Hullo

My last post is a link to my Tops in Blue audition video and nothing else. A few of you asked for it, so there it is. Feel free to criticize. I’ve had a cold since I got back to the US, I don’t think the States agree with me anymore. A friend said that it might be my sudden withdrawal from Soju but…okay, so maybe ;p

Things have been good at home for the most part. I haven’t been to see Thom’s grave yet. I really need to, as I have less than a week and a half left.

My Grandma fell and broke her butt last week. Literally. I don’t remember what the bone is called but apparently it’s part of her butt. She has only eaten a few bites since then, she won’t even eat ice cream. She loves ice cream. My Aunt is with her, but Grandma lives so far away from all of her children. It’s hard. She’s in NC and everyone else is upstate PA or just across the border in NY. She pulled out her IV last night and her potassium levels suck. She won’t drink liquids or eat anything and is refusing a feeding tube. Mom and Aunt Robin are talking about Aunt Robin bringing her up so she can spend her last days with her children.

My older brother hasn’t spoken to my parents in years unless he needs something specific from them. He didn’t call when my Dad’s Mother died or when a turkey went through my Dad’s windshield a couple weeks ago (he’s fine). I told him about Grandma and offered to help fund a plane ticket up and he said he’d ask about getting the time off. Maybe Grandma dying will bring him back to the family. I don’t want her to die. I love her so much. But if some good can come of the inevitable then I guess that’s…positive.

Grammy…she’s so silly. She’s one of those ladies that will normally let people walk all over her, including her husband. Both of the ones she’s had. Her first husband, my Mom’s Dad, when their youngest girl was born he went in to the room and said, “this is what we’re naming our baby” and she was like, “okay” and he left and she named her something completely different.
Then when he left her for another woman, she raised six kids all by herself. My Mom was the youngest then (the youngest, Ray Suzanne, died as a toddler) and I think she was in middle school. Her Mom worked so many hours to keep them clothed and fed with a roof over her head. She was so strong then.
Then she married Al. I love Al. He’s the only Grandpa I’ve really gotten to know, Mom’s Dad died when I was about 8 and Dad’s Dad died when Cooper was just a baby. Al scared me when I was little. Mom says I used to hide behind the couch because he’d yell at me. I don’t remember that, but I do remember how upset he was when my first boyfriend was black and how proud he was when I joined the Air Force. He’s been fine with me since then, but he’s never been able to stand my Mom. He convinced my Grandma not to come up here when she was healthier and now he can’t take care of her.
Stinkin Al.

I love her so much. I don’t want her to die. And I hope that Aunt Robin does bring her up cuz whether or not she goes soon, it would be really nice to see her.

Remember the friend with cancer? I just called to say goodbye. The Doctor gave him 24 hours at most last night and my Mom just told me – so I called.

He can’t speak, can’t even lift his head and can barely breathe. His wife has been fielding so many calls for him and holding the phone to his ear. She said that he opened his eyes while I was speaking to him so I guess that’s nice. At least he could hear me.

I don’t want to visit his grave when I go home in three weeks, I want to visit him.

I couldn’t get much out before I started crying and I didn’t want him to hear that so I asked his wife to take me off speaker phone. She’s such a brave woman. They’ve been together for about five years now and he wouldn’t marry her for so long. I don’t know why. Probably because he was afraid of something like this. After he got sick she insisted and he still held off until a few months ago. He only agreed then because it’ll be good for her when he dies. He has nice life insurance and she’ll be taken care of for a while. She can’t work anymore, she has too many medical issues of her own.

What really got me was that she was telling me, “it’s so much easier for those of us who have Jesus, you know Molly? Everything is so much more positive and I know I’ll see him again someday soon.”
I want to know that but I don’t believe. It’s my parent’s religion, what I grew up with. I tried for a few years to hold on because it’s so familiar but I just can’t find truth in it. And I’m scared of dying and going to Hell, yes, but I can’t force myself into an entire system of belief just because I’m afraid of eternity. It’s not a big enough factor I guess. Probably because I can barely see myself getting through the next three weeks.

I know it’s selfish of me to want him to hold on. He can barely breathe and he’s in so much pain all the time. I got to spend time with him last time I was home and he was able to walk then. Walk and talk and hug and smile. It was still hard to breathe but not as bad. That was a few weeks before their wedding.

Have you ever had so much snot and pressure build up that your ears need to perpetually pop and blowing your nose doesn’t quite do it?

Goodnight.

Blisters and Bungee Jumping

A few days ago I ran 7 1/2 miles. I’m training for a half marathon that’s happening in a few weeks, so 7 1/2 isn’t too awful much. I’m not sure what exactly happened but I ended up with humongous blisters on my insteps (I’m going to blame the fact that it was 85 degrees and there was sweat pooling in my shoes). No biggie, you know? I get blisters all the time. I sterilize a needle, pop the shit out of them, drain all of the liquid, put Neosporin on it, bandage it up and am good to go.

