Blargh
You know those days where you feel sick to your stomach and hungry at the same time? I hate those days. Having one now. The very idea of food makes me go green around the gills, and yet my stomach is begging me to put something in it. It was the same way yesterday, and I ate, quite literally, nothing until four pm -- and even then it was because I felt like I was about to faint. I didn't want the food; I needed it. I just made myself have a small bowl of bland cereal to keep that from happening again. It feels like it's a lead weight in my stomach, but at least it's a lead weight that'll keep me from taking a header into the tile.
It's kind of how I operate, though -- when I'm upset or nervous, it manifests itself in my stomach. Gramps has an appointment in Gainesville to speak with the orthopedic surgeon. We still don't know what he's going to choose to do about his arm. I'm scared, frankly. I know I've talked about my grandfather before in LJ posts, but it's just... I'm scared. I'm thirty years old, and my grandfather has always been a fixture in my life.
Logically I know that no one lives forever, but aside from the sarcoma, he's doing so well. The radiation has him tired out, but he's still his same old self -- snarky and cute and giving me a ration of shit whenever I go next door. Like today:
NiaGramps: "You again?"
Niamh: "Yeah."
NiaGramps: "Don't you have a home of your own?"
Niamh: "Yeah." *points in general direction of our house*
NiaGramps: "What the hell do you want now?"
Niamh: "Doing laundry." (The place we're renting doesn't have a washer/dryer -- Mom's next door does.)
NiaGramps: "Leave a quarter on the dryer when you're done."
Niamh: "Gotcha."
A lot of people think we're weird for having the type of relationship we have. We snark at each other -- it's what we do. We don't show our affection with hugs and kisses. In fact, we're very bad with hugs, and whenever my grandfather hugs me, it's accompanied by a hard swat on the back, which is meant to be affectionate, but mostly just makes me cough. Affectionate for me is giving him a kiss on top of his shaved-bald head (which I sometimes ask to rub for luck -- he always tells me no, and then I laugh and do it anyway).
In grad school, when I'd come back home from DC during holidays and breaks, the first words out of his mouth were, "You again? Hell, I thought we got rid of you for good!" Periodically, during those visits, we'd snipe back and forth at each other, and he'd finally be like, "When the hell are you leaving again?"
*sigh* Sorry 'bout that. I seem to have worked myself into a downer mood again.