up, down, all around

Thursday night was rough. We were all saying our goodbyes, calling the people who couldn't make it in so they could talk to him while he was still vaguely lucid. My brother is at a politics summer program in DC and was too upset after speaking to my grandfather to come back to the phone and talk to us for almost an hour. One cousin flew in from Atlanta and another couldn't come in until Friday morning and we feared it would be "too late." I slept at my parents and my mom and sister and I watched a weird movie and cried while my dad spent the night by my grandfather's side. Friday morning, my grandpa woke up more lucid and functional than he's been in a week. He was telling jokes. He talked about going back to his apartment in the "retirement community." Weeks ago I'd accepted emotionally that he might go at any minute but might not go at any minute, so I was mostly just glad to see the better version of Grandpa with cousins. My aunt was pretty much wigging out, not sure what to do or think, which was only complicated when the woman from Hospice came in to get the papers signed so he'd be formally admitted into the Hospice program. They only admit you into the Hospice that's in the upstairs of the hospital for five days (since the assumption is you go for just your last few days of life for the emphasis of the care to be on comfort as opposed to healing). After five days they extend it for one day at a time. The Hospice nurse was talking about if he wanted to go home or to another Hospice facility as we tried to explain he was supposedly going to die momentarily as of the night before, but now we weren't so sure. Somehow my aunt got caught up in the fact that the name of the Hospice program wasn't the name of the hospital and wasn't the off-site one my grandpa's doctor mentioned earlier when he thought it would be weeks instead of days. She was convinced that they were trying to pull a fast one on us. She couldn't wrap her head around the whole situation. When we were in the elevator she suddenly remembered her friend's mom who'd died recently apparently rallied and seemed much better right before she went. Somehow that made my aunt feel better.
My mom had to be home by 1 to pick up my sister and my friend from out of town was coming, so I went home and showered and put my laundry away until my friend showed up. We immediately had to go to my cousin's (the one from my mom's side who lives in Chicago) to get his keys so I can check up on their apartment while he and his wife are on vacation. By the time I actually got to spend quality time with my friend, I was completely out of it. We hung out and wandered around these funky shops by me. I found very practical and reasonably cute clearance underwear at the lingerie/sex shop. Feeling comfortable in there and being able to shop for "panties" has to be a strong mark of the platonic-ness of our friendship. It's nice. He got a shmancy cigar at the impressive cigar shop. Then we headed over to Goose Island brew pub and tried all of their current beers in a sampler thing and ate good food off the menu that was dollar off after 9 PM. He had to leave at 7 AM this morning to drive as much as possible towards Wyoming, so we were in bed before midnight, and having slept no more than 5 hours at a stretch in maybe a week, I was grateful. It was really nice and really good that he came, since he's one of my favorite people on earth and it was comforting to have him around, even for just a short time. My family tends to stress me out and it's been particularly stressful lately and I do have friends and people I like a lot here to take my mind off things but this particular friend is the kind of person who's really good at just sort of being there when I'm curled up into a little ball of goo.

I should go back to bed; I have a long day ahead of me. My acting improv class is at 1 and then I have to run home, walk the dog, and head over to E's graduation party for as long as possible before heading back to the hospital. I've been looking forward to this party for weeks. I'll finally get to put faces to all of E's stories about people and get to watch them interact, which is more or less awesome. E's also been really supportive through everything lately so I want to be able to celebrate her for a few hours. Partypartyparty.