RIP Uncle James: Do what you can, when you can

I knew sometime in the near future I was going to be writing this post. Unfortunately, I was not expecting it to be this soon. Sometime yesterday I lost a very colorful personality to heart failure. I received the call during a party--which is by the way the absolute worst place to hear something like that. After the call ended, knowing my uncle was dead, seeing the world dance their wonderful asses off to "Party Rock," I simply wasn't buying it. My would not only not accept the bad news of my unlce's death, but it also wouldn't accept the party, the music or the people. For like a whole minute I stood in the hall like "wait, what?" Even after the call, I still heard those awful noises in my ears. "He's dead man." It was like it was 2005 all over again when I lost my father, only this time it was happening to my closest friend and cousin. The 2nd worst feeling in the world is being far away from someone that you think could use your help. and it had happened twice this year now. The 1st is losing someone/something you are close to.
After about a minute, which seemed like a long time--imagine standing in an empty hallway for a complete minute trying to think of what to do next-- I decided to inform my boss about it because I knew that I would be heading back to Knoxville soon for a funeral.  I went to my room for two reasons: There was a party, and Pro Fun Luggage Tim is not gonna be a party shitter and I did not know if I could really party knowing that so many of my family is hurting. Before I got on the phone for the remainder of the evening thinking of pretty much everything every person that has ever lost someone close to them. The same cliches you say every funeral that you never believe you will think of again, but someone dies again, and here you are talking about the last things he/she said to you, what could have been done better etc. It wasn't until last night when I called my cousin back, and got no response, that I realized these ideas are fine. There is no real advice you can give to the mentally matured person that has lost someone that he or she does not already know. So it was okay that I was speechless when he called. Sometimes, you just need to listen. Listen until you find the words that will comfort that person. It might be anything from "I am here" to "I am on my way."

Later, I found myself reverting into my childhood way of thinking: "When is it going to be my brother? My mother? My grandmother? My step dad? Or best friends? When am I gonna start visiting my bestfriends' funerals? Their children's funerals? Their parents funerals? When am I going to be all alone?

The craziest part is that is not the worst question. The worst question is "When will I get used to this?" and the worst part about that worst question is "Yes, you will get used to it." Within that answer lies an even harder truth: You will survive. You will always be okay. You will accept this reality and push through it.

Why is that so bad? Because sometimes I just don't want to get used to losing people. I don't like funerals. I don't even like saying good bye. Sometimes I avoid starting conversations with people just because I don't want to say good bye. Pathetic, right? But here is the question I asked myself that brought me back to an adulthood way of thinking: So you are just going to start avoiding people just because one day you are going to have to say good bye? No.

Never will I ever regret staying at my Uncle James'  house almost everyday for the past summer, just because he would die at the end of it. Would I be the same person had I not been stopped by him just to be told, "Tim, I am proud of you for going to Japan. You could have went over to Japan, taken a dump, and flown right back the next day, and I still would have been proud of you. And your dad would have been proud too!" That touched me. His son, two daughters, ex-wife and new nephew (born this past summer as well are VERY lucky people to have had someone like that in their lives. Especially seeing how its hard as balls to keep a father in a house nowadays.

It doesn't stop there. One day, you may lose everything. But that only implies that you had something important to begin with. This means that when you say " I lost everything" (which your probably didin't), it actually means that I lost something important and I have more to lose. I say that to say treasure everything you have now, as much as you can, as hard as you can, until you can't. Appreciate it while its here and when its gone. And don't ever ever ever believe that life only goes down from here, because sometimes (usually) it goes up. After all, my Uncle James is no longer with us, but at least he lived to see something so wonderful come into existence:

Baby Villainy.