Cada de Cerda

On Sunday night I went to see Pigface with my friend Dawn. I went thinking it would be at best a nostalgic idle. A diversion. It turned out to be a pretty damn spectacular show.

Pigface, for those not knowing, was this sort of all-star industrial band. Like, the Travelling Wilburys of the industrial set. Originally, members included the likes of even Trent Reznor. I don't remember who all was in it originally (they're website lists like 50 people for the total to ever perform with them) - nor do I know who all was even present on Sunday. I know En Esch from KMFDM was there, as well as the bassist, Charles Levi, from My Life With The Thrill Kill Kult. Martin Atkins, drummer extraordinaire from P.I.L., Ministry and Nine Inch Nails was our percussionist.

Is anyone familiar with the guy who is a minor celebrity because he's tattooed all over his body with jigsaw puzzle pieces? He goes by The Enigma Well, he was in Pigface for this show. He played guitar, sung, and played the chainsaw, too. He also did some sword swallowing. His girlfriend, the girl who looks like a cat, complete with prosthetic whiskers. Very cute. At the end, she did flame eating.

The set started with Hanin Elias (from Atari Teenage Riot) singing alone on stage with these white barricades behind her. Soon they were backlit and you could see that there were many people behind the screen.

Overall, the performance was much more entertaining than I remember Pigface being the last time I saw them. They were polished and didn't improvise which seemed to be common when I saw them. The energy was great and the crowd was really into it.

Dawn's not really familiar with "Industrial Music," so she didn't know what to expect. I think she enjoyed herself though.

Oh, also, guess who opened? Sheep On Drugs!!! I kid you not. Sheep on Drugs. I instantly remembered the name and that they had one hit on Q101 so long ago, but I couldn't remember the song. Sure enough they played it and the memories came flooding back. Ah, the nineties.

My mother, the saint

Now, it's going to be difficult for me to write this and not sound too callous or indifferent. It's how I tend to get about personal things. My writing style has always been a little wry and humorous when talking about difficult issues having to do with my family. Also, sorry if this is really long, but there's a lot to say and I've been mostly quiet lately anyway.

As it is widely known, my mother was in the hospital recently getting some sort of spinal surgery. Specifically, she got three levels of vertebrae fused. It's not common, but it's also not unheard of. Her surgery ended up being "successful" in the eyes of the surgeon who performed it, but a strange byproduct occured. Prior to the surgery, my mother had trouble walking, indeed, lost any ability to walk at all. After surgery, she was bedridden for a week, unable to talk or properly swallow. She was intubated for purposes of eating and ingesting liquids. She was also coughing up lots and lots of mucous, primarily from years and years of smoking. Now, in that regard, my opinion is 'you reap what you sow.' She always knew smoking was bad for her and for that I didn't feel much pity.

The lack of ability to swallow, however, is not a typical reaction to this kind of surgery.

Anyway, after she was able to speak again, she was started on physical therapy. By the time Blue Cross/Blue Shield wanted her to leave the hospital (a decision with which none of us, her family - nor her, nor my ex, a doctor - agreed) she was able to walk with her walker about 200 feet, but she was still very weak and according to her, 1-pound weights felt like 15 pounds. She was barely able to operate the plunger which she needed to use to feed herself for two of the four feedings she needed a day. Her physical therapist, in my opinion acting under pressure from the insurance company, consented to her release despite the fact that she would not have 24-hour supervision (my sister has two kids and couldn't stay with her; my grandmother, who almost was able to do it, despite already taking care of her alzheimer's-stricken husband, had a sudden flare-up of emphysema, and I don't have a car, live anywhere near my mother, and am one of two people taking care of a new business).

A day after her release, she was found lying on the floor of her home by one of her nurses (she had nurse visits twice a day). She had fallen. It's still unclear to me for how long she had been on the ground.

She was readmitted to the hospital. Once again, according to her, she was in the emergency room for 9 hours and asking for a glass of water and also asking for someone to contact her physical therapist, whom would be familiar with her case.

