BAD HAIKU OF JANUARY, 2016, DEATH STALKS US

Winter tolls death knell
No weeping at a grave site
Bansidhe screams silent

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I mourn the passing of my dearest uncle Michael. My grandparents and 3 teenagers raised me. When I came home from the hospital as a new baby, Mike was 14, Bob was 13, and Annie was 10.  I was raised by my grandparents and by a tribe of teenagers. They were all very good to me, but I was especially close to Mike. His loss has left a huge, gaping wound in my damaged, grinch heart.

Oddly enough, we both had our first heart attacks at the same, young age, and had subsequent heart surgeries and grafts in the exact same places on the exact same vessels. Along with the bad heart, he and I also shared other strange medical conditions and ailments. There is a definite genetic link in our bad hearts, and doubtless the other health issues, too. I am beginning to think these are not all different diseases or conditions, but are actually symptoms of one disease.

There is something really odd and strange about his heart attack, and please bear with me while I relate it. Mike and his brother, Bob, were on a winter fishing trip at Kentucky Lake. It was cold, and they were out on the lake in a boat. Somehow, they managed to tip the boat over and both of them went into the water. Naturally, neither of them were wearing life vests. Bob was able to cling onto the side of the boat, but Mike surfaced underneath it...he told me he had tried to float and to stay calm, but I suppose the cold and the shock got to him; he slipped underwater and didn't re-surface. Fortunately, someone had witnessed this happen and was able to call 911 and get a rescue team there as soon as possible.

By the time rescue arrived he had been underwater for 20 minutes. In his case, the near freezing water actually helped him. They were able to revive him. He went directly to intensive care via helicopter. The next day, a doctor came to see him to tell him he had fluid in his lungs and needed a heart operation. His reply was, "No shit, asshole, I just drowned. Of course my lungs are gonna be full of fluid!" That's my Mike--never pulled any punches.

The doctor countered, "Nooooo...your lungs are not full of lake water, they are full because your heart is not pumping correctly. You have extensive blockages in all your major coronary vessels. Mike was able to get out one word, which was "Bullshit," and then the first heart attack struck. He was whisked away into heart surgery where they did a quadruple bypass that very day. Afterward they would not release him to go home alone to his own home--he had to be discharged where someone would be there to care for him, so he went to my mother's house to stay. At that time she was probably more sick than he was, as she was in the process of dying of COPD and emphysema. At the time I was living in Clayton and would check on them both nearly every day.

He had to stop working as an electrician, which is often quite physically demanding, and put in a claim for disability. He was also able to draw a disability check from the union, so he was not that bad off. He was still making good money, as far as disability goes. Of course it was nowhere near what he made as an electrician, but now he had no travel or other work-related expenses. He had worked like a dog his whole life and had amassed quite a tidy sum in annuities for his retirement, which had yet to be touched at the time of his death.  His wife, whom he had not seen in 40 years will reap that benefit. She is a greedy bitch. (I never pull any punches either.) She never HAD to work a day in her life, but unbeknownst to him had had a full time job for the last 20 years and had been hiding that knowledge from him. He continued to send her half of his check the entire time he was alive. I believe the IRS will be informed, and I will stand by and wait as the axe falls across the correct neck.

Now here's what really gets me. There will be no funeral. He wanted to cremated and have his ashes poured into Kentucky Lake, where he "died" the first time. He believed, as I do, that you die when you're supposed to die. If you're brought back, you are essentially in a living hell on Earth for the remaining time spent alive.  My uncle Martin felt the same way. We all arrived at this conclusion at different times, but realized we were on the same page when I happened to mention one day that my life has been nothing but turmoil and a roiling morass of pain and anguish of one sort or another since the day I was brought back from death. As was Michael's life, As was Martin's life. So, by Mike's thinking, he is going back to his watery grave, where he should have stayed when he was *dead* the first time.

Another twist to the knife in my ribs: There will be no memorial service for him for our remaining family which consists of me (technically his niece, but I have the pride of place as sister because we grew up together in the same household, in the same generation), his brother Bob, and a skillion first cousins and then the children of the cousins. There are hundreds upon hundreds of union people who knew him and respected him, and many who just respect the family name. We are considered "big wigs" as far as the union is considered.

In summation, I think it is total horseshit that no one cares enough to organize some kind of a memorial service. We NEED a memorial because it helps the grieving process. I can't do it because I am extremely ill. I could make it there, more than likely, but would need at least a day to recover from the drive there, then again for the drive back.

The year 2015 was not a good one for me, health-wise. I'm dying and I know it. Every day I get just a little bit weaker, a little more dependent. I am quite literally wasting away. I have lost enough weight to make up another entire person. My muscles are totally gone -- I have little to no musculature at all on my body. I am merely a skeleton covered by a lot of loose skin. I have reached "dying weight." So, I'm too damned sick to drive up to St. Louis and throw together a memorial, and it's something I just can't do over the phone. Even if it is just a get together, or a potluck meal at someone's house (and there are plenty of big houses among the cousins), it would be better than nothing.

I am disappointed in the rest of my asshole family. Ashamed, even. I see their true colors. I see how they are. How dare they care so little for something so important? Do they have so little regard for their elders, so little pride in their own family? These same people would not have hesitated to call on me, Mike & Bob if they needed something, or if we had something they wanted, or think nothing of just taking that something without even asking. That shit ends today. New will in progress.