Under the same roof

Well-meaning people like The Gil offer kind advice like, "At the end of the day, she's still family." Well, you know what? That means nothing to me. I don't even consider my father as my father anymore, so believe me, it's even easier to cut sibling ties.

I don't wish anybody harm, ever. (Well, maybe I do wish curses upon smokers and crazy drivers.) This... person that lives under the same roof as me is no exception. I do, however, do my very best to live life as oblivious to her existence as possible. Of course, we have our "grace periods". We get along for brief periods of time. But infallibly, it ends. And usually, the end is nasty.

I have kept journals for over six years. I wrote for many reasons. I wrote silly thoughts. I wrote about silly dreams. But in those oh-so-emo days of teenage angst and existential crises, I mostly wrote to empty my anger. I remember that sometimes, that anger was directed at her. I thought that perhaps what I wrote in the heat of the moment was inconsequential. That with time I'd look back and see I was mistaken about what I'd written. But years passed. I matured. And each time I wracked my soul searching for something nice to say about her, I came up empty-handed. I can still recall a phrase I jotted down years and years ago: "She is not a good person."

And I can still agree with the girl who wrote that so long ago.

When all the anger has left me, all I am left with is this overwhelming pity. Pity for her, because deep down I feel that she will never amount to anything in life unless she wakes up. Sure, she thinks she's so bad-ass and amazing for studying something complicated, but sometimes I think she does it out of the need to impress rather than real vocation. Also, she is so irresponsible and lazy and spoiled that I doubt she'll last long.

Oh, look. How fitting. Merriam-Webster Online's word of the day is: Specious.

specious • \SPEE-shuss\ • adjective
1 : having deceptive attraction or allure
*2 : having a false look of truth or genuineness : sophistic

She can be so pathetic. I remember her passionately scouring over dictionaries to memorize big words so that she could sound sophisticated, eloquent, educated. I think that "fancy" words are like cooking spices: they have to be used in tiny quantities, as accents. Too much, and it ruins everything. That's how I saw her school essays. They aimed to impress, but I found it tedious, tiring, superfluous. It still does. Especially because when I hear her speak, she sounds like every single young idiot out there. "Una del montón."

Sometimes we have to laugh, because it's obvious nobody can stand her. I'm not even sure if she HAS any friends. Even people I thought were her good friends who loved her gave up, saying it was insufferable, how she was always obsessed with being different. In the wise words of someone who will remain in anonimity, what at first impression can seem like "uniqueness" (something I believe she possesses not a speck of): "it's an undying desire to be completely unique and hear shite that no one else hears and read stuff no one else reads and see stuff no one else watches. Luce enajenada, cuando (lo que puedo ver) es que all she cares about es el ser único, es el lucir enajenado, no el solo vivir."

Well said, well said.

Worst of all, she is horribly spoiled, and used to getting her way. Every time I refuse to be an accomplice to this, I am first forced to comply, and all the time getting chewed out for it, because not wanting to spoil her makes me a bad person.

You know, its funny. One day, I told her to take the car keys and to drive herself to the station so she could catch the train. She left, and came back before long because she couldn't find a parking space. Translation: "I am such a poor driver that I can't even park in reverse [heck she's crashed and scratched my mom's SUV like 5 times already], I am so impatient that I can't wait for 5 minutes for somebody to leave so I can take that space, and I am so spoiled I am used to having a chauffeur". I left my door locked and kept telling her it wasn't my problem she was going to be late for class, I wasn't going to take her to the train station. She screamed and bitched and even cried (I got a kick out of that, ha).

The best part was when she was screaming herself hoarse while I had my iPod headphones comfortably in my ears, and I couldn't hear a word she was saying. I think she screamed something about some classes I was taking [I assume she was referring to a class I take at church], and I think she was accusing me of being a hypocrite (something about humility? I don’t know, the music on my iPod was more important at the moment), and if that’s what she was saying, well, now, that’s just even more amusing. Was was it that Jesus said about hypocrites? Heheh.

Because she knows the only person who is obligated to obey her every command is our poor mother, that’s the only thing she could do: she called her at the hospital, told her some sob story, and when my mother asked to talk to me, she said she would not listen to my side, and to take her to the station. I didn’t put up much fuss. I dropped my stupid sibling off, and when I got back home, I called my mom and I said to her that now it was my turn. Then and there I emptied it all out. I yelled at her, and it felt good. I told her the reason my sister is the way she is is because she’s been spoiled rotten by her, and that she should be ashamed for even TRYING to make me feel bad about what had happened. I said a good deal of things, and I finished off with a conclusive “You know you’re the one who’s wrong,” and I hung up without even saying good-bye.

