U N L O A D E D

UPDATE: WWE.Com and other news outlets are reporting that this was, in fact, a double murder suicide carried out by WWE professional wrestler Chris Benoit. The following post was written before that horrible piece of news broke. If this information proves to be true, then this man was a very disturbed individual who resorted to the most wretched and subhuman forms of behavior imaginable. Being the huge wrestling fan I am, I hope that what's currently being reported is not the case and that there is another reason behind this tragedy.

UPDATE#2: So far it looks as if Chris Benoit killed them (his wife and child) by asphyxiation. The whole thing just makes me sick. Authorities also think the murders were deliberated as the victims were killed a day or so apart from each other. Bibles were also found by their bodies. Benoit also sent some very disturbing text messages to his friends during this time talking about how the dogs he owned needed to be let out of the house. Again, the post below was written before news of the murders and suicide broke.

UPDATE 3: As more gruesome details emerge from this tragedy I have decided to remove my original post entirely. I want nothing positive on my blog about him because what he did was pure cowardice and he was, above all else, a murderer. There is no excuse, be it steroid related, depression related or otherwise for such a cruel and barbaric act. He's was a murderer, plain and simple. If that wasn't enough, there are now allegations that he had been giving his 7 year old son human growth hormones. This was apparently done to treat a condition known as Fragile X Syndrome, but who knows? This story will continue to get worse, I'm afraid. This will be my final word on the matter. I originally meant this as a tribute since I am a huge wrestling fan and could NOT let an incident like this go by without writing something. But I am done with Chris Benoit as he was a poor excuse for a man.


Next on U N L O A D E D....

Choose Ricardo's movie adventure, should I live free and die hard?

Did Tony live or die? Is that line of questioning even worth it? Were there really clues or was creator David Chase out to mess with us?

As I write this, we are almost 2 weeks removed from the series finale of one my all all time favorite shows, "The Sopranos." That final moment, that black screen, that feeling that my cable has shorted out has left me and others around the world wondering what really happened to our beloved New Jersey gangster?

Speculation around the internet has been a cross between a desperate college student thesis to things that make the JFK and 9/11 conspiracy theories seem tame and plausible. And the longer the debate continues the more the theories seem to loose touch with sanity. Viewers are recalling scenes that never happened, dialog that was never said and making up characters that never appeared in any of the 6 seasons. I suppose the mind will do anything to come up with an answer.

The End?

The final scene is rather mundane. Tony enters a diner and sees that he's the first member of the family to arrive. By family I don't mean La Cosa Nostra, I mean his actual family. For the true strength of the Sopranos was not the vivid brutality of mob whackings and beatings, but the subtle subtext of what such a life does to the nuclear family. As the series went on this became more and more of the focus. Some fans griped as they wanted more blood but I doubt the show would have made such a lasting impression if it did go that route. It would have become too frenetic to carry a story worth watching in my opinion. The Sopranos was a drama, not an exercise in mob hits. I don't have a problem with blood and violence but you have to come to the table with more and creator David Chase did.

So back to this much argued over diner scene. In it, Tony has a seat and watches people entering the diner. He's looking for his family and each time a person enters, a bell rings. Tony looks up and sometimes we see a stranger and sometimes a member of the family. There is a palpable sense of paranoia in this scene as we've just gone through a previous episode where a hit was put on Tony via New York crime boss, Phil Leotardo. However, Phil has been whacked in a earlier scene so over the top and brutal that it's actually rather funny. Also, peace has been made with the New York crime families because some of them hated Phil too.

THE HIT IS OFF.

Keep this in mind as I go on.

As all the members of Tony's family enter, a suspicious looking man in a Members Only jacket (Remember those ugly things?) enters and takes a seat looking over at Tony. The Members Only guy is a big clue according to some because an earlier episode was titled "Members Only." Was this an indication that this man was a mob member? Well, if we are to believe a representative from HBO, the answer is yes or...sort of. But why does this "suit" up in an ivory tower know everything while the all the actors in the show (including Tony himself, James Gandolfini) remain in the dark? This account, for me, sleeps with the fishes.