The story from here gets a little more foggy, and also, the rest of it seems less credible, because from here on out, my mother starts exhibiting something of a psychological break.

The first time I visit her after the fall, she has a lot of trouble maintaining clarity. She seems to blank out in front of you. She'll be talking clearly, and suddenly stare blankly. She also stutters a lot. My ex, who is a general practitioner and very experienced, and also knows my mom somewhat, was there with me that night. She seemed to be able to converse with him pretty well until he started asking her questions about how many of her painkillers she had taken when she was released from the hospital the first time. Her episodes seemed to be a little more selective.

Also, my mother seems to have found the lord, again. Many years ago she became a "born again" christian, but after a second failed marriage with a so-called fellow christian, she lost her taste for the hypocrisy that so often seems to be part and parcel to christianity and organized religion and just sort of didn't talk about god for a long time.

I always knew he was in there somewhere, though.

And so did she, or so she says. So, although somewhat cliche that my mother should rediscover Christ in this time of peril, it's also expected within my own understanding of my mother.

My mother's rediscovered stance on Jesus hasn't had such a benevolent impact on my sister's relationship with my mother, however. It seems that the devil talks to my mother, now. More specifically, he has told her that her "daughter doesn't love her anymore." Naturally, this has shaken up my sister a bit.

Medically, physically, my mother seems to be in ripe condition to heal. Unfortunately, she's falling off the boat mentally and sort of... I don't want to say allowing, but it seems like she's almost choosing to not get better.

Two days ago, I called her up at the hospital to ask her where she last had her eyes examined. I was going to make her a new pair of bi-focal glasses so she could more easily read while in the hospital. She told me that she didn't want me to make the glasses, that she wouldn't need them because she was going to be dying in the next day or two.

"You're not going to die," I said. "Claude just told you yesterday you're going to be fine." Prior to him coming to see her, she had been non-stop asking to see him, because he was going to be able to solve all her problems. She was going to move in with him for a week and they were going to massage her feet together. That's the kind of effect my ex has on people. He's a wonderful giving person that people all love and many many people have the tendency to want him to take care of them. Hell, I did it for a while, I know what I'm talking about.

"God told me that I was going to die. And I have to tell you something else. It's wonderful news. They're going to announce it very soon. They're making me into a saint. You should read about saints in the bible or find a book and read about saints."

I told my mother that John (my current boyfriend) had just recently bought a book about saints, which is true. He wanted the book for the pictures, because he wants to do some paintings of saints.

"See? Why else would he have bought that book? Because I'm going to be made into a saint." I didn't even bother telling her his reason for buying the book.

"Well, mom, in the meantime, can I just make you the glasses so you can read and look at the book that John bought?"

"Cancel the glasses. Cancel the glasses. Cancel the glasses." She kept repeating it. I tried to explain that I hadn't yet ordered them, that I needed her prescription, but she wouldn't hear it.

I was at work during this phone call and had to leave, but as soon as I brought it up, she of course started not being able to talk, to relinquish me of the burden of talking to her. I called her bluff and told her I had to get back to work and had to hang up on her.

Yesterday, she was found again, this time on the floor of her hospital room. She also appeared to be singing in what the nurse described as "another language." My sister spoke with the nurse, who, bless her heart, believed my mom was having a religious experience (that's what happens when you deal with Catholic hospitals - Seperation of Church and Hospital Now!). My mother has in the past been in choirs. It's not at all uncommon for people to be trained to sing a song in another language and have them not know what the hell they're singing. In 1999 I bought a CD by a Portugese punk band called Raimundos, and learned how to sing most of the slower songs. I still don't know what I was singing.

Anyway, my sister went in to see my mom today and she seemed to at least be calmed down. Unfortunately, she has to be restrained because she keeps pulling her i.v. out. My mother will only whisper to my sister because she "doesn't want the devil to hear."

I'm going to go with my ex, Claude, to see her tonight. Maybe more to report tomorrow.

