There was this dream... quite horrible, really. I was walking up a hill somewhere with AmwayGirl and DietGirl (people from school I haven't seen in about 6 years) and we passed a block of flats with a large green area in front. It had been raining. We looked across the street and saw a woman with a small square pond in her courtyard. There were plastic vegetables floating in the water and DietGirl said something like, "Geez, it must have rained a lot more up here." I could see the woman in the water trying to scoop things out and felt uneasy about it, but we walked on anyway. There was a bit in the middle that I've forgotten, then at the end we were walking back down the hill and I saw the woman drowning in her pond. I started taking off my Docs but AmwayGirl said not to, that someone had called the fire dept and I'd just drown. Meantimes a very small child in a furry costume kept jumping from the side of the pond onto the woman's back (she was floating face-down) and back again. I was about to say something about that when I saw there was a fireman in the water, trying to stop this woman from drowning. She looked up and locked eyes with me. She had the same colour eyes as H. She looked terrified and I felt I had to hold her gaze until she looked away.
Mmm, and tacked on at the end, or maybe in another dream, was this grandfatherly Mediterranean type showing me his latest grandson, a very chubby boy aged 6-9 months. The kid was wearing a turquoise jump suit and when I looked at his eyes I couldn't tell if they were inhumanly blue or whether they were just very reflective and I was actually seeing the colour of his jumpsuit.
Hmm. Anyway. I have really stupid dreams.
So what then? I got up, transferred the money, got a cup of tea... started reading the paper then realised I'd rather read it online, so logged on... then at 8.12 the phone rang. Nobody calls me at eight-something in the morning, not even my mother. It was H. He was in hospital. Again. As in about the sixth time this year.
I was, admittedly, a little grumpy last night when I woke up at 11-something to realise he hadn't called... But of course if he tells me he had to go to hospital last night, emergency-like, that's okay. Well, it's not "okay" but I can't be pissed at him for circumstances beyond his control. Particularly not if it involves him having to go to hospital. :
He didn't want to give me any real details, except to say he was dreading telling K because she'd be nasty about it (why he has to tell K anything I do not know)... and then he was in a big hurry to ring off and call some other people... so I let him go, and after that I felt rather sick with apprehension and didn't want to read the paper any more, so I logged off and went back to bed.
Woke a few hours later and got up properly and started to feel functional after another cup of tea. H rang again around 11.30 to say he'd been discharged and was wandering around on K street feeling all weird an' stuff... and he hated to ask... but could I lend him some money.
Which is the fourth time this year.
It's 20 days since the last time I lent him money.
It's about a month since the last time I handed over a substantial amount.
One of these days I have to find out exactly what he earns and when he gets paid.
Now, if he'd moved in here instead of in with James he wouldn't be paying rent. That would be one less excuse for being terminally broke.
Not that I can talk. I can't budget either.
But why is it me who he turns to for money (when he knows perfectly well I'm poverty-line in the income department)..? I suppose I'm the last person he knows who a) has any, and b) loves him enough.
^..^
I'm not mad-angry, just a little mad-crazy. For him, not at him.
So I have no sense of judgment. I can't be objective. I just have this little soundbyte thingy looping in my head: Here, have all my money. Assume I have money to give you. Assume that when I give you money I might still have some left over for myself. Assume that I like to hear you say "I hate to ask..." Assume that you owe me something. Yeah, go on. Why not.
I don't like hearing him grovel like that. It makes me kinda sick, actually. :(
Anyway, so there's me, who can't budget, but still spends like she earns, and there's him, who can't budget, and lawd knows what he spends his on but he never has any either.
Anyway. Yes, I said, I still have something left to give, and how much...? Ah, okay... Yes, I can do that. Meet you in twenty at CB's?
Traffic was fuckawful (I am not gonna walk coz I am lazy; I take buses) so it took three times as long to get there... then I went to the ATM, then CB's was closed anyway, so I was about to call his mobile and ask where he was when I saw him coming down the street towards me. We went to the café on the corner opposite the ATMs. We had coffee. He also had toast.
He looked pretty bad.
What was more disturbing was his state of incoherence. He spoke Russian half the time and didn't even seem to realise he was doing it. I had to keep blinking and smiling and waiting for him to catch on that I had no idea what he'd just said. (And then it transpired that when he'd been in emergency he'd been talking to this other native Russian speaker, and he had apparently explained this to me, only in Russian, forgetting it's Alice, not me, who speaks it in our family.)
Ohgod.
I really wanted to sit next to him and hug him but he didn't seem to even like me touching his arm.
He wanted to go home and sleep. I agreed this was a good idea but I was worried about how he was going to get there - what if he had another seizure, etc etc? He said he'd be fine. He didn't want me to wait with him at the bus stop.
So I paid for the coffees and off he went...
...and I went to the hardware store and bought new doormats, which I've been meaning to do for a while. Then I went to the bargain shop and bought string. I don't actually need string, I just felt like buying some. Then I went to the Irish pub and had a middy of coke while I tried to come to terms with the idea that it was at least 23°C out there (and muggy) and I was dressed for a rainy 18°.
Rang Nils at work to see if he'd suffered a horrendous hangover. He hadn't. Oh well, maybe next time... *evil grin*
Eventually staggered off home. Put a load of washing in the machine. Remembered I'd meant to buy a new lingerie bag because the old one has sprung a leak (so to speak). Which meant I'd have to go out again. Amazingly, I did. It's hard enough to get me out the door once per day, so if I actually go out twice you have to assume it was either a chemical emergency (nicotine, caffeine or prescribed meds) or else I was feeling vaguely decent.
I think I was feeling vaguely decent.
Went to the arts supply place first, hoping to get a few more of my favourite pens. They were out of stock, though, so I got six other pens instead and had a pleasantly mindless conversation with the guy behind the counter. Went back to the hardware store. No lingerie bags. Tried the bargain store. No lingerie bags. Sat outside the post office for a while, thinking maybe the supermarket would have them, but needing to psych myself up first. Off to my right was a bank of public phones. A guy coming up the street headed for the only vacant one. So? So what? Why would I notice? Why would I bother to mention it? Did he spontaneously explode? Was he painted a particularly fetching shade of blue? No, but he had a parrot on each shoulder. A live parrot. On each shoulder. Everyone was looking at him, or rather, at the birds on his shoulders. I should have taken a photo.
Instead of going to the supermarket I went into the post office and bought stamps.
Then I came home.
And now I really do think I should update. It's only been ...er... more than a week. :(