(no subject)

So I cut my hair yesterday, and now more than a foot of it is gone. It's bouncier and lighter and it made me feel like a different person for once; for a day. And then I slept and when I woke up I realized I was the same girl I always was. I like it when I fall asleep happy-- there's a feeling then, that everything will be all right and that there's something to look forward to. It's when I wake up that I remember the illusion.

My grandfather has cancer.

I remember how he sounded on the phone; so very tired, and not at all like himself. The man with the big, warm beer belly who always called me Charlie and Peanut and who sits in his armchair playing video poker that I'm always terrible at. But he's never said anything about when I play the game and lose all his earnings.

I haven't seen my grandparents in three years, and it shames me that they've actually asked to see me, when I should have been there, just like my dad. But I have this fear (and it seems as though everything about me is tainted in fear) and it's that fear that makes me recoil. I remember them vibrant. And although it's childish, I don't want to see them decline. I sit here and watch the years spin by me and somehow I had forgotten that they were watching the years just like I was, and that they don't have many left.

I don't want to say good bye, but the time is coming when I will have to.