So we have the said Member's Only guy staring over at the family and he heads to the restroom. Tony sees this man approaching as the restroom is behind Tony. Also, our Members Only friend would have a clear shot at Tony once he emerged from doing his business. Only we don't see him emerge. We see......

The Black Screen

The screen that has the debate still raging on and on. But right before that screen we see something else. Meadow, Tony's daughter, arriving after much hassle with parallel parking. Tony has "Don't Stop Believing" by 80's band Journey playing over the jukebox. Earlier, we see him selecting the track with another popular Journey song just underneath it. I'll have the title for you in a moment. Anyway, Meadow enters and.....the screen goes black.

WHAT!?! Someone check the cable!!!!! That can't be it!!!

It was.

The interpretations vary. The popular one is that the black screen symbolizes what Tony sees after a bullet has lodged itself into the back of his head. That bullet came from a gun fired by our friend in the Members Only Jacket who was actually an assassin. But remember what I said before......

THE HIT IS OFF!!!

People who want Tony dead refuse to let that stop them and have simply made up characters who reinforce the argument. The question is who, of the actual characters that we knew, would have the power to put the hit back on? From what I can gather, no one really. People also reference a line allegedly said by Tony's brother in law, Bobby Bacala, about how everything "just goes to black" when you get whacked. Bobby never said that. I went back and checked the episodes. He said you would not "hear it."

I also believe that this statement is more of a coping mechanism for Bobby because when he says it in this season's first episode, he's never whacked anyone before. He knows the time will come when he will have to do the deed. Saying this makes his first assassination (later in that episode) more palatable for him. It's a way to rationalise and anticipate his loss of innocence so to speak. As far as Tony recalling it in the second to last episode, I think again, it's more of a coping mechanism than a foreshadowing. Think about it, it's much easier to accept the death of your friend if it is quick and painless rather than the other way around. Tony wants what Bobby said to be true because it gives some comfort to an awful loss in the family and possibly some relief at the prospect of his own death. However, I really think this line is relevant to the Bobby storyline rather than the Tony saga. It gave us closure with Bobby's character even though he did hear and see it coming at the last minute. So did Bobby's first and only whacking victim. Death is not so neat and tidy, even on TV.

There is also the speculation that people in the diner were characters from previous episodes that were out to get Tony. They were NOT. Did they resemble people from Tony's past that were a danger? YES. Did that heighten the paranoia for longtime viewers? YES. That's what it was supposed to do. We got the feeling of what was like to be Tony; always looking over your shoulder. The hit is off but some degree of danger is still present and always will be. The threat never ends for a guy like Tony, it just varies in degrees.

And if the Members Only guy really is a hit man, think about it: Do you really believe that after all these years Tony couldn't spot a "Member" from a crowd of suburbanites while we could? Do you think he would let him walk by and go to the lavatory where he could get a clear shot? Do you really think he would sit there and let his family be targets? This flies in the face of everything we know about our friend from New Jersey. Did he become that stupid? I don't think so.

So What Really Happened?

Through the years I have lurked on "Sopranos" discussion boards but never commented. I have heard all sorts of wild speculation from the Russian guy who vanished in the woods coming back to Furio returning and whisking Tony's wife, Carmella, away to Italy where they would live happily ever after. And even back then fans were swearing up and down that this (insert line, image or reference here) symbolizes something and that it HAD to happen this way and.....it didn't. People spun their wheels while David Chase went on with his story. Sometimes white shoes are white shoes and that's it.

But are black screens JUST black screens?