Well yeah, that worked great for my right foot. I can barely walk on my left though. It hurts so badly that I only slept an hour last night. It hurts so badly that when I had to go to the store earlier cuz I ran out of toilet paper I walked there barefoot, put shoes on for a painful five minutes, then walked back barefoot. This shit sucks yo. If it’s still bad on Tuesday I’ll make an appointment cuz I feel like that’ll mean it’s infected or something. 

In other news, I went bungee jumping today! We went to the tallest jumping tower in S Korea, I think they said it’s 64m high. There was an elevator up the tower and it took forever to reach the top. Every moment we spent in there made my stomach feel just a bit more sickly. When I finally arrived at the top I stepped out onto bridge. The bridge connects the elevator shaft to the jumping platform and it shook in the wind. It shook every time people 50 yards away used the catapult (a ball that you’re strapped into in a seated position that is literally catapulted into the air (don’t worry, it’s connected with straps.) (It was my least favourite part and I almost puked)). It shook every time I took a step. This bridge shook. 

There were about ten chairs on the bridge for those waiting to sit on and about 15 of us up there at any given time. You could see the person currently on the rope by looking down through the grates. If I hadn’t seen 10 or so people jump before me and gracefully flail through the air (you’d have to see it) I probably would not have done it.

They separated us by weight. Most of us were in the red and blue groups (medium and max weights. I was max. Good think we didn’t have any actual fat people with us I guess), but some were in yellow. These colours indicated what rope was attached to you when jumped, so they went through all of the red and blue first in order to not switch out the ropes until necessary. Because of this, I went about 5 turns before I was supposed to. They said, “who is the next blue?” and no one raised their hand. I thought it was a screw up. I thought some one else before me had to be blue. But nope, it was me. The person before me went all the way up to the platform and chickened out. We had a long chat about his fear of heights over a beer later, sounds like some deeply ingrained childhood trauma. He ended up wanting to go to the back of the line to try again and just not look down but they wouldn’t let him. They said that once you chicken out, that’s it. I think that’s ridiculous since we each paid 95,000₩ to be there. I understand that it’s a pain in the butt but we paid a bunch of money and he wanted to try again (He and one girl (my friend Wendy) were the only two of a bus full that decided not to jump. I’m glad it wasn’t more than the two of them). 

So I stood up, walked across the rest of the bridge and stood in front of the people who push you off of a 64m high platform. One strapped me onto the jump cord and a cushion type looking thing that attached to my ankles while the other spoke on the radio. Once the people on the other side of the radio gave the all clear, the gate was opened.

When I was sitting down we all yelled at everyone to “not look down”, and most people ignored us. I did not look down. If I had looked down I would not have jumped. There was a post on the platform that I held onto with one hand and I held the person’s hand with my other. He said “move forward, move forward, move fo-STOP!” and had me at the edge of the platform. When I was there he said “now let go and put your hands above your head” and I said “no”.
I looked back at this guy. This could have been the very last person I saw on this earth. One of the girls I was with hugged him and said “tell my Mama I love her”. THAT IS HOW SCARY THIS WAS. After a few seconds of looking at him, I looked straight out into the air. It’s really a beautiful view from that jump tower. There are mountains and a lake with boats. A pool underneath you if you care to look down (the pool had a big yellow target in the middle). I don’t know if he pushed me or not, but I did tell him “if you count down and I’m not jumping, push me”. So he said, “READY?” and I said “NO LET’S DO THIS” and he said “5!”. Everyone else on the bridge joined him for “4, 3, 2, 1 JUMP!” and I was heading towards the earth.

I think I passed out for a second.

Free-falling towards the earth was one of the most peaceful experiences I’ve ever had. Even when the cord jerked me back up (which was not as bad as I expected it to be) and I backflipped and saw the sky for a moment, it was just…wonderful.

Once you stop bouncing as much they lower you down to the pool where there’s a man in a rowboat who unhooks you and takes you to the base of the tower. This part was the worst for me because I was spinning in circles and it felt like the process took longer than my jump. I don’t do well going in circles. Not everyone went in circles. I’ll have to research how to not make that happen for next time.

If you ever get the chance to bungee jump, do it. I don’t care how afraid of heights you are – I’m petrified. The thing is that once you’re off that platform there is nothing in this world that can stop you from falling besides that cord. And the cord works. If the cord doesn’t work for whatever reason, you fall into the pool. There are only like 10 recorded deaths from bungee jumping since the first jump and most of them were people who did it themselves and measured their ropes wrong. It’s an amazing experience and over too soon.