This is my personal journal regarding
My Uncle. I visit him often, do what I can for him. I try to add my thoughts and experiences to this area. Comments will be moderated.
I work on responsabilities for my uncle perhaps at least an hour a day. I have to call him regularly with updates on things.
Somehow I'm always shocked at how quick my phone calls are -- 1 minute, maybe 2 minutes. We both have to try so hard to speak concisely and clearly.
My uncle has come to expect my weekly phone call(s) and he asked me "when are you calling next?" and telling him "the weekend" isn't good enough. He has to know the day, if not the very hour. I really like that he has the phone. But, it's so much harder to talk on the phone with him instead of in-person. I can't tell when it's my turn to talk.
But he always ends with something along the following lines:
“be good. careful of the world and its powers, they're very great.
He is very thoughtful and caring. I have to call him again on Friday June 13th, 2008.
We had a relatively long day with my uncle today -- but today went very good as well. We had a contractor come over and some good progess was made on fixing up the place. 2 whole sinks now function again after years of not working! It's really, really, really great.
It wasn't all easy, but it got done. My uncle shared many gifts with my mother -- and even a few were perhaps pretty valuable. Most of what my uncle owns has little or no monitary value to anyone but him. My uncle mentioned to my mom that he'd like to visit Mexico again. Thats a very interesting thought -- airports, security ... I don't really want to think about it much right now. But, it's the only place I've heard him say lately that he WANNTS to go see. Washington D.C. -- nope. My home 3 hours away -- nope. The beach -- nope. If he really wants to go visit -- maybe it can happen.
Why does he want to go to Mexico? He reiterated 3 times very plainly:
I like to walk around Mexico. Because when you walk around -- and you look around -- there are alot of Mexicans.
Yup -- you're in Mexico and there are alot of Mexicans. My mom is 100% Mexican and my uncle is 3/4 Mexican (but was born with blonde hair and blue eyes). He lived in Mexico as a child and he speaks Spanish well. But it was rather funny -- I like Mexico because there are alot of Mexicans. There are alot of Mexicans in LA too. Heh.
My Uncle is apprehsive of the changes going on, but so far while it's been difficult it hasn't been impossible.
More information to follow. I've got various writings I haven't put online yet because I'm debating to make the information available to the masses.
Uncle showed me 2 metiorites from Griffith Park he found. Meteorites have a distinctive look, they are dense rocks with visible iron ores typically and often have very smooth faces because of the extreme heat during atmospheric entry. Each meteorite was the size of an orange -- these were museum quality display pieces.
We fed Osama and talked abit. An acquatenence of his named Al stopped by briefly and politely said hello. My uncle explained that Al was a cashier at the local Albertson's supermarket (when it exsisted) and that Al was in Gloria's (now deceased) class at Santa Fe High School. So Al knew my aunt Gloria and my Uncle. My father does not recollect this person. But, it was very nice to see a friendly face visiting my uncle -- if only for a moment (I think he didn't expect my uncle to have company).
I was pretty intrigued about Al and asked my Uncle to explain to my father who had visited. I know my Uncle does not have any friends. He once told me:
These are my replacements for human friends. They can be just as good -- they are very smart, moody too.
So I was content he has visitors on rare occassions. We also dropped off 2 chairs and overall had an ok day. The bathroom has a new coat of primer!
Long day ... I have no idea where to begin to make this a short posting.
My uncle got mad at me today.
I'm sorry that he didn't receive his money the day before. I'm sorry that things are chaotic when you can't work out the contractors schedule ahead of time and have to re-schedule to next week. And, I'm sorry grandma is too old to help personally with money anymore. These 3 events are really upsetting my uncle because they horribly break up the mundane routine of his life.
And since I was there -- I suppose it's all my fault.
I'm not sorry that:
I drove 4.5 hours each way to visit with him.
woke up at 7:30am to check out of the hotel to buy him breakfast and take it to him.
fed Osama some sausage
attempted to offer him some cash to hold him over until his funds arrive.
respectfully informed the hotel staff my uncle may stop by to visit.
made a list during the week of of the 5 chores/items to do with my uncle.
spent 45 minutes taking pictures and writting him the letter last week.
that I tried to mediate through the above 3 events -- to ensure progress this weekend.
I was very upset when he tore up those papers to intimidate me -- seeing somebody tear up alot of paper at once sounds silly. But, you try tearing a phone book in half and tell me how far you get.
It wouldn't have been so bad if I didn't know when he was so mad that he didn't realize he was tearing up the letter I hand wrote instead of the bank envelopes he thought he was tearing up.
He said he was sorry once -- eventually. That he had torn up the wrong papers on accident. But still, now he can't read the letter or look at the pictures to write back. That hurt more than just being yelled at.
What he doesn't realize is that while he's upset with the situation -- that the situation only exists because various individuals care about him. Not because they want to bother, complicate or burden his life.
Perhaps I'll write some more details of today at a later date ...
Friday LA traffic is the pits -- it turned my 2 hour commute into a 4 hour commute.
I arrived at my uncles at 8pm. He was doing very well, active and alert and very busy.
We spoke for roughly 1 hour before I had to go buy some dinner for myself since I had last eaten at 11:30am. Among some of the things my uncle said were the following:
We have a broken light across the street. It goes off and on. Omniscient eye. They're watching us.
Don't see many comets tonight. Murky sky. Milky Way.
I didn't write a letter because I didn't want to complicate matters. Overexpose hazards. If you write a letter to God, how quick would he respond? ... Probably not very quick ...
I had a friend in San ***** that was a radio announcer. John *****, sometimes used the name "Jack". Sometimes the radio guy sounds like him -- only sometimes. Yea, sometimes I see his ghost walking around ...
His world is very rich and vivid. Sitting on the curb I get to thinking what all the bright lights and passing noises from the street must be like -- their very own special language to him.
Take those sayings and multiply them by 1 hour and that's a talk with my uncle. It was a very nice evening with him waiting for another relative to stop by, the weather was tepid. He was very positive the whole time. The only crazy thing of the whole evening was that he was trimming plants ...
Trimming plants, sweeping, and raking at 8pm at night. It was surreal :P -- I can't remember the last time I was up at 8pm and doing yardwork.
... more tommorow.
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