Well yes, why couldn't they be? Why could it not be the family getting back together and there simply being nothing left to tell? Could not the black screen be a release of tension as the last member of the family arrives safely? Why must it be a blood bath? Would that not be incredibly unoriginal for a series that inhabited the mafia genre and always swam against it's powerful tides? I don't know the answers but I do know that Steve Perry of Journey has gone on record saying he didn't want his song to be used if Tony was going to get killed to it. He did agree to this ending. And what was that ending exactly? The answer may be in the second Journey song we see on the jukebox......"Any Way You Want It."

And this, for me, is just fine. I don't mind ambiguous endings but I also don't think the ending is as ambiguous or as sensational as people are making it out to be. But to make something out of nothing the way Chase did is not a cop out like some claim, but a masterstroke of epic storytelling. The story of people flirting with danger goes on and on through our speculation, just like the lyrics in "Don't Stop Believing" indicate. Check them out for yourself.

But then again, Chase may have just really liked the song and not have given the lyrics a second thought. I could be, like so many fans, making much ado about nothing. Funny how that works.

If there is credence to the black screen symbolizing death, then I think it was we the viewers who were whacked.

We wanted more, the end came, and we never saw (or heard) it coming.

Much like the way this entire blog will....in time.......


Coming up next on U N L O A D E D.....

Chose Ricardo's adventure. Should he go see Live Free Or Die Hard with is lousy PG-13 rating or should he wait for the unrated DVD? You decide and I'll tell you why a rating like this hurts me so badly.

Previously on U N L O A D E D:

Drunken Woman: Tell Rick....that his father is dead......


A: I just couldn't get involved so, you know, I left it all up to your Uncle L. He knows all about the case. The one with your father getting hit by the car. It's not settled yet but there's money.


L: I looked over some bank records that belonged to your father. There was lots of withdrawals, money missing here and there. I have no idea where it was going.


Me: Why is A saying you're the one handling this when your not?


L: No one told me your father was dying until the very end, I moved out of New York to Florida. I had a rough time getting there, there was a snow storm. When I found him in his apartment, he with a nurse that took care of him. He was 60 pounds. He said that he would be fine and that they were just going to remove a tumor and he'd be OK. He also told me a few other things that he had hidden away.

Me: And what was that exactly?

ENDGAME

So here we are, right where we left off before I went on break. You know the story, so I will continue.

My Uncle L had told me that that my father had hidden a few things away that were kind of, shall we say, off the map. I had told you of how my father lived off the system but he also existed off the grid of sanity. My father was not just a small time con artist, he was mentally damaged beyond repair. I recall when I was 21, being reunited with him after an 18 year absence, that I went to his home in Ozone Park, Queens and felt the instability coming off the walls. Many things, inexplicably, were covered in plastic. There was no working phone and there was no food. Nothing in the apartment was made or manufactured post 1973. There were boxes and boxes of things stacked everywhere from cloths to boot leg videos of major studio films that he picked up from street vendors. It was a cluttered place yet it was an empty place. It was a dark, no matter how sunny it was outside, with creaky wooden floors that gave more mystery to it inhabitant than answers.

When L went to meet my father in the final moments of his life, he told me that the covering things in plastic had escalated to the point that even cups and pictures on the walls were sealed in it. Why, we will never know. The addition of more plastic covering was also accompanied by mountains of cloths with the tags still on them. While my father dressed in layers, even in the summer, here were many nice cloths that he never used. Apparently he liked buying cloths but not wearing them.

My father tipped L off on a little hidden treasure that was locked away somewhere.

My father: There's a green duffel bag with with money. There's a few thousand dollars. It's hidden underneath one of the floor boards.

L promised to look for it but first thing was first, the hospital. But he wasn't going to the hospital, he was going to hospice. The colon cancer ravaged his body past the point of no return. He's days were almost done. He did, however, make a mention of someone to L that would have otherwise seemed irrelevant.

My father: I want my landlord to have a cut of the money, she's been good to me.

The Landlord and the money trail

I met her once years ago. My father made it a priority to introduce me. She's a middle aged woman, rough around the edges and likely born and raised in Ozone Park. Her thick New York accent said as much. She had a cackling laugh was in need of some minor dental work. She either smoked heavily, drank too much coffee or both based on the stains. She seemed friendly but my father never really had friends, just people that avoided him and people that took advantage.

