Sometimes It Sucks To Be A Responsible Adult

Saturday night I woke up at 2:30 am thinking about if I should gather important papers in case something happens to us on our upcoming trip.   I’m not trying to be morbid or anything.  I just like to be organized.  I know sometimes I can be too organized, but I don’t think this is one of those times.

I was awake for an hour before stuff stopped rolling around in my head.   I know I would have to gather bank statements, life insurance, etc.   If I did leave out papers they would be mine because Steve’s sister knows where all of his papers are.   I never thought about doing this before so this is kinda weird.  Should I gather documents or shouldn’t I?  I doubt if anything is going to happen to me, but you never know and I always like to be on the safe side.  If I did, where would I leave the manilla envelope?  My mom will be bringing in the mail so I don’t want to leave it on the kitchen table and freak her out.  My brother will be staying at the house so I don’t want to leave it on the coffee table or anything and freak him out.  On second thought he probably wouldn’t notice because he’d be too busy watching tv (he doesn’t have cable at his house).

Maybe that’s why I was blah on Sunday.  Maybe the shooting in Vegas bothered me more than I realized.  It sure has made me think about a lot of things.  My death.  Steve’s death.  Do we have everything we need in writing?  We had our wills done earlier this year, but we still have to decide on burial.  I want to be cremated and buried in the same cemetery my dad, my dad’s parents and two of my cousins are in and Steve doesn’t know.  I know I want to be buried with my husband.  We have to discuss this further and come to some decision.

My mom and I have talked about my wishes so she kinda knows about what I want and my documents are easy to find, but will she think so?  I think that thinking and preparing for death is what we have to do in the second half of our life.  As unpleasant as that sounds, it’s what we have to do.  Be responsible and have the details figured out.  I don’t think it’s fair to leave this to our loved ones we leave behind to decided what we should have decided for ourselves.      The shooting has made me think of how short and precious life is, how the unimaginable can happen in a heartbeat and how we should be somewhat prepared.

Are we ever prepared to die unexpectedly?  I don’t think so.  I’ve had a good life.  If I died tomorrow I would have some regrets.  One of them is that I didn’t fulfill my writing dream yet.  I would like to get my writing published before I die, but I believe in reincarnation and maybe I have done as much as I need to do in this lifetime, but that is another post.  Lately everything is another post.   I know I don’t want to die before I realize my writing dream.  Am I ready to die?  No, but I know that decision isn’t up to me.

Maybe I’ll just write a letter to my niece and tell her how I feel.  I would hate for something to happen and not have written a letter before hand.  She’s almost sixteen and hasn’t had a good life death wise. Her uncle committed suicide ten years ago.  Two of her very good friends committed suicide — one was two years ago and the other was six months ago.  I try to be as involved in her life as I can be.  She lives about forty five minutes away from me and I worry about her.  I don’t get to see her nearly enough.  I do call her and text her.  She would be the only one I would write a letter to.  I love her and I want her to know how much I love her and why.  In fact, I think I wrote a post about this awhile ago.  I told her to read it, but I don’t think she did.

This is definitely not the post I thought I’d write today and it’s probably not the post you thought you would be reading.

“That’s life, kid.  People die.”  My dad used to tell me this.  I can hear his voice clearly in my head.

I’ll let you know what I decide.