finding normal

I promise to not let this blog go from being the(extra)ordinary to pleasekillmenow, but I can imagine there may be a few entries like this one here and there. Imagine how awkward it would be if I continued writing as if everything was fine? I'd like to be more honest than that. I assume anyone reading this blog probably knows that my father passed away two days after my last post. As you might guess by my cavalier attitude that day (work, hospital, dinner, play! yay!), it was largely unexpected. But alas, 11 days later I am back to work, back to school, and am told I am supposed to be defining normal. Figuring out how after and before can be as close to each other as humanly possible. But right now, I kind of hate the idea of normal. I don't want things to be normal, because I don't want a normal that he is not a part of. I know this is inevitable, no matter how much I fight it. It's just that right now I can't think about making a new that puts the old in a nice little box tucked in its new home under the bed.

Not surprisingly, it is the "adults" who have complicated things thus far. My friends have been amazing. They have closed the gap between us through lillies and plane flights and homemade breakfast casserole. But it's the people who were close to my father that want to dole out advice like free samples, outnumbering my questions with answers 1:10. Most people my age (including myself) don't truly understand what kind of things needs to be taken care of...and yet they are so so much better at being a band-aid. The adults who have lived through this already, they are somehow the insensitive ones. They want, think, feel like they're protecting me...but really they're just pushing. I hope they will soon return to their normal and not force me to find mine. In the meantime, I am settling for lazy days at work, a 3-week break from classes, a trip to Mexico, and a variety of cabernets. Arriba.