When my father died, L had to meet her to pick up the remainder of his mail and begin the process of moving out his stuff. Most importantly, L needed to find that green duffel bag. While she was away, L and my aunt D tore the place apart, removing every lose panel of wood they could get their hands on. The found the bag, but it was empty. Where did the money go? There's no signs of a break in. Who would even know about it? How would they know where to look?

THE LANDLORD!!

She played dumb and acted as if she knew nothing, there was no proof. She had also known A (you remember him) and L suspected that they might have worked together at stealing it. L also began getting bills in my fathers name for auto body places and general car repairs but my father couldn't drive. More bills in his name came for services that he never used like utility and gas companies which were likely used to maintain the building she owned. Something was wrong, very wrong.

L looked over my fathers bank records, money was being withdrawn during the time he was too sick to leave the apartment. Was A taking it? Was she? Still more issues when L found bank records concerning my father's mother who was in an "old folks" home with Alzheimer's. Her records were in my father's place and dated back to a time when she was healthy and in control of her finances. It seems as if my father was swiping them and skimming money off of her social security checks.

So we have my father stealing from his mother while A and the landlord steal money off him and none of it left for anyone that should have received it. Isn't this a wonderful cycle?

L and D found something else that does at least bring some redeeming value to this man...

The Opera

Let it not be said that my father was devoid of passion, it was there in his love of music. In the search for money they found stacks of sheet music that he wrote, one of which was an opera. But was this stuff any good? L presented the opera to a friend of his that majored in music back in college. He couldn't play a note of it. It was too advanced for his abilities and the complex movements could only be handled by the most advance of musicians. All of us were impressed and actually.....not too surprised. We always knew he had talent with music, it ran in the family but missed me. The tragedy is that he chose to play the system instead of his instruments and his harmony was in finding ways not to face reality or, for lack of a better term....the music.

Where are they now?

Ladies and gentleman, I have presented you with a cast of real life characters that defy logic and reason. And the ones that don't struggle to overcome the ones that do. This my friends, is drama in it's most pure form.

I can't properly finish this saga without giving you a rundown of where everyone is now. So here we go.

My father: Dead as Dillinger. No clue as to where he's buried, don't really care.

L: Living in West Palm Beach, Florida and is a Realtor with a wife and family of 2. We're still in contact and have given up on trying to find the money. But I still have questions for him. Wants to fix me up with a place down there should I ever decide to move. Thought about it, but it's not my kind of place.

A: Probably won't make it through the year. Tried to stick me with the responsibility of taking care of my grandmother on my fathers side. She is spending her last days in the convalescent home which is costly. I never knew the woman, and I can't help her. He maintains that he knows nothing about the money despite bank transactions that indicate he took quite a bit.

The Landlord: Still running the apartment building in Queens. L still gets bills from services that she may have put in his name. She may be taking in the sun at Rockaway Beach or letting the money roll at the Aqueduct Racetrack. How involved of a relationship she had with my father is still a mystery but we suspect it was very involved even if not romantically. Either way she cleaned him out. Clever girl.

D: She is currently a high ranking executive of the GAP clothing store chain and works on the corporate side of things. She continues to rise through the ranks. Maybe she'll send me a free sweater for Hanukkah.

Drunken Woman: Still drunk and living out in the Arizona desert. She's actually my mother.

P: Still in New York and riding motorcycles. Still regrets putting the loaded Beretta to my head but remains impressed by my nerve. L jokes that P didn't pull the trigger because he didn't want my blood on him. I was in too close.

My father's Mother: In the home and has no clue who I am.

The opera: Sitting somewhere collecting dust. It's notes may never be played.

