So I totally got pissed tonight. Was catchin up on some folks blogs and what not after cleaning up the apartment (my gosh I still have a ton of laundry to do) but things were zen. So i'm like... Hey i'm going to the store to get a pack of ciggies, dp (the two main staples of my diet) and to top it off a six of shiner. Chill night. Quietly alone all is good nothing is all uptight for the most part.

I walk downstairs and get in my car and forget I was blaring my radio pretty loud to a cool new cd I had so it scared me out of zen-ness. I blink a couple times and go to the corner store where everybody knows your name and they have DP and ciggies (your own brand and the number of packs you usually buy) sitting on the counter. I just wanted one pack since I already have one right now and tell the guy "Just one pack tonight kemosabi".

He giggles in half arabic and rings me up. I walk to my car with my armload of drinkage and nicotine and get inside. Start the car... look to see if anyone is behind me.... Pull out to the parking lot intersection and GEEEZE.

The first thing I saw was the police light they fanagle around from the cockpit. He had to have come up so close to me that I could probably taste his bumber in my ass. I double take and get somewhat nervous like... OKAY WHAT did I do THIS TIME.

Of course they have nothing on me. I'm legal. I'm well over 21.. I'm driving home. I have not been drinking yet. Not speeding doing 5 mph in the park-ling lot. So I turn and the whole friggin time this cop is like raping my exhaust hole all the way down arkansas back to my apartment. I get infront of a van going like 30 mph. So I slow down and hit the brakes and I think the cop got uneasy... He peels around me and is watching me in the next lane... Luckily I turn to go down the street to my apartment and he accidentially turns the other way. I see him try to turn around later in my rear view mirror but by this time i'm near my parking spot.

So I'm like... Geeze thanks for probing my tailpipe.

I was gone not 5 min total and some friggin idiot has taken my parking spot at my apartment. So I'm yelling at the top of my lungs and trying to find some other parking spot less than a mile away. I get out slam the door and yell.... THANKS FOR TAKING MY F------- PARKING SPOT.

Crickets.

I get in the door and see that Cisco has completely knocked over the christmas tree.. Note this tree is only a small one but it is up on a counter away from normal kitty activity.... Little jerk pulled ornaments off and obviously thought he was going to have a good time with something shiny. (Funny thing I threw away all the santa clause ornaments because they were creepy today)

So I yell at my cat and he ducks down and looks at me stupid like "What did I do?"

So all is finally quiet again. Maby some sort of zen. I have my shiner and ciggy and i'm happy.

I used to have a ton of patience when it came to most things but I guess the last 6 months I seriously can't deal with petty things anymore. They grind on my last nerve in lightning speed and I flip and start yelling. Luckily not many people have seen this happen in public. I have been pretty vocal with my car horn when it counts.

I really don't think that people realize that just under the surface lately I'm pretty friggin angry and raw. I can flip on a dime and not realize it till I have said something or done something that I didn't want to do.

I hated the phone call from mom ... You know the eerie phonecalls you get when the first syllable in their voice you can hear that something major is wrong. Dad needed to go to the hospital because he was so sick and his lungs were pretty much shutting down and all.

So above the normal screaming level of stress we got added Dad being in the hospital. Now let me please mention that about 2 years ago I would have cared less if he was in the hospital or not. Something has changed in this man and I think it was a comment that I made while we were in Milwaukee visiting family.

I told my mom, " Why is it that when he comes to Milwaukee he can talk to anyone and everyone about anything but he can't say two sentences to me." It was the damn truth. He was talking about things I had never heard about and things I should have heard about as a father would tell a son, but .....

So I sat astonished.. Mom ended up telling me later after we came back to texas that she had told him what I said to her. After that it was different. I think dad realized that his son did want to hear his voice at times even when some of the things he talks about is pretty far fetched.

In the hospital, while dad was on oxygen I was sitting in the chair listening to him talk to the nurses and doctors, and I noticed something different.

He seemed like a little boy. And he was a bit scared. The man who had killed so many in the jungles of viet-nam as a re-con marine had become scared.

Nonetheless I spent as much time in the hospital as I could and running errands that were needed.

Not 36 hours later we got a phone call that my grandfather was in the hospital for a blood thinner overdose. He was bleeding pretty bad. So that tweaked up my chest a few more notches to where I was breathing GREAT.

My grandfather I respect greatly. He has his failures as does any other man, but over the years he has developed his story telling abilities to where he can bring you so deep inside his head where he dissapears and your reality becomes his story.

I'm intoxicated listening to him talk at times. Partly because I hear the echos of the same struggles and goals within myself that he has lived. During thanksgiving I stayed at their house for several days after Grandpa made a comment that no one comes and sees him anymore and has anything to talk about. I felt pained because this man would still walk the earth for someone in need and will still fight the hard fight for what is right. Those traits I dare hope are tight fisted inside my own character. A day later he mentioned, "Andrew, I hope you dont mind me talking so much... You seem to listen alot and not say much..." I didn't care if I was sitting in the same room for hours because I was seeing a man who had conquered cancer by the grace of God being nursed back to health emotionally by remembering the past.

My Aunt did get pissed at me since we were staying up past midnight every night that ,"HE NEEDS HIS REST AND ANDREW DOESN"T NEED TO BE KEEPING HIM UP AT NIGHT" Although it would be incredibly disrespectful I would have slapped her with that comment.

She was not present when laughter filled the living room as old bluegrass songs and church music was being played on a 1940's (incredible) guitar and myself on a careworn violin. She did not see his eyes light up as fresh music was being played... She did not see his countenance change when he started talking about Washington state when they lived there, and Grandma smiling when other memories were brought to mind.

IN ALL the years I have known my grandfather, it does not matter who is in the house, if he is tired he goes to bed right then.

Luckily both my father and grandfather are out of the hospital. Two men who deserve respect, and really grabbed my attention when they were sick.