Urgent news. 

The Westboro Baptist Church are planning to picket the funerals of the deaths of two volunteer firefighters in MY hometown next Sunday. The firefighters were shot after the arsonist called 911 to come to his own house that he set on fire. When they showed up, he opened fire on them, then turned the gun on himself. One of the volunteer firefighters went to my high school. They died on Christmas Eve. 

Please recommend this post and offer your support and ideas for peacefully counter-protesting the WBC. 

So I haven’t felt ready to update since last Saturday because I didn’t know if I could handle telling you about it. Last Sunday was my uncle’s burial…everyone, if you have to go to a funeral, please take the option to NOT go to the burial. It’s too much. Especially since he was in both the Army and the Air Force, so naturally he had a military burial. They fired rifles to salute him for his service to his country. He fought at Normandy, France, and the Battle of the Bulge in Belgium, earning a Bronze Star Award for valor. After World War 2 was when he joined the Air Force. He helped supply the planes that flew the Berlin Airlift. I can only hope I’ll be a quarter of the man that he was. After they fired off the rifles, they started playing TAPS while the military personnel assigned to him folded up the American flag and gave it to his wife, my aunt Eva. I couldn’t restrain myself. I cried. Alot. Especially when I had to say goodbye to my aunt. They were married for 57 years. Putting that into perspective, that’s longer than both my parents have been alive.

Since then, all I’ve been doing is working and sleeping. A couple days ago on Friday, my roommate had a huge party at my apartment for her birthday. It was fun…for the most part. Until her best friend decided she couldn’t hold her liquor down so she puked in the bathroom. There were about 40 people here. Everyone was behaving and there wasn’t any drama between anyone which is always a good thing at a party with shit tons of alcohol involved. The food was worth it though. Lots of cookies and cake and brownies and someone brought homemade chicken wing dip. So at least I ate. But then I had to go to work at 730am the next morning and didn’t sleep..so I was still really buzzed and drove to work. I worked all day, came home and slept for 8 hours. After waking up at 2am I had some food and stayed up till 6 watching movies, then went back to sleep. Sunday I stayed home watching football all day. Today i worked then came home and slept for another 7 hours afterwards. Now I’m up (probably gonna watch another movie) and crying because I’m still greiving.

What sucks is none of my friends that I had invited to that party wound up showing up. Liz didn’t show either. She kinda ignored me. I got a text from her about 2 hours ago from her saying she wasn’t feeling like going anywhere or doing anything lately, so whatever. I’ll let it slide. But no more of that. I have huge trust issues when it comes to people doing what they say they’re going to do and keeping me informed about it. If you can’t take the time to text “hey, I don’t think I can come tonight” then please by all means let me stay up all night worrying about you on Sunday when we had made plans to meet each others families…

I don’t know guys. I’ve been in an overall sad state since the death of my uncle. I can’t tell you how long it will take to pull out of this because I don’t know how long it will take. All I want to do right now is curl up in a ball. Goodnight.

Certainly was a whirlwind of a day today. 

I slept at my parents house overnight last night and drove out with my mom and dad early today for Pennsylvania. The ride down proved to be very uneventful. I felt sick most of the way because I was overtired and stressed out which didn’t help. After about a 4 hour drive we got to the hotel and I layed down for a nice nap around 330. Woke up around 445 because we were all starving our asses off and had to eat. The restaurant inside this hotel is horrendously slow, but at least the food was good (even though the serving size here is substantially smaller than home). I had ravioli. It was worth it to have some food in my stomach for my uncle’s funeral service. But the cook took so long to make our food we got there an hour late. And we were the only ones in the restaurant. Oh well, slackers will be slackers. We get to the service and I meet about 30 cousins I never knew I had. But that’s the way it is with Italian families. I wasn’t shocked but meeting so many people all at once is still a little overwhelming. Speaking of overwhelming, my uncle was open casket. He died of natural causes. He was 94. I didn’t cry but it was hard to stand there and say a prayer amongst all the scattered thoughts. I just told him I know he’s in a better place now, and I hope he keeps making people laugh in the afterlife. That was just part 1 of this trip though. The next part is the burial which takes place in about 8 hours. And that will be even more difficult. All I’ll want to do tomorrow is come home to my apartment and my bed, text Liz that I’m alright and go to sleep. 

Things are still great with her. She actually has been next to perfect, although I know nobody is perfect and I don’t WANT her to be perfect anyways. I just want to keep it going the way it has been going. We met up again on Wednesday night. @jess_i_cuh you’ll appreciate this. She took me to learn how to swing dance. I learned how to lead her, spin her, and even dip her. It was….awesome. I met the dance teachers there and they were so friendly about everything. So was everyone else who came that night, with helping me get up to speed on things and just feeling comfortable. Liz was a great sport too. I embarrassed myself in the beginning but after a couple of dances I got the hang of it and could keep up and dance with confidence. It was pretty simple and fun, and I’ll be going back with her again. Afterwards, we walked out holding hands and went to the bar next door for some fried pickles and beer. All we really did was sit and stare at each other and talk though. She’s cute. Some of the people from the dance place came over to the same bar and we all had a good time. Liz wanted to cuddle though and started hugging me in the booth lol. I took that as my cue that she’s probably tired and needs to go home, but I enjoyed the fact that she feels comfortable around me. I walked her to her car hugging her and said goodbye and that was that. Good night I’d say. I’ve set the day for her to meet my parents (or me meeting her mom) on Sunday. I’ll wait until Sunday to tell my parents though. I’m not worried about meeting her mom, since I have never had a problem with parents. I expect it to be a bit more tough though since her parents are divorced, and by nature, her mom will probably be cautious. But I’m just speculating. 

I have a full emotional plate on my hands in the morning. I won’t update again until possibly Sunday night, assuming everything goes as planned. I’ll be way too tired after I get home to be on the computer. But I just wanted to give you all this little update. I know I probably have worried some of you but I’m doing okay for the most part…I’m hanging in there despite the unfortunate situation. I just hope tomorrow I’m able to handle it.