trying to find some sort of comfort or peace or relief in this unbearable place
turn back the clock turn back the clock turn back the clock
saying it won't make it happen
saying it over and over makes it worse
makes me feel like a child, foolish and out of control
hoping to regain this missing piece of me
feeling your presence in your absence confuses me
makes me cry makes me sob in the car in the store
you never yelled you never criticized you never blamed
even when you should have
and the past is in the past but this is still so here
and my fingers type mindlessly and my pen writes without pause
but nothing comes out that makes this better that makes this anything but reality.

post number one thousand, five hundred and forty...

... i'm sitting in my sister's basement and witnessing my brother in law and my husband battling it out in halo 3. it's mostly quiet for the occasional "you're still alive? impossible!" and things of that nature.

today is my friday, so i'm looking forward to sleeping in tomorrow and being lazy. oh yeah, AND doing dishes and laundry. b/c that's awesome.

the top of my foot itches. it confuses me b/c if i really itch it, it both tickles AND hurts. if i do nothing, it might actually drive me to madness. what's a girl to do?

i just purchased shoes recently for a nifty buy one, get one deal and have since made the mistake of wearing the lovely maryjanes without socks. this is going to cause the shoes to ... well, to put it bluntly, smell like dog. and i suspect that the itch of the top of the foot is caused from the maryjaney strap across it, but if i remove the shoes, the whole world (husband, brother in law) will have to deal with the sockless shoe choice i have made. i cannot bear to do that. i fear only a scrubbing in the style of Silkwood will heal my feet.

what's that? i'm talking only of the ridiculous? the lame? the pointless? i feel like i need a little bit of that right now. or maybe i should just talk about what is on my mind.

two and a half weeks ago, i didn't really believe in an afterlife. if people die, that's it. maybe it's a belief out of necessity now, but it has changed since bram's death. i can no longer accept that people are just ... GONE. it's going against everything i believed before this, but there have been just these little things that i won't go into now... but just a feeling here and there that he's not just gone. little reminders, little... signs, if you will.

in the last few weeks my older sister has had two of her classmates pass away and after she found out about each one, a song came onto the radio that was completely indicative of the time she spent with them. coincidence? maybe. maybe these things do just happen. maybe during a moment of sobbing in my car it just so happened that the two very songs i associate with bram more than any others songs in this entire world play one after the other.

maybe it seems naive. maybe i'm looking too hard for something. maybe it seems like a childish way to handle it. but whether these things mean something more or are just mere coincidence, i don't think it matters. if it offers me even a sliver of comfort, i'll take it.

but don't you think that if there was ANYONE in this world that would be able to go from life into some sort of energy that is near to us, wouldn't that person be bram???

dear god...

... if you are there, please make the fellow sitting behind me who wears far too much cologne step into a torrential rainstorm to cleanse off what i can only assume to be Sex Panther.

thank you.

... it is lonely here...

... but not alone.

for those of you who don't know...

bram's wife has been updating his two blogs. you can find one here and the other here.
here's a few pics i dug up..


bram wearing an "i'm quitting today" sticker, ready to light up.

me and bram at a party at patrick's house.

bram and that hat.

a sample of our party...

is that meg and chris? nope, it's Holly Golightly and Mr. Varjak!

Mr. Varjak and my husband, the father of my unborn child, the terrorist.

sharon, laura, sean and the notorious MB.

i made cupcakes that look like rodents. it's my way.

me (an impregnanted Sally) and benito.

terrorist dustin (from Mattell!), impregnanted Sally (see the bump?) and Holly Golightly.

the happy expectant couple, Brandeen and Terry.

that wig just got itchy after a while.

props to jegecita...

for this wonderful quote that somehow applies perfectly to bram:

"maybe he was the way he was - you know, twice as good as most people, so important to so many - because he was only gonna be here for half his lifespan. The cosmos sort of squished, or "concentrated" his essential Bram-ness into just 33 short years. I was thinking of frozen orange juice concentrate while typing this analogy....Bram as sort of an undiluted orange juice concentrate, when so many other people are just watered-down......"

it's so true.

*UPDATED*
bram would tell me how his dad would add four cans of water to concentrated juice instead of the directed three cups, 'cause it "makes more juice." this is why jege's analogy is so fantastic.

untitled

this is the first day in 10 days where i've not cried. that's not to say i won't get weepy later. i've been reading poetry today and of course i have come across poems that i think are fitting to what has been going on.