Me: I just try to keep myself from becoming a victim of circumstance. I think I do a good job at it too. I look back and know the apple feel far from the tree but I resent the tree I fell from. I'm not going to tell you that I forgive the man, my father, for what he did because I don't. I hated him but I'm also indifferent at this point. I'm not out to erase the mistakes I endured with my father by someday becoming one myself. Such things don't interest me or make me tick. I just move on, looking for some peace of mind, some comfort in knowing who I am and what I'm not. I feel well, actually. I feel very well.

Also...life is good.

I see that now where as before....I couldn't.

I'm unloaded of this burden and I face the world with a renewed sense of resolve. I have things to do with this this life and I intend on doing them.

Can't do much more than that but I can certainly do much less.

We pick up from where I we left off, the call to my uncle known as L.

While his best friend P had put a gun to my head 10 years ago it was L that talked to him afterward and made P realize that he had done a very stupid thing. P apologized profusely to me and I forgave him. I don't hate the man, I really didn't nor do I now. Yet, when it comes to my family, I don't have that power to forgive that easily. Probably because the sincerity I saw out of P dwarfed anything I saw from anyone that was considered family. I had only know P for 48 hours and my fathers side of the family for all but a few weeks but my gut told me to worry them. All of them except for L.

He called me on a Sunday evening and we spoke for hours. It was good to hear his voice, we had a lot of catching up to. But once all the pleasantries were set aside we finally got down to the issue at hand; the deceased.

The Dead Father

He lived and died by the system. Not the system that you and I play by but the system of government subsidized living due to his time in the military. You see, technically speaking, he was a Vietnam War veteran but between the lines......he was never really a war veteran. He played in the military band that would perform at the funerals of soldiers that were killed during the war. My father was an exceptional flute player and knew his way around other instruments as well, but he was not a grunt. He never saw a day of combat but would look into your eyes and say he was in there for the Tet Offensive and the fall of Saigon . They were very authentic sounding stories and by most accounts they were genuine, they just weren't his. He had culled together bits and pieces of war time horrors that he heard from other soldiers who did see combat and made them his own. From there he was able to convince the powers that be that in hearing these stories, it caused him great stress. That stress, the fear of going to war, gave him P.T.S.D. (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder) and that entitled him to benefits.

Till his last days he lived off this. When money grew tight, he would volunteer for some experiment or research that a veteran's hospital would be doing. He even faked a heroine addiction and took methadone to get a little extra from the system. He lived at veteran's hospitals and even got his housing in Ozone Park, Queens taken care of via section 8 provisions. He avoided real work, tried to stay poor and reaped the social service benefits that followed.

To be fair, he wasn't playing with a full deck to begin with. He was an alcoholic, a big one, and he was reclusive and obsessive compulsive. It's because of this that I can give a little and not write him off as a total waste of a life. There was also his music, which I'll get to later.

Yes L and I retraced the trail of lies he had spun through the years and L shed light on some new topics as well. None of which were complimentary, all of which involved money. He had been stealing money from his mothers social security checks. The same mother A wanted me to visit. I told L of A's recommendation that I visit her. L asked, "what's the point?" She has no clue who I am since she has Alzheimer's and we only met once. I agreed.

I asked about the accidents that happened to my father, the fall in the subway and getting struck by a car. I asked what ever became of the settlement.

L: You know what? A told me about it and left me with no direction on how to find information. I found a lawyer but the lawyer doesn't know what became of it either.

Me: What?

L: If you want to work with me on finding it we can. But it's not going to be easy.

Me: What about the money from the fall in the subway? That was used to bury him, right?

L: Not all of it. I looked over some bank records that belonged to your father. There was lots of withdrawals, money missing here and there. I have no idea where it was going.

Me: Did he leave anything else behind?

L: A gave it all away or kept it. I told A that he could have at least set aside one of your fathers flutes.

Me: That would have been nice but I'm not interested. Why is A saying you're the one handling this when your not?

