1.23

 Coping through Multitasking

Today is day two (of now three) of the blizzard. Classes got cancelled again tomorrow, which is good for me because I spent the entire day distracted by a ton of things all at once.

There was a point where I was rotating three things at once: getting my daily practice in, studying calculus, and watching the Pitt. 

It's been nice to find myself indulged in different hobbies and media outside of college work for the first time in god knows how long. I hate how it's resulted from the unexpected loss of so many friendships, but maybe this will turn into a good thing in the long run for me. In the past, I've always coped in self-destructive ways, so this has been a nice change.

The Pitt and the looming presence of death

The Pitt is the first show I've sat down and watched in its full in four years (the last one being Better Call Saul in 2022). I started last night at 11 PM and just finished an hour ago. I won't spoil anything but it's really fucking good and you should watch it.

My mom called today. She's a nurse, so we ended up talking about the show. She loves it and says that it's super accurate to how things actually are in a hospital. This led into medical talk and how we found out that the guy who sold me my Volvo, Bob, died in September. I've been telling people, as recently as last week, to check out this guy's business, only to find out today that he died just three months after he told me my car.

It's pretty unfortunate. My mom said that he seemed like he had symptoms of CHF, and looking back on our visit, I agreed. She said she noticed some pretty clear signs of it, the clearest to me being issues with his legs.

I was pacing back and forth in my apartment when I stopped. I've seen those same things in my grandpa, and I knew vaguely that he hasn't been doing the best. He's been going to the hospital over and over for an issue with his leg. I hesitated to even bring this up in fear of sounding like I was overthinking, but I asked, "Does he have CHF too?"

Turns out he does. This isn't a horrible shock because he's 90 years old, but still sad, obviously. I thought it was weird that she hadn't told me, but whatever.

Oh don't tell my brother. You know that he doesn't deal with this stuff well.

"Don't worry, he's known for a while... I swore I told you too already??"

It's crazy what things family forgets to tell you when you're not living at home anymore. It's kinda funny, but at the same time, I'm just thinking, Wow, it's finally starting to happen.

I have six grandparents (many divorces in the family), and I've been fortunate to reach adulthood with all of them alive. I realized at around 10 years old that there was most likely going to be a 10-ish year period of my life where they were all going to die around the same time. My grandpa with CHF is 90, but the others are all 78-79 years old (two even have the exact same birthday, year and all). It's a hard thing to grapple with, but I've accepted it for the most part. I know it's going to be very hard for all of us, since many of them raised me when my parents couldn't (or refused to). 

I guess if there's anything that's been reinforced to me from my past 24 hours of The Pitt is that we have to keep moving through grief and trauma. It's okay to lean on people, but you can't let it destroy you. We just have to appreciate everything we have for now. I'll make sure to try to keep those things in mind.

Sorry to be a bummer on this one, but that's just how my day went. I will be in better spirits tomorrow! See you then -G