A Reminiscence
by Anne Brontë

YES, thou art gone! and never more
Thy sunny smile shall gladden me;
But I may pass the old church door,
And pace the floor that covers thee.

May stand upon the cold, damp stone,
And think that, frozen, lies below
The lightest heart that I have known,
The kindest I shall ever know.

Yet, though I cannot see thee more,
'Tis still a comfort to have seen;
And though thy transient life is o'er,
'Tis sweet to think that thou hast been;

To think a soul so near divine,
Within a form so angel fair,
United to a heart like thine,
Has gladdened once our humble sphere.

The Answering Machine
by Linda Pastan

I call and hear your voice
on the answering machine
weeks after your death,
a fledgling ghost still longing
for human messages.

Shall I leave one, telling
how the fabric of our lives
has been ripped before
but that this sudden tear will not
be mended soon or easily?

In your emptying house, others
roll up rugs, pack books,
drink coffee at your antique table,
and listen to messages left
on a machine haunted

by the timbre of your voice,
more palpable than photographs
or fingerprints. On this first day
of this first fall without you,
ashamed and resisting

but compelled, I dial again
the number I know by heart,
thankful in a diminished world

---------------
i keep making attempts at writing something to get all this from my head onto paper, but i'm not quite there yet. and when i do get there, i'll write it with a fountain pen, b/c bram felt he could only write with a fountain pen.
for the accidental mercy of machines,
then listen and hang up.

beautiful words...

spoken about a beautiful man by my friend, jason.

an oldie but goodie....

that old favorite game of typing Kari Needs, Kari Wants, Kari thinks... and stuff like that into google and seeing what happens.

KARI needs...
- an effective system
- needs care and attention
- to make a few gonzo pornos to upgrade her resume

KARI wants...
- her tender earlobes pierced
- Ellie to remember that being a good friend is better than having a best friend
- to lump all women who have regretted the abortion decision into a category
- to take her love for art a step further
- to solve her aunt’s murder

KARI thinks...
- this girl has potential
- they'll be romantic
- that special requests must come with a letter from an administrator
- the world of him
- that the old Christmas tree has had enough and suggested to sell it in the next garage sale
- they should try to slice through a smaller machine gun barrel and they choose a Tommy Gun

back from minot

a very long, very emotional weekend. still in a bit of disbelief, but it's more of a "i wish it weren't this way" sort of disbelief, because i'm very aware of how real it is to have lost a best friend. many people said many words of comfort, but in all honestly, the only thing that would really comfort me is to hear that he's not gone.

got back last night after a 7 1/2 hour drive and pretty much hit the road running in regards to work. just finished up my workday a bit ago and now i sit, looking around at the cleaning i need to do, but i just don't feel it yet. tomorrow is cleaning day. no, really, it is. NO REALLY. i mean it this time.

we're having some folks over for a halloween party this saturday and i will now spend the rest of my day looking for creepy recipes online. that's my way. the finger cookies from last year were a big hit.



so we'll see what i can find this year.

i'm easily distracted by the outdoors in fall. i'm currently sitting on the couch where i can look out our picture window and it's really windy out -- there are leaves blowing around like mad in the street. it's actually pretty hypnotic. and very soothing. and now i'm sleepy.

kids are pretty smart.

i went in to wake up abbey this morning and when i went in, she was looking out the window and said "it's raining out. when my dad told me about bram, it was raining. and it's still raining. it's like the world is crying for bram."

smart kid.

my agenda today.

i need to do housework. NEED. no, i don't think you understand...i NEED to get stuff cleaned up. i'm not sobbing uncontrollably right now, therefore i need to tidy up while i'm still able. and yet i'm not tidying up. i'm blogging. i truly am the great procrastinator.

this is our third overcast day in a row. i normally really like weather like this, but this just feels.... yeah.

sometimes people imagine what they would do if someone close to them dies -- not something we LIKE to do, but that pops into our heads, as if to plan how to cope with that. i can honestly say that i never had that thought about bram, b/c i simply assumed that he'd outlive us all -- when someone had energy like he had, it's inconceivable that this happens.