L: No one told me your father was dying until the very end, I moved out of New York to Florida. I had a rough time getting there, there was a snow storm. When I found him in his apartment, he with a nurse that took care of him. He was 60 pounds. He said that he would be fine and that they were just going to remove a tumor and he'd be OK. He also told me a few other things that he had hidden away.

What exactly were those things? Why wait so long to tell L that my father was dying? What was A up to? We had our suspicions and I will share them with you here.......

But not tonight.

The news that my biological father died of colon cancer 2 years ago.

The resurfacing of my fathers "brother" via a phone call.

The promise of money due to several accidents my father endured while still alive.

When I last wrote I told you the details of a conversation I had with my "fathers brother." Some of you feel that the way I addressed him was a way of me separating myself from someone I didn't like. A person who I think is a con artist. Why not just call him an uncle? Well that's the thing, he's not really my uncle and he's not really my father's brother. My father and he were cousins who grew so close to one another that they consider themselves brothers. But if he were my actual uncle, I would use that terminology, so you guys know me pretty well or do you? The more I reveal about myself here, the less you'll actually know. Call it mystery, call it mystique, I just call it the nature of things.

For the sake of continuing our story, we will call this "brother" of my father, A. And we pick up with A and I continuing the conversation from the previous post.

A: I just couldn't get involved so, you know I left it all up to your uncle. He knows all about the case. The one with your father getting hit by the car. It's not settled yet but there's money.

Me: These things can take years...yes.

A: I really begged your father to at least leave something behind for you. He was never there for you and...it's the least he could have done. Like I said, there's nothing else left but his bible. Everything else is gone. I'm giving things away too because the end could be close.

Me: I'm not here for the money.

A: Oh, no one's saying that. It's just a nice thing he could have done for you. One more thing, your grandmother is in a nursing home now, she would love to see you if you can visit. I can't make it down there all the time with my condition.

Me: Well I.....

A: It's been a rough few years for me but as long as I'm alive you have a place to stay here in Brooklyn. After all, we're family. That's what really matters.

Me: Thanks. You know...while I can't top your news today...I had a rough few years that I almost didn't make it out of....

A: Yeah well, you sound great and be sure to call your uncle. I have to go to church. Take care. Bye.

CLICK!

If he didn't jump off the phone so quick I would have told him to be sure to bring my fathers bible along with him. He'd need it to keep up his new religious front.

All About A

A is a character, late 50's to early 60's, pencil thin mustache, slicked back hair, diamond earing in one ear and an early 80's Cadillac that makes him look a bit like an over the hill pimp. A spent his better days drinking and dancing at the Copacabana. Yes it's a real place in New York City and I've been there and wish never to return. But I went, A forced me there. It was a free buffet night which was A's favourite. I got yelled at for wearing my leather jacket inside by some over the hill attendant that really wanted me to pay 5 bucks to have it hung in the coat room. I told him to "go fuck himself" and demanded to A that we leave. A was too busy hitting on a cigarette girl less than half his age. She was a stunner but looked to be annoyed at lugging around a box full of cigaretts and his advances. "I've spent so much money on her through tipping, my God." He declared to me with awe and lust. But all the tipping in the world wasn't going to get him laid, not by her at least. He was a stud only in his mind and seemed to be comfortable with that. Every man has their bliss I suppose.

The food at the free buffet was awful by the way and the clientèle were very Latin in all the wrong ways. And while I despised the Barry Manilow song named after this place before the incident, it causes me to shudder now. Actually, anything by Barry also induces me to vomit, but that's another post.

The astute reader will recall that I had a grandmother that recently died, she was on my mothers side and the one that mattered most to me. The one on my fathers side I barely knew nor did I really want to. This was all becoming too much for me at once. I placed a call to my uncle per A's orders. I got the voice mail.

Me: Hey, it's your nephew. Listen I know my father's dead, I talked to A about it and he says there's some lawsuit and money and you're overseeing it but this is A so...I don't know. I don't know about this. Call me and tell me what this is all about because...I don't know about this.

