Absence

I think it's important to tell everyone reading this that I haven't abandoned the blog. Here it is, the 27th of an entire month that I have been silent. I haven't been taking a break from the blog, reclining back and putting my feet up. I've been extremely busy and right now is pretty much the first time I've had this month to take a breath. 

Source- Washington Sunset

On November 4, I found out one of my friends had suddenly and tragically died. By the 7th, I was on a plane to Arizona to be there for my best friend and to attend my friend's memorial that Saturday the 9th. 

That Saturday, right before his memorial I found out that my grandfather had passed away. I was crushed by grief. 

Saturday was a hard day to get through and on top of it all, my brother called me to tell me that the outlet in his room had caught on fire and he had to race to turn off the electricity before the house went up. If he hadn't been home, our house would have most certainly burned down. 

After spending a day organizing my next trip to Kentucky on the phone and countless hours attempting to get Russ off his ship for the funeral (to no avail), I was on my original flight back to Seattle on the 12th only to come back to the airport four hours later for my next trip. 

On November 14th, we laid "Crazy" Pawpaw to rest.  

Unfortunately my childhood is only punctuated with memories of Pawpaw because we lived a state away from them for the first half of my life. Despite the few times we were able to visit, I'll never stop feeling his warm presence in my life. Any sweet memory of him (and there are many) makes me smile and seeing his picture makes me laugh (because he was always doing something crazy). Mom has told my brother and me stories of him throughout our childhood so often that it almost feels like we had lived it alongside his five children. He was a beautifully silly man with a child's heart and a sense of humor that is unmatched and he will be forever missed by everyone who had the good fortune to know him.

Russ got to fly home early last Thursday because his leave was denied the first time. That same night half of our house went dark after I dared to run the vacuum. Three electrician visits later and we still have half power. The dark half of the house has all of our televisions and internet so... it's been quiet and boring around here. So yeah, we're going to try to move in the coming two months or so because this house, despite being cute and homey, feels a bit dangerous as far as the wiring goes. Not cool. 

What a month. I'm glad we've only got three days left of it.