Caterwauling

I stopped to say hi to my friend Christopher today.

He didn’t remember my name, which I told him I didn’t expect him to. But he was tickled that I knew his.

I get that “feeling seen” thing. I really wanted to show that I saw him as a nice guy I was happy to talk to. Because, it’s the truth.

He seemed in good spirits. I’m not sure all the stories he told me are true. If they are, this guy needs to be a stand-up comedian. Even if they aren’t, well, all the comics I know are gifted at masking their pain behind others’ laughter.

It wasn’t all smiles, though. He told me he stopped his cancer treatments. Nine years of radiation was enough.

He got an offer to stay at a shelter where everyone does drugs. He said no thanks; I’d rather stay on the streets.

But thank goodness he said no, because he knows someone who’s willing to let him stay at an apartment for three months for free — to focus on recovering from his illness and too long on the streets.

So many life lessons. Know when to say when. Never jump at the first offer. God is good, all the time.

The stories came fast and furious. He was in Los Angeles during the Rodney King riots. Got shot with a rubber bullet there. Ended up in Vegas for a while. Was a biker and went to culinary school.

Won’t go back to Ohio, even at his family’s urging; he’ll take too-hot Florida over a day of snow. Has a mom and a brother named James who can’t cook and a sister who’s the single mom of twins.

It occurred to me that he’s likely seen as much of the world as I have, but from an entirely different perspective.

I said well I was happy to run into you again. And if I pass by next time and he’s not here, I can be excited and not scared for him.

He told me he’d pray for me, for something I told him about. I teared up and said, you can count on me doing the same for you.

Funny. I never tell anybody anything. Yet I can tell this man my biggest secret and he gets it right away.

I hope he gets his happiness. For however long it can possibly last. And I hope it’s even happier than even he could have dreamed.

I needed to see him today. Thank you, God, for something my heart can feel good about.

My soon-to-divorce friends are a case study in social media strangeness.

I see competing posts. One mostly positive affirmations and heartwarming memes. Then you scroll down and it’s accusations from the other about cheating and claims of depraved shit.

Being the first/only to air grievances must be like whoever yells the loudest is clearly the rightest. Makes sense only to the one who gets hoarse.

I tried to defriend the S.O. but apparently they have four accounts and I’m still connected to one.

Pro tip: One really doesn’t need fake accounts. Log out and boom, all the drama your heart can possibly take still awaits.

I want to turn away. It’s hard when you see your friends get trashed.

But I prefer to know people’s mental states and physical locations. Certain types are all too willing to give both away.

It’s as if they don’t realize that, in their quest to be heard at all costs, they are making the other person the sympathetic character.

Wonder how long the shitposting will drag out for. Three years? Five? Till death will they stalk?

I was already reeling from the loss of Betty White when I caught up with a work friend today.

She’s been out on bereavement. Her mom died on the same day as Betty.

I can’t stop crying between all that and Bob Saget’s death. This is Gen X’s nightmare week. Everyone we grew up with … gone.

Everyone I know has Covid, too. Luckily they just seem to be miserable and not dying off, like they did last year. I still can’t believe Jane, Ginny, Jesse, Sue, C.J. and so many more are gone from this world. My world.

They say be gentle to yourself. Iz pandemic, after all.

Meanwhile I have a friend who’s getting divorced. God, it’s ugly. His spouse friended me years ago. I figured because I am witty and delightful. Now I see it was to keep tabs on all of us.

My friend used to read this page, so I am not saying shit other than, ask me if I am surprised by this outcome.

Per usual in this situation, one is taking the high road and saying nothing. The other is blathering and trying to drum up support from people who never really liked them in the first place.

TBH, I am happy to be able to befriend the hysterical one. I always called them Drama. The more you whine and complain and drag your S.O. under the bus, the more the sane among us go Jesus Fuck, SO glad my friend got away from your psycho bitch ass.

Now, of course I won’t SAY that in case they get back together. But fuck, good riddance. Bye furrlicia. Take that nasty ass anywhere but my timeline, please and thanks. Christ, my friend can do SO much better.

What’s funny is I reached out to my friend on Christmas Eve, after quite some time of not really saying hi.

I had said, you are on my mind. I just want to know if you are OK.

He said he was. That’s all he said.

I KNEW some shit was going down. I know a psycho bitch situation from 985 miles away. The “sudden” divorce confirms it.

In any event, I am just sad today, for so many people. 65 (Saget) is too young to die. But damn, it sure gets you out of dealing with some shitty health and relationship problems along the way, doesn’t it?

There’s a troll who gets so mad at me that I publish my old ZIP code on Twitter.

Maybe they don’t believe I lived there.

Per this old photo from 2015, I did.

With my suicidal screen door.

Still not jealous of anyone else. Ocean and Intracoastal air > glue and fish sticks.

Also, I’ll stop posting things to tweak ol Nutter Butter when ol Nutty Butty stops invoking my witchy ass with every post. If ya don’t want me in ya bidness, stop inviting me.

Someone wrote recently that they think I’m jealous of their house.

Here’s my view right now.

Good one.

Mom said it’s boring since we gave up Nutter Butters for the new year.

It was pretty boring reading that Nutter Butter wrapper. So it’s a draw.

I wonder if they use the water to dilute bleach. ?

I found myself wondering today what old Cindy Lou Poo has to say about my latest blogs that have nothing to do with her.

I’m sure there are a bunch of Twits from her about my father and half-sister. Because that’s what she does.

She’s like Statler and Waldorf all rolled up into one angry muppet.

I’m back at that point I hit every few months where the thought of seeing ill-informed and misspelled opinions about shit her brain could never contain is just too much for my sense of peace.

