Grandpa:
My grandpa is doing better. I just saw him (he's now in a rehabilitation facility rather than the hospital) and despite the fact that he's eating out of a tube and he's lost weight he barely had, he's back to his old self.
When I originally saw him in the hospital he was looking pathetic (for lack of a more appropriate word). He had been lying in a bed, hooked up to machines and feeling like his life was at its end. Of course, his life was at an end; as far as I could tell he'd come dangerously close to passing, and his entire attitude had changed. It's sad to see how much a fear of death will change people who believe it's quickly coming for them. I don't think I'll ever forget how sad he was - believing that his time was almost up.
That was not the case when I most recently saw him. He was up, walking around, talking in his normal tone, speed, and volume as if nothing were wrong. He even did a little dance to show us how good he's feeling (an unexpected side effect of being fed the exact perfect balance of nutrients through a tube seems to be that he feels absolutely fantastic). It's good to know that a disaster was averted.
Uncle:
I wish I could say the same for my uncle. The idea that Mickey is no longer ... a person at all ... still haunts me. I've still not had time for a "proper" grieving (no funeral, as was his wish, but no family gathering yet either), though I doubt that would make me feel much different than I do now. It's just not fair; loosing someone so close so suddenly. It seems that the cliché is true; I'd do anything to talk to him just once more. For the most part I try not to think about it, or I think about it in some sort of abstract, segmented way where I think about the idea of me not being able to talk to him just now, rather than think about the fact that I'll never see or speak to him again.
Wedding:
The wedding is fast approaching (June 14th, mark your calendars!), and I cannot wait! We've met with the coordinator at the hotel (we're doing everything in one location, so people don't have to waste time driving around), my fiancée continues to check things off on the to-do list while I'm at work and she's not, and tonight we'll be taking advantage of a free dance lesson. Aside from the obvious fact that I'm excited to be getting married, it's a bit odd to wrap my head around after being together for six years, living together for four, and being engaged for three. It's weird to think it's finally happening, but it's about damn time.
Writing:
Writing my novel continues to be an educational experience. It's clearly my first real attempt, because I've only gotten a few chapters in and have already had to go back multiple times to change or add details to fit my continually growing idea for what the book should be. All of the changes, I feel, are for the better, but I wish I'd had the foresight to iron out such details before I began writing so that I could just write the damn thing from beginning to end rather than go back and change so many details before I move on. Unfortunately I'm a perfectionist, so I refuse to move on until what I have written is perfect!
Reading:
I'm actively in the middle of three books right now: Doomed by Chuck Palahniuk (hardcover, signed by the author), Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn (e-book via my Nook), and Under The Dome by Stephen King (audio book, from the library). There are a few others that I'm in the middle of, but stalled on (my goodreads.com shelf says there are three, but there are perhaps more), not all of which I intend to finish. Gone Girl is by far the best of them, and I'm nearly done with it. Under The Dome is good, but in typical Stephen King style I'm on the sixth disc and not a lot of plot has really happened, which I'm not a fan of. Doomed is by far the most disappointing, since Palahniuk is my favorite author and I loved the original (called Damned) and it has almost none of the things that made the first one good. It's not bad, exactly, but it's nowhere near as good as everything else I've read by him.
Work:
Work is going well. My internship has been extended through September, giving me some more time to impress my superiors and prove to them that they are, indeed, in need of a full-time copywriter. I wish they'd just give me an answer one way or the other already (full time, part time, freelance, or out on my rear-end), but I'll take what I can get. It's not great news, but it certainly isn't bad.
Perhaps I should blog more often so I can make my posts shorter.
-Ryan
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