March 11, 2003

First, an apology.  After seeing the photos posted yesterday, a friend of mine who is very much more plant inclined than am I (to the exasperation of the Witches I knew in England in 82-85, every herb they showed me just looked like another weed to me.  I've gotten better, but not much.  I still have to keep my dried herbs carefully separated and labeled), that my miracle lilies are not lilies at all. They are actually "Zantedeschia aethiopica, probably Crowborough, usually referred to as Calla 'lilies'," so I totally screwed that up.  I looked at them, saw lilies and dubbed them lilies.  Anyway, I'm not really eager to say "My Zantedeschia aethiopica is heralding another miracle," so in the interest of accuracy, I'm going to just call them the callas.  :)  I've always wanted to be better at plant identification, but like other things, I just don't have a talent for it.  I'm just glad there are other people out there who do who can help me along.  Like with the web sets, like working on my car, like singing or making music of any kind... it's just something that I've accepted that I'm not gifted with and I can definitely appreciate those who are!

OK, so I just deleted about a gig's worth of writing about what a totally worthless shit my brother, Guy Allen, is and his various sins.  It was too long and too negative and too bitchy, so I'll keep it more simple.

My brother has never done a day's work except under court order to force him to help provide for his children who are in the custody of his ex-wife.  (When he was married, she supported the family and they lived in a trailer in her parents' back yard and siphoned off their utilities)  He reluctantly works now because he will go to jail if he doesn't and lord knows he bitches and screams and bemoans it at every opportunity.  My mother covered all of his expenses while she was alive, right down to his science fiction book club payments.  She was living off of her social security.  He qualifies for a special housing program where he could have sliding scale rent on a nice apartment, but refuses it because he couldn't take all of his "stuff."  He lives in what's left of our family home:

...which did NOT look like that when he got a hold of it and this is NOT on some country road, it's on a major highway where the neighbors take a great deal of care to make their properties look nice.  He's a jerk to everyone he encounters. 

So my Mom dies and her will disappears (think of that, it left the property solely to me and to Edward... Allen was given his inheritance while she still lived in the form of 3 acres of pine trees, which he promptly sold and THAT is a nasty story of back stabbing until itself), so we tell him that we (Edward, my other brother who is sane) cannot afford the $5000 funeral bill that was left after donations to Mom's memorial fund (God knows Allen refused to pay any of it) and although Ed signed for it and I'm going to help him, we just can't do it.  The only fair thing is to sell the property, pay the bill and split the remainder three ways.  We also learned that my grandmother died and her property (not in much better shape... here it is):

according to the deed goes to her grandchildren, me, Allen and Ed.  We thought it best to handle it all in one swing, sell both properties, pay the bills and the rest goes three ways (Yayy!!  Eric could finally, maybe get the laser surgery for his eyes!). 

My uncle was appointed executor of her estate.  He's our family patriarch and the one person we all trust completely.  More importantly, he's THERE.  Ed and I are not.  It was flowing along until this weekend when Allen showed up at my Uncle Delmar's, grinning like a possum and proclaiming that he had us right where he wanted us.  ("Us" being me and Ed)  At the advice of the people he works with (the ones who bought poor Allen a car), he consulted a pro bono type lawyer who told him that because we left and he "stayed behind to take care of Mother" (she moved out of the family house to get away from him because he wouldn't leave and he soaked off of her his whole life and was very verbally abusive to her), he is entitled to more than we are.  His proposal is that he be given my grandmother's property straight out, he gets 1/3 of the money from the sale of our family property and he is exempt from paying any of the funeral expenses... because he stayed.  Because he has always had someone to take care of him.  Because he is so obnoxious and offensive that he's learned if he creates enough drama, people will succumb just to shut him up and make him crawl back into his hole. 

This is all so offensive to me.  My brother is negative and rude and angry at the world.  The people in the neighborhood are afraid of him.  When I went back for my mother's funeral, I worked hard to open my heart to him.  I tried to talk to him about the options he has and the people who care about him.  I gave him money to use to get some decent clothes and take care of himself.  I told him he has a chance to make a life for himself and get some counseling and do things he can be proud of and find some peace.  I told him I would help him do that.  I sent him money for his birthday the beginning of this March, told him we had to proceed with the sale of the house because the bills were coming due.  Told him I hoped he'd made the contacts I told him to make so he could get into an apartment well before he had to leave the house (his work connections will give him priority in the program). 

So now the whole thing is jacked up.  Instead of flowing smoothly, it will likely have to go to court.  My brother, Ed, wants to give him everything he wants just to shut him up.  After a lot of thought and a talk with my Uncle Delmar, I told Ed last night that in all good consciousness, I just can't do that.  I'm not going to be just one more person who hands Allen what he wants because he fussed enough.  I just can't advocate and reward that behavior.  Dr Phil says we teach people how to treat us.  I can't see any court adjudicating this in  any way other than an equal division.  My feeling is his reward for "taking care of Mother" is that he got free room and board and an all expense paid trip through life until now.  He just turned 37 and I'm just not going to be a party to this guy getting a free ride any more.  My brother, Ed, works very hard, 50-60 hour weeks every week.  His wife Caryn also works very hard.  My husband and I have worked hard to get by and I spent 20 years in the work force, often as a single parent with 3-5 children to care for on too little money.

I'm warring with whether or not I'm just being obstinate or if I'm just playing off of other issues or what.  Regardless, it pisses me off.   I don't like feeling pissed off, so I'm working to get passed feeling pissed off and into jettisoning the emotion from the situation and just doing what needs to be done.  I've never been one of these new-agey types to feels that the "negative" emotions should be overcome.  I think we have emotions for a reason and that they are very primal motivators, throwbacks from when we needed to react based on instinct rather than intellect and stimuli alone.  I believe that pain teaches us a lot about ourselves that we could not learn through constant happiness.  I believe anger can be channeled into positive change when handled appropriately.  I believe jealous can teach us a lot about our own insecurities and can also be an intuitive heads up into situations in our relationships that need to be given more attention.  I think shame and guilt can be the sniggling voices that propel us into wanting to be better than we are, to atone for our actions that hurt others.  I don't think any of our emotions are bad and all serve us well provided we respond appropriately to them and keep a level head. 

So...  enough of that.

The diet is still going well.  I didn't adhere to it yesterday, but didn't go crazy either.  I had a piece of homemade white bread (it was yummy) and a couple of girl scout cookies (not as good as I'd hoped).  Today, I'm craving protein again, so I'm shunning the carbs for a bit.  I was able to wear a dress today that I'd packed away a couple of months ago for being too small.  I'd guess I've lost maybe 5-10 pounds.  This is starting on week #3 and I'm still not feeling any real deprivation or hard cravings other than yesterday.  I'm surprised and pleased that I didn't give into them any more than I did. 

I'm worried that I may be getting the virus that Eric and both boys had in the past two weeks.  I'm feeling low energy (might be the carbs from yesterday) and tired.  In fact, I think I'll see if I can coax Nathan into a nap.  ;)

 Talk to you tomorrow!