother before the will was read. She was a pretty funny and weird kid. So, anyway ... the drama continues. The Cole women didn't get SHIT from Violet's will - which is what I expected. My family will never get anything from that side of the family, you know? I felt kind of upset, though - because Violet gave equal shares to eight people - one of them was her half sister - and I thought she deserved more than that, you know? Ernestine's always been there for her, and yet she gets an equal share ... and ... Violet didn't even belong to a church and yet another equal share went to some random church I'd never heard of ... and, this was what pissed Mom's sisters off - one of my cousins, the oldest of the third generation, you know? (my generation - I'm the youngest out of ALL my third generation cousins - I just learned this yesterday, too) SHE got an equal piece of the estate ... when none of my mom's sisters got anything. Why am I upset over this? *shrugs* I don't know, maybe because you find out a lot about the real person after they're dead. Sorry, this just ... really bothered my Aunt Alice to the point of tears ... that, and she talked my ear off about it most of the afternoon. You know ... that funeral home was packed with relatives ... and I didn't know who most of them were! I just kind of shadowed Shannon the whole time and whispered occasionally "Who are these people?" or "I don't know how most of these people are!" And she'd give me a look and whisper back "And you think I'd know?" I was introduced to a few - even that cousin who was mentioned in the will later. I think I scared my grandmother, though ... You know ... she used to hate that I wasn't a Christian - but ... when I was sitting there on the steps, just listening to the organ play (that damned ORGAN!), I was actually singing along with a few of the hymns ... hence, I freaked her out something good. When the guy sang Amazing Grace during the service, I leaned over to Shannon and whispered "he skipped verses two and three" - and my grandmother, who was sitting on the other side of me, just sort of gave me this look ... Sorry, Grandma, I didn't mean to freak you out. So ... for the inquiring minds ... yes, David and I have, for the most part, patched things up. I mean, things are still a bit awkward, but we're okay. Guess he realized how much he missed me when I broke up that fight between Alice and Grandpa. I must have broken up half a dozen fights yesterday - who knows how many more of them there was when I WASN'T there? Anyway ... I've been writing for a while, haven't I? I look back, reading on some of my old entries, and I notice that ... I used to be a lot more detailed. A LOT more ... there'd be entries that are forever long ... And frequent! No "Hi, I'm not dead" entries - but actual, long, readable entries ... I'll try to get back to that for you lovely people ... Anyway ... I might write more later tonight, depending on whether or not I see the faeries ...