maybe that's why it's been so hard to do anything other than sit on this couch, facing this computer monitor and occasionally look out our big picture window that has shown the exact same grey overcast sky since monday morning.

seeking out some normalcy...

did i spell the word "normalcy" correctly? (dictionary.com says "yes.") i'm doing laundry. loading up my ipod with different music. enjoying how my dog manages to move a pillow around so that it's under her head, just like people do. there's a couple of cats scrappin' in the hallway. i'm taking in the normal things in my house, trying to just get on some sort of even keel.

trying not to fixate on things like how i can't find that picture of bram when he was sleeping on little mermaid sheets at my parent's house, or how unfair it is that there are parents who have to bury their child -- something no parent should ever have to do. or how sad it is that michele and bram didn't get to grow old together, that bram never got to play with grandchildren.

i think it just comes down to the fact that there's so much that is upsetting about this, it's going to take a long time to come to terms with it. and even after that point, i think many of us will still feel as though a part of us is missing.

in usual bram style...

this was the last message i got from him, and it was in regards to my pregnancy:

i've been...

... tied to my email account all day. while doing other things i'm constantly checking to see if there is any news, when really i need to realize there isn't going to be anything i don't already know.

it's as though i keep checking it in the hopes that it will say "JUST KIDDING" or "IT WAS A MISTAKE" or "THIS WHOLE DAY WAS JUST ONE LONG, HORRIBLE FUCKING NIGHTMARE."

and i know this is not the truth, but i still hit the "refresh" button on my browser, because just maybe, JUST MAYBE my wishful thinking will pay off and i'll know that one of the best people to ever walk this planet will still be here.

and i know i'm not the only one grieving -- the fact that there are so many of us who are missing him so much really says something about him as a person. that doesn't make it any easier to breathe when i think about never seeing him again, but it does make me realize how very lucky i was to call him my friend.

this picture makes me smile.

i don't know who took it, i just know it was on his myspace page. let me tell you about my friend, bram. and it's going to be harder than fuck to use past tense regarding him. it's impossible.

after a night of drinking (or during a night of drinking) he'd fry spam. and then actually eat it.

when taking a shot of tequila he'd swish it around in his mouth like mouthwash.

he and our friend Joe would flick each other's penile tip just for fun. (then bram would jump up like a little girl and giggle.)

he and i knew every line in "when harry met sally."

he was an amazing writer, and luckily some of that writing is online at his first blog site, here.

during a the song "puttin' on the ritz" he'd tap along with the tap dance part.

he had a light brown sweater from the gap that, for years (even just a month ago) i'd say was actually mine and that he needed to return it to me.

he'd drink kool-aid from a large glass jar. a REALLY large glass jar.

he hated tuna fish, but once in black box play, had to mix it up with mayo in a ziploc bag.

on our trips to fargo we'd take a corn-cob pipe that he kept in his car, mount a little troll doll on it (yes, he kept this doll in his car as well) and hold it out the window and hum the Wicked Witch theme song.

when he worked at Nite Train Pizza, he once put the phrase "Fire Bad, Pizza Good" on the sign outside.

he had two fish in a very murky 10-gallon aquarium, they were named Fist and Fuck (from a NIN song).

he put up with so much of my shit and stood by me when i was bat-shit crazy.

we'd watch "PCU" all the time. and it was always funny. even when we weren't drunk out of our minds.

he always made fun of the way i thwacked my cigarette on an ashtray... "thwack thwack thwack!"

he'd cook a whole mess o' bacon, then poor the grease into a glass jar where he'd put his used insulin needles and called it "art."

he always had a knack for winning big on pull tabs at a minot strip club.

he growled at my stomach when i was pregnant with abbey and i swear, the first time he talked to her, she made a growling noise.

when he'd pee, it sounded like a fire hose.

----------

i could probably go on and for days. i just don't know any other way to get through this without writing about it. but honestly, i keep feeling like i'm going to wake up any minute and this won't be reality.

i can't stop crying.

one of my best friends has passed away and it's breaking my heart. and it doesn't seem possible -- i heard it, it was said to me twice. and it was as though i couldn't say anything to anyone b/c it couldn't possibly be real. it just can't be.

papa larson and his four girls....

the sound of a fetus.

not my fetus, but you get the idea...

Gabcast! k. larson #1