Tag Archives: death

Life Changing Products

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Nothing like going through a REAL life changing event to highlight the hyperbole of that term applied to things that are nice or helpful, but hardly Life Changing…
There are a lot of big terms we throw around that a sensitive person (which I’m usually not) would jettison.
For instance, “The traffic was so bad I was going to kill myself!”  I have some friends who have lost loved ones to suicide, so I try not to use this exaggeration.  I have replaced it with, “stick a fork in my head” or something a little more Three Stooges.
Perhaps beauty products could come up with something different as well.

Momversation:What to Say to Parents who Have Lost a Child

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Monday night at 11:25pm Hunter Zen Thawley passed away in the loving arms of his parents. If there is a super something that makes these calls, I can tell it that a mistake has been made. His parents wanted him to stay. This was a strong boy who endured so much and still had the most adorable giggle a little boy could have. He was days away from being 3 and half.

This is the edited version of the long video that I accidentally posted the other day. Heather Spohr was a real champ here. She was candid and honest about her own experiences as a mother who lost a child. I so appreciate her doing that. When I asked this question of Heather, Hunter was still alive. And even though his parents were told he would not survive I still had some magical thinking that there would be an 11th hour save.

The deep pain that my friends, Hunter’s parent’s, are now going through is beyond measure. I wish that I could lift some of that pain off of them. I’m glad they know that in his short life Hunter did not live, laugh, and suffer in obscurity. His tenacity, and the love of his parents, has inspired  a lot of people. He was braver than I would have been, than most would be. By talking to Heather I hoped to maybe figure out someway to offer comfort to my friends and others who have lost a child or at the very least not to make their suffering any greater by doing or saying the wrong thing.

I will never forget you Iron Hunter.  I promise.

Shhh, Mommy’s Watching Tributes

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Ted Kennedy’s passing is the kind of event that makes me want to just park myself in front of the tube and take in the tributes and old news footage. The great speeches, the sad face at funerals, the neck brace after his greatest moral failure. Only to be punctuated by reading articles on line and in the paper. But as a mother one rarely gets to do that. But I did get a bit of it… yippee (hate to say yippee around a death, but there it is). Rex took the longest nap of his young life, and Vivien was happily playing at her neighbor friends.

Then I heard that Domminck Dunne died. Dunne and Kennedy seem so different, but they had a terrible common thread. Both of their lives were marked by the murder of at least one close family member. I always enjoyed reading Dunne’s essays in Vanity Fair. Great, compelling dish. His interest in court cases and crime took root because of his daughter Dominique’s murder (and the short sentence given her boyfriend/killer). (Sidebar: My husband knew the man who killed Dunne’s daughter Dominique. They worked together many years ago. Which is a whole other weird tale of someone who can seem normal and then so thoroughly snap.)

Dunne will be Farrah to Ted Kennedy’s MJ though. The next week will be be dominated by Ted Kennedy’s passing. And of course it makes me think how his brothers would have lived to be gray-haired elder statesman as well if only…
no
Creative Commons License photo credit: bradleygee

When I was eating up the Michael Jackson coverage I could simply say to Vivien, “He was a famous singer,”  and she got that that was somehow special or important. Today when Vivien came home and was wanting my attention and I said, “But Vivien, one minute. Ted Kennedy died. He was a senator; his brother was a president.” I didn’t say, “His family was iconic, tragic, troubled, great, and we all wanted to be invited to the Compound.”  I don’t think she would have gotten that.

I don’t think she knows what a Senator is.

But she has to learn one day.

Michael Jackson’s Kids

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In an attempt to parody the coverings of MJ’s kids, I ended up looking like Twitter avatar sticking up for Iranians.

I have to weigh in on some of the Michael Jackson stuff. I loved his old music, thought he was kind of sad, and probably after about “Smooth Criminal” didn’t pay a lot attention because he started to have the cooties.

It’s prurient sure, but it’s also because of being a mom I am curious about what happens to the kids. Or what has already happened to them. Raised with no mother, they have strange identical names, a ferris wheel in the back yard and every summer their father has a different face.  Someone will be penning a great tell all on their up bringing one day.

I was thrown by the Diana Ross as back up for guardian ship after his mother.  Miss Ross might need to step in at some point.  Less so because his mother is 80 and more so because her estranged husband Joe is a gross child abuser.  He is open about having beat his kids and their are rumors that he did even worse. Of course now there is speculation that they are not his biological kids as if that matters.  It does annoy me that people act like then they are not his kids.  I know many adopted children and their parents who would beg to differ. The dermatologist in question, Arnie Klein, my husband is acquainted with from the restaurant.  He talked about treating Michael, but over short ribs never offered up, “oh, and btw I fathered his kids.”  Mark said Klein was in a very bad car accident that has impaired his walking.

But, did Michael talk to Diana Ross about this?  Is she in Europe ( where I think she lives) saying, “oh, god, Can’t Liza do it? ” Michael was her best man. Liz Taylor can’t pull it together to be Auntie Mame?

I hope someone teaches them to manage money well.  Maybe Michael’s former mother in law Priscilla Presley could step in.  She save Elvis’s estate when it was in shambles.

Telling that he didn’t ask any of his siblings to step in.  Might be best if the children go to a less carnival like home where creepy grandpa can’t stop by.  But, what will it be like for them?  Where is the consistency?  Well, that’s where the nanny comes in.  They have had the same one their whole lives, their only “mother”.  But do they in a sense hire her till they are legal? ( Wait a minute, sound s like a good premise for a movie.  Kind of like “Parent Trap.”) Or the courts could give her custody and shove a few Beatles songs in her back pocket to support them?

Just thinking…

Hello Knuckles, My Old Friend

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Our snake Knuckles died today, and I am the only one that cares. Knuckles was my stepson Oliver’s snake; he bought him when he was a little boy. But since I’ve been in Oliver’s life, he hasn’t cared much for Knuckles.

Vivien and Knuckles the snake

A few years back, Knuckles shed his skin. Oliver looked at him and said, “This is the most exciting thing Knuckles has ever done.” Snakes don’t fetch or cuddle or lick. A nice Albino corn snake, Knuckles just wanted to be warm and hang out. Don’t we all.

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