Current Post On Trae’s Blog:
My grandmother died last night. This wasn't a shock or a surprise. Her health has been on the decline, and she's been in hospice for the last month. She lived a long life, and in her final days she was surrounded by her three adult children.
My grandma was a kind woman. She wasn't perfect, but I always felt loved in her presence. She was a retired kindergarten teacher, and was still working when I was a kid. I have so many happy memories sitting at her kitchen table, and I'm going to carry those with me for the rest of my life. She was also proof that anyone who claims that you get more conservative as you get older is full of shit, because she certainly didn't.
I think it's interesting how the body processes grief sometimes. I don't know that I'll cry, but over the past month, knowing this was coming, I've felt a tension in my gut. Now that she's passed, instead of relief that tension is replaced by a sense of emptiness. That something is missing that should still be there. Something has been taken away, and I feel it.
Of course, as I wrote that, I immediately started crying... so I guess my body processes grief in pretty ordinary ways too.
I wanted to come up with something profound linking this to Beltane, which we sit in the middle of right now, but it just seemed hackneyed. Like I was trying to dig out some greater significance when the truth is death comes whenever it wants. The only predictable thing about it is that it's the end of all of our journeys. I hope that when I pass I'm so lucky to have lived such a long life with people that I love around me in my final days.
For the record, I will be fine. I just needed to get these words out while they were still in my head. I don't have some rousing conclusion or deep insight to tack on here at the end, just that gut feeling that something is missing.
Because it is.
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Now see, that’s why I like Sarah – always thinking. Get murdered AFTER you spend your money at the con, please.
And she’s generous…he’s not going to be spending money at HER table, so she’s letting him spend it at other tables. Also, she’s so polite about it, merely offering it as an optional modification of his daily schedule.
This is how customer service should be done. Were I a con-goer who happened to overhear this conversation, I would be very tempted to go buy a couple buttons from her.
I understand his frustrations at not finding what he’s looking for among the vendors’ wares; but neither his tact or animus
You ever watched a vendor table for a while? That kind of crap is sadly not entirely uncommon. Cons draw some people with interesting gaps in their social skills, sadly enough. Doesn’t make it make sense, no – but I understand it happening quite well. Some people are just looking for someone to at least metaphorically yell at – the actual issue involved is tangentially important at the absolute best. You get a lot of nascent “I paid for this… I can act like a jackhole! For once I can be that annoying guy instead of being the target.” goofballs.
This is not just a con thing. Plenty of people seem to think that all retail workers are robots who should be happy to clean up spills or get yelled at for stuff completely out of their control. Empathy, sadly, seems to be a lost art.