Day 28, 18Apr10

I'm not sure how much more of this I can take. We all have our limits. God knows we are reaching a very high threshold right now.

1. My aunt Eleanor dies in Feb'10
2. Alicia dies 20Mar10
3. Catigny one of Alicia's chicken is killed and eaten by a predator (likely racoon) today
4. I spend 5 hours with my dad in the ER/hospital because he has not eaten or drank anything for the past 3 days.

Jeeze. 2010 has sucked so far and it does not appear to be letting up. My dad was diagnosed with prostate cancer in Apr'09. Since then, it has mets'ed to his colon, rectum, lung, liver, and abdominal lymph nodes. Stage 4. His oncologist has given up and is only prescribing pallative care. We are taking him another hospital for pain management. But all else have given up. So it is just matter of time. He is so scared. He is not ready to die yet.

Then coming home after the hospital, Cathie finds Catigny. She loses it and decides it is time to buy new soil at Home Depot and replant the front yard planter. I pick up and dispose of her remains. Just yesterday, we were out on the porch talking about these chickens as they scurried about. This hit us like a 2x4. These chickens were Alicia's idea to get and raise them. Now we have only 1 chicken left.

Maybe I am over analyzing this, but I feel this is another vestiage of Alicia which has slipped away from us. This will soon be followed by forgetting her scent, her laugh, the sound of her voice. I am struggling with the though of turning off her cell phone. Kids are still calling and leaving messages for her as part of their road to recovery.

The good news is that we were able to give the HD tapes of Alicia's memorial to my friend to download and edit. Our goal is to place these on YouTube to share. This should happen by Alicia's BDay on 07Jul10.