Firstly let me start by saying that my brother is not insensitive and neither is he a cad. We just have a weird way of communicating both me and him. We tend to not show our emotions or verbalize things in a socially acceptable manner most of the time and we don’t do the whole letting people know how we feel about them, we just assume they know, but I digress.. Anyhow if the way the following conversation pans out insults anyone I apologise, but it’s meant to be light-hearted and to show how my weird family deals with everyday life events and situations, namely in the same crazy-assed way we deal with everything, we’re in a word “mad” and it’s not meant to insult or make anyone feel uncomfortable. J
I should also note that this is how *I* experienced this conversation and how it sounded to *MY* ears!! The other members of my family most probably didn’t experience it in the same way and they would probably disagree as I’m sure it sounded completely different to them as they don’t have the same hang ups with death as me!
Me: Hi. What you been up to all day then?
Bro: Hi. Me, my best friend and another guy dug up a grave today. We got paid for it.
Me: *momentarily shocked speechless* Uh come again? You dug a grave up as in a grave complete with coffin and dead person in it?
Bro: Yeah it was so bizarre..
Me: Mother did you cleanse the house with incense from church?
Mother: Why on earth?
Me: Your son has been digging up graves and bagging dead people’s skeletons.
Mother: I know. I don’t see the point of ‘cleansing’ the house though.
Me: Well I’m a touch superstitious, I’m OCD oh and did I mention necrophobic. I demand the priest comes and cleanses the house ASAP, oh and I’m putting bleach in the bathtub to kill off any pesky lingering germs...
Father: There we go again.. She’s a bit liberal with that bleach ain’t she? (father mumbles incoherently for a minute) Bleach is expensive, when is she getting a job so we can be rid of her again?
(I gave him the evil eye just then cause trust me there’s no one in this house that wants me to finally find a darned job more than me just so I can be rid of them. Permanently.)
Bro: *laughs nervously* you know it wasn’t nothing much. Just a disintegrated coffin, a suit and tie that have not degraded yet and the skeleton in the suit. Only...
Me: What? (My gag reflex started to kick in at that point and I turned just a little bit green at that point) There’s more? What do you mean “only...”?
Bro: Well the dead man, well technically dead man’s skeleton was kind of stuck like he was lodged in the earth pretty firmly there, had to hold the shoulders and shake him quite a bit to get him unstuck; and at first I was a little sick to my stomach and a bit creeped out when we started but . . . well I never thought I was capable of doing this kind of thing. Ever. Like didn’t think I had the stomach nor the maturity to deal with death and be quite so up close and personal with it.. (frankly speaking neither did we.)
(I was pretty surprised at this part of the story as my brother admitted to apologising to the –ahem- deceased before he shook him- and after he placed him in the bag-, at which point his best friend exclaimed ‘oi you’ve probably made him go dizzy there’ –we call my bro’s best mate slow motion and there’s a good reason for it too but anyway I digress yet again; and then it was time to bag the, well, remains..
So my brother proceeded to gently pick up the man from the ground and the bones fell out the suit, he admitted to momentarily blanking out in mild shock there but he recovered quickly, and he gently folded the suit and placed it in the black bin bag with the rest of the remains and the, um, skull on top, so he can be placed on top of the other deceased family member that was being buried in that grave the next day.
Mother and father actually *smiled* at their offspring’s gumption and asked him how much he got paid.)
Bro: Well I think everything is just an idea really, it struck me though, how in however many years from now, that that’s going to be us down there, buried, rotting and disintegrating, left with just bones, it was a surreal experience and a touch creepy at first but now I’m ok I guess...
Me: Uh yeah speak for yourselves I insist that I be cremated (when that far far –well I hope that is- time arrives) rules of the Christian Orthodox religion be damned! I’ve watched CSI, and earth worms and disintegration do not suit me, now fire on the other hand totally me check my zodiac too, Capricorn, our element is earth and earth totally goes with fire; actually seeing as we’re on the subject I don’t want to die at all, so there! Vampires anyone?!
* When I’m nervous by the way I babble and get all jittery and start to hyperventilate. My family is now officially too weird, I don’t see how I am related to these people at all, unfortunately the DNA test and all the relevant blood work says differently and now it would seem the way we all deal with situations affirms it too... Science sucks! hehe
On a less morbid note, we also played host to a black male baby goat in a green vest top and a bib briefly that evening. He didn’t have a name so I got permission and named him Pascal, his temporary owner is one of my brother’s friends, Andreas. He’s a lovely boy the baby goat too oh and it’s going to a birthday party hence the attire. Also the goat liked me.
My life is so so strange; it’s a certified madhouse in here! *chuckle*
(Please note that the above slightly odd conversation & events took place on Friday the 15th.)
Reviews, Stories and Articles by Maria Bitar are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.
No comments:
Post a Comment