Playing Ketchup

Last month I went up to Green Bay, Wisconsin to console my boyfriend and his family after the death of his step-father, Terry, whom I've never met. By all accounts he was a nice guy. He'd had cancer of some sort that started to to away due to chemo treatments when it spread to other parts of his body and became untreatable. His final days were less than lucid and he endured pain, so most of the family experienced their grief with a bit of relief mixed in.

This was also the first time I was meeting the fam. John and I have only been dating a few months, but certainly long enough to due the family thing. Interestingly, John met my mother a couple weeks before she went in for surgery, so she was at a stage where she could barely walk. She likes to tell the story that she met John, introduced herself, and asked him to help her put on her shoes. So, similarly, I met John's mother where she said (without having been formally introduced), "Hi Brian, I'll meet you later but right now I need you to leave the room so we can be alone with Terry."

See, I had flown up to Green Bay last minute because Terry'd passed away unexpectantly, John drove up and I flew standby because we'd planned on going anyway. So, I had to fly up alone, take a cab to the funeral home in a city I'd never been, etc. Getting on the standby flight was a little nervewracking. John had bought my ticket, and I've heard stories that because of the heightened security, the credit card holder of the ticket needed to be present or whatever. So I called the morning of and tried to find out. United's phone system is totally automated and you have to say your requests instead of typing them so the voice recognition software wouldn't recognize my speech despite my trying 8 different inflections. Finally I hung up, tried the internet, and realized I didn't have my mileage plus number to log in (it's packed in a box somewhere, since I haven't been needing to travel so much lately).

I finally decide to just go to the airport, which was my initial idea anyway. I check in for my flight scheduled for like 9 pm (it's about 10:30 am) and get on standby for another one taking off in about forty five minutes. I get on that flight and my stress level is greatly lowered.

Strangely, the first sight I see as I walk out the doors of the comparatively tiny Green Bay airport is a muscular drag queen driving a huge pickup truck. It was very surreal. I almost wanted to go thank her for greeting me to this strange backwoods town.

I take a cab to the funeral home and literally get in during the last 30 seconds. Terry was in the armed services, so there was an honor guard in front and this naval woman dressed up in full regalia is presenting a folded American flag to John's mom and does this weird slow-motion salute that I figure must be the salute to the mourning because it's like less intense and somehow showing respect. After this, the funeral director announces where everyone's going to eat and I realize this must have been a moving service.

We go to this banquet hall type place called Charneski's and are served family style fried chicken, mashed taters, corn, stuffing, cole slaw, etc. John's family is having a feud, so there are three long tables and the two feuding sides sit seperately. There is a buzz because John is 34 years old and has never brought anyone to a family function and people are all coming up to me and saying hello and sort of talking to me knowingly and John comments later on how odd this is because he didn't tell anyone I was coming yet everyone seemed to know the situation.

Despite the sad circumstances, it was a nice visit to Green Bay and we just did things we'd normally do while visiting, like go shoe shopping at the mall (bought a nice pair of brown GBX boots for a paltry $20 - bargain shopper here!) and go to the movies (saw House of Wax, which was better than might've been expected with a surprisingly good performance by Paris Hilton).

After coming back from Green Bay, I then went and visited my mother in the hospital. The good news is that her spinal surgery has been considered a success. She will be able to walk again on her own. The bad news is that they screwed something up on the way out and now she can't swallow and has to ingest food and water through a tube and this will be happening for an indefinite time. And the "Good News" is that my mother found the lord again and is finding "his work" in all the mundane things of the world and hearing the devil whisper bad things about my sister in her ear and I don't know if it's the meds or what but it's pretty annoying and really bothering my sister. Hopefully as her physical health stabilizes so will her mental/spiritual health will stabilize, too. In the mean time, hopefully she won't totally alienate my sister, who has become the closest thing to primary caregiver.

Yesterday I took a certification exam for being an optician. Opticians design lenses to be put into glasses when optometrists prescribe them. They're the middle man between going to the optometrist and getting new glasses. All of my studying had to do with optics, light, curvature of lenses and index of refraction plus types of eye abnormalities and what they mean.

Anyway, now that the test is over, I can devote more time to writing and art. Yay. So, expect some new art and stuff soon.