I remember in my freshman year of community college taking a class called Communication In Organizations, which was essentially your stereotypical handbook to basic human relations skills in the workplace. How a communications class worked in an online setting, I am not sure. Basically you read the textbook, answered questions, and took quizzes. Anyway, the first chapter was about stress and how there are both good and bad types of stress. Bad types of stress is wondering if my mother-in-law has cancer or not and waiting on those results. Good types of stress include planning a wedding, or having a baby. In those cases, you are stressed for a good reason because it is a happy time in your life and you know things will work itself out.

Right now I am t minus 8 days until Diego and I have our housewarming party. I kind of had a minor freak out on him today when I visited him during his lunch break. I forgot to take meat out of the freezer for dinner tonight and so I asked him what we should eat and he shrugs and replies, “I dunno”. He always makes me decide what to cook and what we both should eat and I don’t normally mind choosing, but some days I want to please him and cook him what he enjoys. He says I am too picky and that if he does choose something, I won’t eat it.

I yelled at him in the break room saying if he doesn’t figure out what we are going to eat that I am not going to cook because I was sick and tired of having to plan and make all these choices for us. He said we have a menu board at home so this shouldn’t be an issue and I said from the beginning that I didn’t take any dinner stuff out of the freezer so nothing is thawed. Once I got home and began thawing something, it wouldn’t be ready to cook and eat until 9 or 10 at night!

He didn’t see a problem with eating so late whereas I did. But he didn’t like how I threatened him with the whole not cooking thing. After I left his work, he asked me what my problem was and I said I am stressed about this housewarming party because it is really up to me to get everything done, do the decorations, cook, invite everyone, make sure to be a good hostess, etc. I am an introvert with extrovert tendencies, so when my manic ass self thinks, “Let’s throw a party, I’m hosting!” Everyone is all over it and now my introvert self is like, “what have I done…I hate you”.

Not only that, but I was told that my grandmother with Alzheimer’s is now not eating at all. She refuses to eat and I know it’s a fight for her to take her meds. She has become very aggressive and hostile so her dementia is definitely in its late stages. It’s good in a way that she is in assisted care, but they can’t do much assisting at this point because of how ornery she is. All she remembers to say or do is wave at people and say, “Goodbye”, which makes me wonder if she knows she is going to die soon.

Diego didn’t have the opportunity to go see his grandparents before they passed away in Mexico and they died within a month of each other. So he isn’t very sympathetic to me when I say I haven’t seen my grandparents since my sister’s wedding and she’s going to die and I can’t be there.

After my nana died (my mother’s mother), I made a point and a promise to myself and my grandparents that I would see them more and get to know them better. I was 17 when nana passed away, but I was never close to her because I never tried to be. That is something I still regret that I didn’t really invest my time and be with her while we were together.

Now with my grandmother the way she is, she has no idea who I am and hasn’t known for a long time. So I try to keep in contact with my grandfather who is a little out of touch with real hardships (He compared his nursing home to an internment camp back during WWII because they are on lock down due to corona virus). So I tend to just smile and nod and that seems to make him happy.

I mean, the situation with my grandparents is bad stress because the ending of the story won’t be a happy one. And if my grandma really isn’t eating it won’t be long before she stops drinking fluids, and you know… she will be gone.

As for Maria, my mother-in-law, she is in a lot of pain. She seldom takes narcotics and ices her neck and face all day. I went and saw her with my own mom and she wanted to talk to us, but it hurts her to do so. She can’t chew very well so she drinks smoothies and water out of a straw. We are impatiently waiting for Monday, July 13th, the day we find out the results of her biopsy. Hopefully the three tumors they found were non-cancerous, or if they happen to be cancerous, they got it out early enough or it can be treated with chemotherapy so she can go back to caring for her family.

Besides family health concerns which is making my moods swing like crazy, I am fine. I am off work for the next week, until Monday, July 20th, because I got a new job! I quit the hardware store because I got this job interview, followed by a job offer all in one day! It’s a stay-at-home position where I can work from home and essentially I call clients up on the phone and create payment plans with them so their homes don’t go into foreclosure. I am the middle man between the client and the bank. Having 6 years in customer service and about a year in banking, the interviewer thought I would be perfect for the position. I scored a 99% on the skills assessment; the best he had ever seen. I got every question correct and got a 95% on the typing assessment. I am just waiting for my background check to come through, which it should considering I worked for the government.

So the day before my first day of work is Sunday, July 19th aka the day of the housewarming party aka my dad’s birthday. I am not even sure how many people are coming over, I just know it’s gonna be a lot. Diego is buying 6 pounds of flank steak for the carne asada that he will grill on our huge propane grill that my parents gave him. I am making 2 – 2 pound pork shoulders in the crockpot for pork carnitas. There should be plenty of guacamole, chips, and salsa. There will be a quarter coconut sheet cake for the party and my dad’s birthday. I am making watermelon sangria and a cranberry vodka punch, we will have soda, tea, corona beer, you name it.

I have spent close to $150 on decorations for the house, whether it be chalkboard labels for the food, thank you cards, stamps, and I even got little Tabasco bottles for everyone that will come with a note that says, “thanks for spicing up our party”. I got some pinatas for the kids. It is going to be a killer party, that’s for sure….

But I am afraid it’s not going to be done in time. I have all week to finish getting things out of boxes, finish the unpacking, finish the shopping, along with the regular housework. I have so many ideas of what I want this place to be like, but it’s just not there quite yet. It will be okay, just got to take the day minute by minute, hour by hour and piece out the to-do list so it’s not as overwhelming.

You’ll be the first to know how it goes…

Dani