blurring_the_edges_45_the_family_trip birdmad In a manner you've been expecting, the news from the doctors is neither encouraging nor discouraging as it relates to your mother's condition. She seems to be showing some slight improvement with the aggressive treatment, but at the same time, the more aggressive chemotherapy makes her weaker and more frail and as a result, more susceptible to more related illnesses. The word has been around the family and you've been at least peripherally aware that your brother is moving back here right around Easter. He's been gone for nearly four years since your dad died and he senses what you sense... that sooner than later you will be without either of your parents. There has been a lingering sense of loneliness lately, and while hanging out with Teri on the weekends and going all over the city and even going as far as the Grand Canyon on one trip has been nice, it isn't the same since she got the new job at Precision across town. You've got your buddies, but they don't quite quicken you the way she does and you have to fight to keep any kind of enthusiasm for anything during the week. Taking Teri's advice, you call Precision's personnel office and ask what kind of openings they have available and you are crestfallen to find that unless you have very specific types of experience or credentials, none of their lower echelon positions are currently available and you remember that Teri mentioned having done specialized electronics work for nearly ten years now. You laugh when you remember that after asking you how old you are, she told you she was nineteen, and while she can pass for that young, bits and pieces of her story make you wonder just how much older than you she actually is. The week before your brother and his family show up, you get a call from Teri who tells you that she was out with some people from work messing around on the ATV trails out near the Superstitions and had a bad wreck. She sounds medicated and your suspicion is confirmed when she tells you that she in the burn unit at County Medical. You rush over to visit her and you see the big wrapping on her right calf where she got a large second degree burn and, according to Teri and the nurse on duty a concentric ring of smaller more intense burns including a small cremation burn where the quad she was riding landed on her after she miscalculated a jump, driving the exhaust pipe right into her leg, setting her pants on fire and burning a hole just a few inches above her ankle. You stay with her until the ward nurse kicks you out, keeping her company through her medicated haze. When you get home, you clean house like a speed-freak to prevent your mom from having to exert herself. Even though you've been doing it nearly every day, she always finds some excuse to do it. The doctors have told her to take it easy and for once you agree with them in that assessment, but you start to wonder if your mom doesn't equate kicking back with giving up in much the same way that your father resented the loss of his independence as his illness progressed. Sunday afternoon comes and goes with a visit from your dad's aunt and uncle. Luisa and Andres are a study in contrasts. She is more of a glad-hand personality, but loses some of her sense of humor is something rattles her. Andrés, on the other hand, looks serious at first glance, but has a very playful demeanor and is always ready with a smile. It is always fun to tease Tîa Luisa about how many more girlfriends does Uncle Andrés have this week and what does she do about it. Uncle gives it a good hearty laugh, but Tîa doesn't always find it so funny. She is just a little past seventy and he is just turned eighty years old. By this point, age and years of hard work have shrunk him down to the same height as his wife, but where she is thickset and still has a remarkably fine complexion for an old lady, he is slim, a little bent and his skin is the deep brown tan of a good leather, which makes his fuzzy crown of snowy white hair stand out that much more against it. Even though he has long since retired, Uncle Andrés is a compulsive worker and looks for any excuse to keep busy, especially messing about in his garage or his little garden. They come to see your mom and check up on her and of course they ask about you and how you are doing, as they do every time they stop over, which is at least twice a week. Luisa asks you why you aren't married yet and Uncle gets her riled by playfully saying that you are doing the smart thing by not being married "¡Aî! qué viejo tan loco." she tells him, poking him in the arm and smiling at him "Cinquenta y cinco años conmigo y puede decir algo asina, que barbaridad" [Oh, what a crazy old man, fifty-five years with me and he can say something like that...how barbaric] and with that, there is a long, almost uncomfortable pause after which they both bust out laughing an infectious laugh that you and your mom can't help but join in. (more later) 030527 ... birdmad As the afternoon wears on, you go back home for more news - your sister, who works in logistics for the Army is being sent to Germany for a year, but in an assignment that doesn't allow her to take your nephew with her. This means he'll be staying with you and your mom for a while. You can see a certain amount of good and bad in this. Good in that at ten years old, he's old enough to help your mom out at least a little around the house while you are at work, but sort of bad in that once your brother and his family unit move in, you will have absolutely no space or privacy whatsoever. The week at work is uneventful. You and a group of friends go to the Pavillion on Friday night to see White Zombie playing with Anthrax and Quicksand. Teri, heavily bandaged leg and all, was making plans to raise a little hell in the mosh-pit but thought better of it when a slight bump to the bandage from a drunken concertgoer dropped her to the lawn in pain. Having quit the pavillion last year, but knowing the security people and the layout of the place quite well, you coach the rest of your friends from the factory in getting past the lawn-fences and ushers to get down to the pit. Sending them on their merry way, you pick up a couple of beers and head back to the spot where Teri is sitting. "Ooh, you read my mind, aren't you sweet?" she says, patting the spot on the grass next to her as she sits down, looking terribly cute in the sunset glow. Sitting next to her, you hand her a beer and watch as Anthrax takes the stage. In the end, you, Teri and everyone who isn't a totally devoted and hardcore Anthrax fan is slightly bored and a few small, trash fueled lawn-fires pop up among the restless crowd. The White Zombie set proves to be highly entertaining and when you drop Teri back at her apartment, she's actually in a more psyched, upbeat mood than she was when she wanted to hit the mosh-pit. Inviting you in, she pulls out a menu for a Chinese restaurant that does a fair turn of late-night, take-out business a few blocks from ASU and pulls out a couple of good vampire movies. Picking up the food, a two person order of the House lo-mein, you come back and watch movies until nearly five in the morning. When you notice she has fallen asleep, as gently as you can, you gently scoop her up off the couch and carry her to her bed, tucking her in and tidying up the living room before you go. "Goodnight Alex," you hear her call out softly as you are almost out the door, half-asleep in that Tennessee drawl of hers. Then, with a quick, drowsy giggle, in almost a sing-song tone "you tucked me eee-inn." Driving home along Southern Avenue with the rising sun at your back, you stop at the Circle K near 32nd street and pick up a bottle of orange juice which you enjoy thouroughly as you drive. Surprisingly, your mom, who is eating breakfast in the kitchen by the time you get home, isn't the least bit perturbed by your lateness, having gotten somewhat used to it in the last couple of years. Your nephew is asleep on the couch, having watched most of the cartoons you rented for him the afternoon before. Surprisingly, you are not terribly sleepy, even for having been awake for the last twenty_four_hours. You ask your mom if she will wake you up at 9:30 so that you and the little space-monkey can go out later that morning. "Sure, mijo. Where are you going?" "Oh, probably to the comic shop and maybe to the mall. You and Tîa Luisa are going somewhere today to, no?" "Yeah, I'm feeling pretty good today, so i think we're going to that little mercadito over in Guadalupe, just for the hell of it." Giving your mom a kiss on the cheek, you head for your room and fall into bed, sleeping like a log for the next three and a half hours. Enjoy this little bit of peace while it lasts, Alex. Pretty soon it will go the_way_of_all_things. Your bro is coming home next week and they've got a kid on the way. 030708 what's it to you? who go blather from