Yep. I’m sick, again, with another cold. Pft, so much for only being able to catch a cold once a year.

I’ve been feeling quite lonely and down lately. I love my friends dearly, but sometimes I feel like they don’t quite understand how my mind works. I miss James a lot, which is probably the main reason for this down-swing. The longer the periods between visits get, the lonelier and more agitated I get: with myself and everyone around me.

Meh.

It’s been over three years since my grandmother’s death, and I think about her regularly. She was an amazing woman. She died at the age 58: Yeah, she was young for a grandmother. Her oldest grandchild was 18 when she died. The youngest was 18 months. She had her first child, my mother, when she was sixteen. She had three more children before she was 20.

Her marriage was abusive. Her husband was overly harsh - would beat her and the children. He would make up ridiculous rules, regardless of anybody elses opinions, and his rules stuck. She left him eventually, but her experiences with him were enough to torment anyone for a life time. Despite the abuse, she was a strong, capable, and able bodied woman. She cared like no other.

She was 44 years of age when I was born. From the moment I can remember, she had been there. My mother had terrible Post Natal Depression when I was born, and did not want to know me from the moment I came into the world. But my grandmother did. When my mother broke her leg when I was less than a year old, my grandmother cared for me: Fed me, bathed me, comforted me, loved me. When I was a child, and didn’t see her very often, she would write me letters. Personal letters that nobody else would understand. She’d draw silly little pictures of her on her Yacht with her parner. She was happy. She’d visit us, money depending: The flight down from Cairns was expensive for her. Occasionally we’d go up and visit her, or pay for her to come down.

I guess life eventually got too hard for my Grandmother. In September, 2002, my grandmother had drunk herself info oblivion. She was depressed, lonely, and poor. Anyone she had or needed was too far away from her. Her partner was out at sea on an oil rig, working. We were in Sydney. Her other children were too far away to know or care.

We got a call from her a week before she was found dead in her bedroom, surrounded by numerous vodka bottles, as well as unopened crates of alcohol. I didn’t get to speak to her: I don’t think she wanted me to know she was going. She was brief on the phone: Nobody would have been able to tell what was wrong except me.

She was dead a week before anybody realised. Her boyfriend had to call a family friend to knock down the door after none of his calls were returned. Her body was so yellow that we couldn’t even see her. Her liver had failed. We had a closed casket funeral for that reason.

A post mortem discovered she died of a heart attack from too much alcohol in her blood.

I only wish I could have spoken to her on the phone that day she called… I only wish I could have written her more letters, shown her how much I loved her, and how much I need her, especially at the moment. I can only hope she’s wherever she is, watching me, and is proud of me, because I’ve always wanted to please her, ever since I was a tiny baby.

So why the blog about my grandmother? Everything I do at the moment makes me think about whether she would like it, or whether it would make her proud. I’m going through a tough time with my mum at the moment, and whenever stuff was difficult with mum, I would always talk to Grandma about it, and she’d make me giggle, and smile. Her death has allowed me to understand how fragile life is: It may sound corny, but it is urging me to live my life to it’s fullest capacity.

I love you, Toni. I’ll never forget you. *heart*

God freaking damn! Less than two months and it’s DEAD.

My brand new computer which James built for my birthday is DEAD. It will Not turn on!

Probably won’t be updating until it’s fixed. don’t really like using my laptop for site updates… :p

EDIT: It’s working again :) It was the powerpack.. AGAIN. eugh. Silly thing..

My blogging skills suck. Really, I need to get back into the habit of blogging every one to two days, rather than one to two weeks! *butthead*

James arrived last Thursday, and left yesterday. He came down to our holiday house with us and we spent the entire weekend lounging on the beach. It was wonderful! My pale ass even got a tan! *hyper* Unfortunately, I won’t be able to see James until (most likely) November, but we get to go to the Hunter Valley for a retreat, which is an annual thing for the partners of the business which my Dad works. We’ll be going up for about three or four days, and it’ll be nice and warm, and lovely swimming weather! I’m excited. :D

School starts again next week. I’m not so excited about that. I have about two more weeks of year 11, and then I will officially start the HSC course. I went up to Office Works yesterday with James and spent a whole heap on stationery. I’m so obsessed with stationary. Anything that I can draw on or with I have an instant liking for ;)

Eugh, man, My poor poor car! The other day, Dad demanded that I go and wash the thing (it was filthy :X) so I backed into the driveway and completely rear ended a tree! *headache* Now my poor echy has nasty dents on the back, and majorly scratched paintwork, which I have to fork out a whole heap to get fixed. Hopefully it won’t be more than $500. The smash repairer is sending the quote to Dad via fax, so if he comes home grumpy, needless to say, i’m screwed!

Time for a rest now, I think. I’m absolutely exhausted! Before I go, check out my latest vexel, which can be seen here. Bye!