Happy as a Seagull Sitting on a Trash Can

That's how I felt today....

when this view greeted me:

The sight of Anacapa and Santa Cruz both visible from end to end. And yes, the sky and the water really were that blue.

I still feel immensely relieved that I'm alive. When I sat in front of Dan's Day of the Dead altar for a bit last night, I told him I'd almost come to see him.  "Hmmm," he said. "Dear sweet girl." 

This afternoon after my mom and I had voted, we nearly got caught in a road rage confrontation. I thought of The Appointment in Samara, a story I first heard from Dan. I've also been thinking about another real life story he told me about a friend or a friend of a friend who had been going through a terrible divorce and a fortune teller or a palm reader told her that on such and such a date there would be an event that would change everything. She construed it to mean her ex would die. Instead, she died. 

I frequently think about my mother's death. When. How. Yesterday, I thought, well, hahahaha I guess that's not how things are going to happen. We're going to go together.

On a happier note, I used to tell Dan I was not the person he would really want with him in an emergency. (Happier is a relative concept, okay?) I sited my deranged mumblings in the ambulance when C had an accident, and she told the paramedics that they needed to take my blood pressure because I'd given out my cellphone number as her father's contact number and I'd given them our old home address instead of our current one.  Or maybe it was birth dates I'd mixed up. I was so out of it, I really don't recall."You don't know that story about yourself is still relevant," Dan told me. And indeed, I don't think I'm that person anymore. 

What old skins have you shed, dear readers?

And, oh, p.s. I AM as happy as a seagull on a trash can despite all these musings about death.