The Almighty Forward

I love my mother. I do. She annoys me, pisses me off, sometimes forget I'm an adult, but she's my mommy. However, there are some things she just doesn't get.

I don't like email forwards. No, that's a lie. I don't like most email forwards. Those with funny pictures/captions or a really good joke, feel free to send them on my way. I will mostly likely enjoy those. But anything with a preachy message or telling me that if I send it to 10 friends, jump up and down and stand on my head for 3 minutes, my soul mates name will magically appear on my screen? No. That's a waste of my time, and yours by sending it to me. (Funny, misspelled captions of cats is not a waste because they amuse me.)

Mother has been informed several times of the email forwards I don't wish to receive. And yet, some seem to slip past and I get it. This time, it was one from Ben Stein, talking about how, as a Jew, he's not offended by the Christmas thing because that's Christmas, a Christian holiday and he's Jewish. Fine. I'll buy that. But the email goes on about how things got messed up since taking the bible out of schools.

And that's where I draw the line, click ctrl+t and do a Google search.

Yes, Ben Stein did say things like that...5 years ago. The rest of it was just added on by some idiot. Reading the whole thing, top to bottom doesn't make sense. For example, why would someone who's Jewish blame the problems with the Bible being taken out of the classrooms?

Once again, I explain to mother why this does not fall into the category of emails I like to receive. She said that it was religious and I'm religious and therefore might enjoy. Facepalm. No. I did my focus area in Religious Education so that I can learn more about the various religions of the world and place that knowledge into other students heads so they don't grow up to be prejudice to any religion. I'm the kind who would want, not just the Christian Bible, but the Torah, the Qur'an, the Bhagavad Gita, among others, in my classroom. Then I remember I'm a Primary/Elementary educator and the age may not be able to comprehend. Excerpts then! Or at least common ideas found in most/all religions.

Long story short, if you have an email forward and you're not sure if I'd like it, don't send it. If it says that I'll find out my date of death or children's names, I don't want it. If it has a picture like this:

Please do forward.

Family Differences

It's amusing how different people manifest their anxieties, even in my own house. With me, it's all physical. You know I'm anxious when you can see me like Marge here:

I may also be experiencing a panic attack, or freaking out over any physical ailment I'm experiencing.

My brother on the other hand, he's borderline OCD. He's constantly washing his hands, will usually only eat food prepared by himself or by mom in the way that it has always been prepared. For example, Mom makes spaghetti, he's fine. I make spaghetti, no way.

We're both hypochondriacs of course. One of the most common symptoms of Wellbutrin is numbness, tingling, pins and needles in extremities. So, usually tinglings in my arms and fingers. Throw in some heartburn, and I immediately think I'm having a heart attack. It usually takes someone talking me down from it. My brother is also a hypochondriac but I can't give examples for him.

However, my mom is anticipating the phone call from one of us in the future that goes, "MOM!! The baby coughed! Should I take him to the doctor?! Is he going to be ok?!?!".

But I guess the differences in anxiety are due to various things, such as slightly different genetics, slightly different upbringing (the fact he's a male and younger than me shows that). Either way, we both have anxiety issues.

However, I'm more willing to admit it than him.

Plan for the Future

Yesterday, I sang at a funeral for a member of the church. I don't know if he knew me, but his wife does. As I was sitting in my seat, my mind begins to wander, as it does. I was looking at the coffin and the size of it dawned something in my mind.

My brother is three years younger than. Women tend to live longer than men, so it's entirely possible that I will live longer than my brother. The thought occurred to me that finding a coffin long enough to fit him might be a problem. Would we have to get one long enough or would they break his legs to fit him in? Would he even want to be buried? He's very into zombies and the zombie apocalypse right now, so would he want to be cremated to ensure he doesn't come back as a zombie? I realized that, while my brother and I are close, he has never mentioned these ideas to me.

So I asked him. Before I could get very far, he immediately stopped me and said that he didn't want to talk about that, the idea really disturbs him and to never mention it again.

I was a little surprised by this. Most people in my family know that I want to be cremated and have a general idea of what music I want for my funeral (Faure's Requiem, Let All Mortal Flesh Keep Silent, Jesu Lover of My Soul, O God Our Help in Ages Past and (if I die at the right time of year) St. Patrick's Breastplate).

Maybe I'm more open about this kind of thing. Maybe I'm more realistic. Maybe my brother is too sensitive about this topic.

Or maybe I'm just morbid.