Now, I’m guilty of dropping a truth bomb here and there myself. Usually I let her make an ass out of herself and then I post a simple comment that sends her unraveling into a thread of epic proportions.

But despite her two tweets using my mom’s full name, I like to focus my mocking squarely on her.

Like the eating fiber on company time and the socially conscious hashtags with no actions to back them up. Or the saying I am somehow jealous of her latest vacation where she spent every day shitposting about me.

I haven’t yet mocked her for her rage at me for posting pretty plates, specifically how she insulted her husband by posting the food he grew to feed her angry muppet ass yet said that didn’t make for a pretty plate.

Or the fact that her aunt and her mother each sent him a loon. Thirty years apart.

Seriously, be like Betty — White, not Broderick.

That goes for both of us. I need some joy in my day. And not that weird porn account she runs that somehow contains those letters.

The last time I stopped reading her, she speculated incorrectly for months about what happened. I didn’t see it till last August when, after several months sober, Mom said, “Oh we have to see how Nutter Butter is reacting to your latest career move.”

My new year’s resolution for mom is to not encourage me to find us some twittertainment.

I will be back someday tho. I am not going to lie like Talbots Basement and I both do and say we aren’t going to read each other again.

It goes without saying that I will feel down about something or, more likely, I’ll be procrastinating and I’ll want something to cheer me up.

NGL, seeing that veggie spiral is always good for a chuckle. Or guffaw. Or chortle. Or whatever else she calls that braying.

But I’ve never regretted blocking this toxicity from my line of sight.

I just wish every sweet soul had the same option.

2021 just couldn’t leave quietly.

Losing Betty White today, for me, is just like when we lost Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

As long as RBG was alive, the world was going to be OK. But when RBG died too soon, TFG found a piece of human excrement with which to spackle the Supreme Court. And we will be paying for that mistake for the rest of our lives.

As long as Betty was alive and well, it felt like the universe was still on course. Things couldn’t be all bad when there was a world with this sweet, wonderful soul.

Back in St. Olaf, we are mourning the loss of Betty White, who brought joy to so many. May her memory be a blessing to all who loved her.

Learn more about her 1992 visit to campus: https://t.co/RhjIZMXTQf pic.twitter.com/MNT01RTO3M

— St. Olaf College (@StOlaf) December 31, 2021

Well, shit.

I told Mom I would write off this year as a waste, but I can’t. Mom is still here, my sickest kitty is doing better, I got my old job back, and I even got a Disney Wedding out of the deal.

Hashtag Life Is Good.

In any event, what I really wanted to write about today, before Betty had to go and leave us, was about one of my sisters. (Both have the same name. Both share varying degrees of blood with me.)

I looked up the half-sister today.

Mom kept saying that she felt like our biodad died. But it’s her MOM who passed.

And my sister, who has normally seemed cold as her ice-blue eyes, posted wonderful photos and tributes. My heart goes out to her.

Also, this normally private girl has since posted dozens of photos. All of which I flipped through with curiosity. I wanted to see ol what’s his name.

There was not one photo of our father. It’s like she only had a mom and brother. Even her mother’s obituary showed that she went back to her maiden name.

The obituary was wonderful, too. And all the comments. She sounded a lot like my momma and grandma and great-grandma. Eager to feed anyone. Always room at the table for friends and strangers.

[The women in my family would pull the “plenty of food” line while not actually eating so that there would be enough for everyone else. I didn’t learn that till a lot later in life. I just always thought they were on diets. Nope, they just ate enough to get by. God bless them.]

In any event, this woman who passed — she HAD to have known about me. Did her kids?

I wondered if she ever encouraged dipshit to reach out to me. (He didn’t.) I assumed she was probably grateful that she didn’t have to deal with the previous mess he made.

Perhaps both things can be true.

I’ve noticed that our father’s mother tries to comment on my sister’s wall. She barely likes any of the posts. And she doesn’t touch the grandmother’s wall, where g’ma seems to be all about her own daughter, and her daughter’s kids.

Never a mention of her son. It’s like he doesn’t exist to any of them.

Anyway, it has to be hard for my half-blood siblings, having their first Christmas without their momma. And clearly no father worth speaking of.

Lucky for them, they’ve gone on to have families of their own. They don’t have extended family, but they don’t really seem to need it, either.

Isn’t it funny, though, how we’re all going through stuff … and we could all go through it together, if we so chose.

But we don’t.

Sure, life is good. But isn’t it really funny how we all know how to make it better … and who could make it better … but we simply choose not to, and choose not to engage with those people who could make the sucky stuff suck less.

I had a New Year’s intention in mind before today. But I think I will resolve to live like Betty.

I mean, if you live to 99 and leave everyone wanting more … you did something right. Tonight the world is toasting her for all the smiles she gave us. Not one person (in their right mind, anyway) is happy she’s gone.

Perhaps everyone lurking here — folx gone from my life, so who knows why they want to attach to me like a poltergeist — should consider adopting the same resolution.

After all, resolving to be “as awesome as last year” is a low bar.

Be like Betty White, not like Betty Broderick. Ya cunt.

Thinking about writing a kids’ book about Stinkerton McPooPoo Biscuits.

About a sourpuss who goes to the beach but can’t get off the pot. There, he chomps on string cheese and digestive biscuits.

He also doomscrolls Twitter and thinks everyone is jealous of his bowel movement regularity.

Maddie will donate her “Doo wah dooh wah Poo Poo Kitty” theme song for the soundtrack. Since Shit Bizkit is still reading her Twitter account that hasn’t been updated since 2009.