Smitty

I dreamed that dad, mom, brother Greg, nephew Noah and a couple of strangers were all squeezed in my car driving across the country. Dad and mom were only coming part of the way, I was supposed to drop them at different airports so they could go back to where they came from. Noah had been driving all night, the rest of us had fallen asleep. When I woke up, I realized he'd missed a turn off. We were supposed to head east but we were still.heading north. I had him pull over at the ramshackle diner where we found a cool, shady parking lot out back. Mom was sitting in the back seat and I was really glad we found shade for her. I took out my paper map and went inside to ask for directions. I tried to ask the folks in the kitchen but they were closed off behind a wall with a tiny service window and they wouldn’t come to the counter. I tried asking a guy whose extended family was sitting at several tables but I couldn't make him understand the map. I went back outside and tried to unfold the map on the hood of the car but it wouldn't open to the right section. It was a jumble. Dad was standing by me trying to help, trying to tell me which way to go, but I kept fumbling with the map. The map didn't show the whole route, just part, and I couldn't unfold it to the section i needed. Smitty kept trying to take the map and show me something but I insisted that I knew the way, I had planned the route and we were going to go the way I had planned. He wasn't fighting me on it, but he kept debating my decision. this was something he did a lot, take an oppositional point of view, play devil's advocate. it infuriated me and we'd end up fighting. I refused to listen to him, told everyone to.get back in the car, I would drive. We were heading back out in the Freeway when I woke up. Lingering control. issues left over from childhood? Whatever are you talking about? i refused to listen to him for my entire adult life, from my early teens to his death. there was a lot i could have learned from him but he was so confrontational, so fucked up. He Swung wildly between being deeply proud of me and profoundly disappointed. One day he would be fighting like a wildcat to control me, the next he would be oblivious, absent, deliberately shutting me out because I wasn't what he wanted me to be..I was too fat, too loud, ro opinionated, too much like him. the wild swings were too much for me. i had to get out of there. i didn't look.back. but oh, I wish he had gotten some help, gotten a break. I wish he could have found some peace so he could have shared it with me I woke up with a sore neck from clenching my jaw so hard.

Funeral Songs

The ever-expanding list of songs to be played at my funeral Coyote, Joni Mitchell Clouds. Joni Mitchell Sisters of Mercy, Leonard Cohen To Lay Me Down, Jerry Garcia The Wheel, Jerry Garcia Mood Indigo, Duke Ellington Many Rivers to Cross, Jimmy Cliff What'll I Do, Harry Nilson St James Infirmary Blues, Jelly Roll.Morton Nuages, Djamgo Reinhardt Minor Swung - Django Reinhardt Gymnopedia, Eric Satie Im Coming Home, Staple Singers By the Rivers of Babylon, Bob Marley Redemption Song, Bob Marley Peace Like a River, Paul Simon Slip Slidin Away. Paul Simon Candles in the Rain, Melanie She, Graham Parsons Tapestry, Carol King Elvis Presley Blues. Gillian Welch Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain, Willie Nelson Angel From Monthomery - Bonnie Raitt version All Things Must Pass - George Harrison Hide Your Love Away - Beatles