So she was late to her class. Ask me if I care. I saw it as retaliation. The day before, I was late to work because of her (she has what I call paso de comemierda: she walks as if she had all the time in the world). I looked back as we were walking and shouted at her to pick up the pace. When I looked back again, she had DELIBERATELY slowed down. If she hadn’t been so far away, I would’ve punched her square in the face. I got to the train station before her, and I had to let the train to Bayamón leave because she wasn’t there yet. I would’ve left her behind, but I knew I’d get in trouble for it later. Yeah, yeah... "La venganza es de Dios". Well, I say God helps those who help themselves.

You know, I’ve been sour for the past few days because of all that’s happened. But now that I have it all written out… over two pages of my bitching about this bitch… I feel a lot better.

Sleeping on hospital floors

I don't like hospitals. I mean, who does? But I don't like hospitals, and I certainly don't like Centro Médico. It's run-down, it's depressing, it's shabby... Esteban says it looks like it came right out of a Silent Hill game. We had a good laugh while walking down one of the hallways... it was dark, desolated, forgotten gurney included, some of the lightbulbs didn't work, and at the end were some old public telephones mounted on a wall with ugly mustard, red and brown-colored tiles. We said that all that was missing were sparks falling from the malfunctioning lights and for one of the telephones to be hanging from the hook, the busy signal beeping ominously.

My mom underwent surgery to have her matrix removed. No more painful periods for her! ^^ Lucky. She's doing great, but they keep postponing her release because she keeps getting sick- fevers, drops in hemoglobin, lung congestion. But she's in great spirits, and she might be coming home tomorrow.

She's been treated like a queen. For four days she was never alone. We got a special pass so that one person would be allowed to stay with her out of visiting hours. So we took turns spending the night at the hospital with her. We stayed with her, talked with her, watched TV with her, helped her shower, pushed her heavy IV pole along (damn wheels didn't work, and the nurses said that almost all of the units were in similar or worse condition... state-of-the-art-technology, isn't it?) while she took walks around the floor to get her strength back...

I felt really sorry for the woman in the bed next to my mom's. In four days, nobody stayed with her. Nobody visited her. Nobody helped her with her meals, or to go to the bathroom. Even when I wanted to go over and help her to do something dumb, like throw away the foam box the hospital meals come in, but I thought that would be too presumptuous, and I thought that maybe the laborious task of getting out of the hospital bed and shuffling to the wastebasket with her IV in tow was basically all she had to do.

I spent one night at the hospital. About an hour after visiting hours were over, I unrolled a sleeping bag one of my aunts donated to the Do Not Leave Irma Alone program (which I dubbed "The Parachute") because it was so long... the nurses accidentally kept pushing their medical contraption carts over it. I soon fell into a deep sleep, and I would've made it through the night comfortably... but two hours later the nurses came to make checks, and I was wide awake, tending to my mother's every need. And every other hour I was jolted awake by the nurses, or my mom needing to go to the bathroom, and so on. It didn't help that I was freezing my butt off. I had to sleep wearing a scratchy jacket that's as old as I am, under a comforter pulled up over my head.

But I'm not complaining. It was uncomfortable, but I liked being able to spend the night and morning with my mom. She looked so cute peeking over the huge Lion King-themed comforter we threw over her... I don't know why Centro Médico, being as cold as it is, only gives the patients a thin sheet as a blanket. Cruelty.

Let's hope she comes home tomorrow.

Veggie time!

I don't usually have time to do this, and I don't particularly enjoy doing it, but once I start it's just too... difficult... to stop. By this I mean taking time to do *absolutely nothing*. Of course, the busy bee routine I live day to day impulses me to do some chores to balance out the laziness... I reduced the mountain of clothing that needed to be put away piling up on my chair to a hill... did the dishes and tidied up some of the cupboards... but for the most part, I've just been sitting at the computer, watching anime.

I was supposed to go to college today, but I didn't feel like it. Heh. I must sound so "pantalonúa". But I was tired from having to wake up so early yesterday to work the opening shift... at least yesterday was a holiday. Holidays on Thursday are a pain, because it makes it harder to work up the moxie to get back on track for Friday. So I said, screw it, I'll sleep in late, miss my first class... won't miss much... just listen to some airheads rant on and on as if anybody gave a damn on their opinions and life stories.

My mom was out running errands, and I didn't bother to call her to remind her I needed a ride to the train station so I could make it to my other class. It's been a bitch, being car-less (thank you Dad), but today it gave me an "excuse". Behold, the power of sloth. Now that's a capital sin I don't mind going to hell for.

Oh well. I'll make up for the easy-breezy day by busting my back tonight at work (yay for closing shifts... I hate cleaning up other people's messes... c'est la vie).

NaNoWriMo's just around the corner. I almost feel ready for it.