Last month will go down as the worst month of my life…I have no doubt about that. I have discovered new horrors that, though I knew existed, I had no idea the depth of how they would infest my very being. I didn’t think there was much left in life that would cause me to curl up in the fetal position crying like a baby. I mean, I have already experienced flash bulb memories that I didn’t want to know happened. I have had my newborn baby taken from me and had to watch her in the NICU for 2 weeks hooked up to all varieties of machinery and fluids. There are other horrors that I wish not to speak of as well, but here I am…a mother of 2 children, over 30, curled up in the fetal position in our bedroom because of a smell based memory. And I don’t think this is going to change anytime soon, as it has happened at least 4 times in the last 3 weeks. More of that thing called LIFE has crept into my world.
At the end of my last post I believe I said something about “here’s to a year without death”…yeah…let’s say that didn’t work out so well! Yeah, we have had a death in the family and it has a smell. Did you know that dead has a smell? And when you mix it with blood and vomit and heaven only knows what else, the smell becomes almost unbearable, especially when it has been sitting for at least a day. It was only through the grace of God that I did not throw up. My in-laws either have really dulled senses, or my sense of smell is highly acute, as I was in misery and none of them noticed. The worst part is that I can be sitting somewhere and all of a sudden it comes back to me. Smell is the only sense that is directly connected to the brain. All your other senses go through a type of filter, that it why smell based memories are so strong and bring up emotions that you don’t really understand. For me, dental offices smell a certain way and it will immediately bring up anxiety…as it is my only real phobia.
Anyway, I should probably explain…my husband has a younger brother who was born the same year that I was. He has been a type 1 diabetic since he was 6 years old. His body was found in his 1 room apartment the first week of January. We were awoken early on a Saturday morning by this news. We had to drive my mother-in-law to the Orange County coroner’s office to get whatever personal effects they would release to us, which turned out to be his driver’s license, phone, key, and note. Yeah, that was fun. We then drove to his apartment, which turned out to be a motel room in Westminster, where we discovered a Coroner’s seal on the door. It had been there for at least a day and the windows were also closed and locked…in the humidity of Orange County. When we opened the door the smell hit me so hard that I damn near fainted on the spot, and thank you so much, I will NEVER be forgetting. That first day, after much argument because his sister wanted to turn it into a shrine or something, we loaded what we could into his Ford Thunderbird and I drove it back to my mother-in-law’s place. My husband and her had to leave earlier as they had to pick up my husband’s other sister at the airport in Ontario. I get into his car to discover that his GPS is so dead, it isn’t even powering on when I plugged it in. After pulling out of this motel, I decide I will head toward where we came from…I am on Beach Blvd…I am sure to find a freeway eventually…right?! The good news is that I found a freeway…the bad news is that I have no idea where it goes. I lived in Southern Orange County…not Northern Orange County. I decide on whatever direction the lane I was in took me…soon to discover was the wrong way. I get off said freeway, to discover in O.C. traffic that the brakes on his car aren’t very good. The person a couple of cars in front of me stopped on a dime…yeah, an accident then occurred. So here I am, under a freeway somewhere in O.C. having just had an accident in my dead brother-in-law’s car. Try explaining that to the Chinese lady who was in the car in front of me…the poor woman was terrified that the insurance was no good. After leaving my information, along with the information from the car, I managed to get across to her that even if his company won’t pay, mine would…I got back on the above mentioned freeway.
At this point the thought hit me…”I wonder how much gas is in this car?”. Yes, I know that I should have thought about this before…however, my stress level was just a tad high. I look at the gas gauge to discover that there is less than a ¼ of a tank of gas, that’s ok…I will just put more in I think to myself. Then I remember, I left my bank card with Angie to get some groceries for the kids while I was gone. So, the situation stands thus: I am driving my dead brother-in-law’s car, that I just had an accident in because the brakes are no good. I have less that ¼ of a tank of gas and I am driving from O.C. to Riverside County and I have no money or bank card. The GPS still has not powered on and I am praying that I will eventually find a freeway that connects to the 91. Through the grace of God I made it to the 91 freeway, where I start to cry and the GPS comes back on. My husband calls to tell me that they have just arrived at the airport and wants to know why I am crying…WELL LET ME TELL YOU WHY!!! I manage to convey to him the most pressing matter…I have no gas and no money to buy more, and I haven’t even made it to Corona. He starts to panic…then makes the best suggestion all day: Jasone had $20 in his wallet, was his wallet in the car? I remember that yes, it is in the car, in a grocery bag with oodles of other crap…I wonder where that ended up! So I tell him that when I have to (meaning when the car starts screeching at me) I will pull off and find a gas station and look. And if I can’t find the wallet they will come rescue me after they pick up Sherrie at the airport. Eventually I end up parked at a 76 station off the 60 freeway under a light post digging in the trunk for the wallet. Happily I found it and made it home…always a miracle!
My husband and I went to bed and woke up the next morning to nightmares, only to have to go back to Jasone’s room and finish clearing everything out. We put the furniture by the dumpster, threw what little there was in boxes, loaded Jasone’s motorcycle into the back of Ben’s truck, and fled the scene with much haste, as that smell is NEVER going to come out of there. Then came the nightmare that was the funeral. I have learned some things: 1…Skipping the embalming of the body is NOT a good way to save money, especially when the body has been with the coroner for several days and then at the funeral home for several more days. The family has to sit in the front row, and heaven help me that is the category that I fit into. 2…When skipping the embalming, a wise decision would be to skip the viewing…I’m just saying. 3…When you don’t embalm the body $7000 is NOT a good deal, even if the plot is on the top of a mountain in Banning. 4…For the love of your husband and mother-in-law is NOT a good enough reason to give the plan of salvation talk when your sister-in-law left the church because she wants the priesthood. And 5…Sitting in a room eating a meal after all this nonsense is over is enough to make even the most devote Latter-Day Saint want a good stiff drink, make mine a double and where is the Jack Daniels!?!
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