I’ve lost count of the number of times in the past three weeks that I’ve pulled up my xanga account and sat in front of the keyboard unable to put into words what I was feeling, or started a blog about what I was doing and found it too boring to continue, or tried to communicate what I was thinking only to find that my thoughts were too chaotic to put into words. And so, each time I ended up reading a few of my friends’ blogs and then turning xanga back off, hoping I’d feel like writing again someday soon. Here I am again. This time I think I’ll take a page from leaflesstree’s book and give you my recent life in list form.

1. I was planning to go to Fort Smith, Arkansas to see my mom right about now. Unfortunately, my cousin in Springdale, Arkansas fell, hit his head and died early this month, so both my trip and my anxiety level about the trip got pushed up. I am happy to report that, although the reason for being in Arkansas a couple of weeks earlier than planned was distressing, I had some nice conversation (and possibly some liquid refreshment) with family I hadn’t seen in a long time (or five months).
2. After 99 consecutive days of not geocaching because of crappy weather, I was able to stop a few times on the way south and west and do a little rest area caching. Luckily, I had my tall Bogs boots with me because I ended up in snow over my knees at least three times.
3. I was able to stop in Illinois and meet musicmom60. She wanted to learn about geocaching so we went to a nearby cache and found it. I’m pretty sure I left my hiking stick at that cache.
4. Last Sunday my daughter (joyouswind) invited me to her apartment after church and presented me with a fancy new hiking stick.
5. When I left Fort Smith, I drove up to Kansas City and found the oldest geocache in the state of Missouri. All by myself.
6. When I visited my mom, she knew I was her daughter most of the time but wasn’t really clear on which daughter I was most of that time. The second day I visited her, she introduced me to someone as her youngest daughter and went on and on about how wonderful I am. I forgot to pass that onto my little sister. Mom also remembered that we had been in the room with the piano the day before, and she asked me if I “still do that thing where you go somewhere and look for something.” That made me happy.
7. Last night I suddenly realized that the training course I’m taking today starts at 1 PM instead of 6 PM so I stayed up really late making dessert for tonight. Now I’m wondering if this is spring break and I didn’t need to make dessert. If this is spring break and I didn’t need to make a dessert, whatever will I do with this delicious cake?
8. I have less than ninety minutes to finish this blog, get it posted, make and eat lunch, gather my stuff and leave for the Red Cross chapter. I am taking Psychological First Aid training, which I’ve registered for a couple of times in the past and the class was canceled both times.
9. While I was in Springdale, my California cousin spent the night with me in my hotel room and introduced me to fireball whisky. If you’ve ever had Atomic Fireball candy, then you know what fireball whisky tastes like, only it has a kick to it that’s missing from the candy.  I had been in knee-deep snow the day before, and Ginny and I sat out by the pool that night. I propped my bare feet up on a chair and marveled at the difference a few hundred miles makes in the weather.
10. The morning of my cousin’s funeral, I was in the hotel lobby filling plates with breakfast for Ginny and me when I heard a man speaking to a child. I thought, “That’s a Stockton voice.” The Stocktons are my dad’s family and those members of the clan who were raised in Kansas have a particularly distinctive Midwestern timbre to their voices. I looked at the man and thought he might be my Uncle Larry, but I’d never seen him with a beard before so I wasn’t positive. He was wearing short sleeves, so I waited for him to turn and there was the Dennis the Menace tattoo on his forearm. Definitely my dad’s younger brother Larry! I launched myself at him, grabbed him in a big hug and shocked the daylights out of him because he wasn’t sure who I was. The shock wore off after a second because he’s a Stockton male and being accosted by a strange woman in a hotel lobby is a moment to be enjoyed. As soon as I said, “You’re my Uncle Larry,” he knew who I was. It gave him a story to tell the other family members that day.

And now it’s time to wash the breakfast dishes, stir the stew, make my lunch, gather my notebook and pen, put Boo outside for a few minutes, fold a load of towels I forgot about, and head to my class.

That is me on the left and my "twin cousin" Mike on the right. It's a screen grab from a home movie my dad shot in Upland, California in 1959. Mike was supposed to be a week or two older than me but I came early and, believe it or not, I'm three weeks older than him. The twin thing is not just because we were born so close together, but also because we are double first cousins. Our moms are sisters and our dads were brothers. A doctor once explained to me how double first cousins are genetically closer than siblings. It made sense at the time with him charting it out for me; it pretty much stopped making sense the second I walked out of the doctor's office.

When we were growing up I was closer to Mike's younger sister Diane than to Mike. She was slightly younger, but we were close enough in age to play with our Barbies together at our Aunt Jeanne and Uncle Harvey's dry cleaner shop in Arizona. To this day, I think of Diane and Barbie whenever I walk into a dry cleaners and smell that distinctive scent. Diane died suddenly of an undiagnosed heart condition at the age of 16, exactly nine months after her younger sister Susie died of a cerebral hemorrhage at the age of 12.

As I write this, Mike is dying of a massive brain bleed. He was taken off life support a few hours ago. He has a wife and two adult daughters. He has an older brother. And he has two parents who are now facing for the third time what no parent wants to face ever. I can't even imagine.

I expect I will be heading down to Arkansas sometime in the next few days. I am determined to get our taxes done before I go. I am not in the best frame of mind to do them, but death and taxes can only be put off for so long, and time is up. I hope you have a better weekend than I am expecting.