My first meeting with L

When I became reacquainted with my fathers side of the family at 21 this uncle was one of the few bright spots. We'll call him L. L is very business minded and has his head screwed on straight or at least more so than everyone else in my so called family. I liked him, even though our first night out involved infiltrating a gay bar so he could sell designer shot glasses to the owner. It was supposed to be a quick run but the owner kept disappearing in the back to do blow. While L chased her around trying to hammer down a deal, I was left to my own devices with L's friend who we'll call P.

This is not a good situation for a straight man to be in and P was ready to cause trouble. He was a straight man with an agenda. When not trying to provoke the bar patrons he would interfere with my only source of refuge, a hot bar maid that knew, just by looking at us, that we didn't belong there and thought I was cute. Every time I would move in P would make a move on her as well. I finally asked him what his fucking problem was. He gave me a speech on how he doesn't take BS from anyone, took out his gun, put it to my head then tucked it back into his jacket. I told him to do it again. He was taken aback. I demanded that he say what he said to me and do what he just did, again. If he thought he was such a bad ass, then I would show him bad ass sans weaponry. I don't need weapons to get my point across, just a few well placed words. He did it again. I leaned my forehead into the barrel, looked into him eyes and told him to "go fuck himself."

He put the gun away, hugged me and said anyone with a set of balls like that would be his friend for life. He vowed that if anyone crossed me, that they would be taken care of promptly. I never took P at his word but appreciated the gesture of friendship.

The stupid things men say and do when drunk and in the presence of a beautiful woman.

Yes L would hold the answers and shed new light on my fathers final moments. And these details will be shared with you here, on this blog, in full detail.....

(looks at the clock, takes a sip of wine and eases back into his chair)

But not tonight.

Tonight I will venture outward. Tonight I will fall into the sensual world known as the night life and welcome it's touch, it's embrace, it's rapture. Tonight I will attempt to feel the warmth and power of a woman's body next to mine. Tonight I will temporarily forget this madness so I can return and tell you the rest.

Last week the phone rang. It was late, around 1:30 AM, which is not the typical time I usually receive calls. I had a bad feeling about it. My instinct was to not pick up the phone...but I did. I was greeted by a drunken woman.

Me: Hello?

Long silence.

Me: Who's this?

Drunken Woman: Who's this? Who's this?

Me: What do you want?

Drunken Woman: Tell Rick....that his father is dead......

She hung up. I was disturbed but shook it off and went to bed.

Fast forward to this past weekend, I get a call from my fathers brother saying he needs to talk to me and leaves me his number. I've worked hard to put distance between this side of my family and yours truly. I didn't want to let this door swing open again because what's on the other side isn't worth letting in. But what about that late night call from the week before? Something was up. I called him back.

"Your father is dead. He passed away 2 years ago from colon cancer. I'm also dying of liver cancer. I don't know how much time I have left." He declared. I told him that I was sorry to hear that but this particular individual (my fathers brother) excels at embellishment and manipulation. Even if he was sick, there's a hook, a twist, a plan buried underneath all the shocking news. I let the conversation continue for curiosities sake. He told me how relived he was that I was doing well, I didn't buy it. He told me that he had always been thinking about me, didn't buy that either. He told me that my father left nothing behind for me except his bible, I didn't want it. I've got a dusty Tanakh somewhere that works just fine so I told him to keep it. What the hell was this really all about?

My Father's Brother: Your father was involved in a subway accident and got hit by a car. There was a lawsuit and the subway one got settled. He got money and I begged him to keep a little bit so he could be buried. I mean...I couldn't handle all those funeral arrangements, it was just to emotional for me.

Me: Right.

My Father's Brother: I never cried for anyone that died, not even my friends that were killed when I was in Vietnam but this one really got to me. I cried like I never cried before.

Me: Really?

My Father's Brother: I just couldn't get involved so, you know I left it all up to your uncle. He knows all about the case. The one with your father getting hit by the car. It's not settled yet but there's money.

Me: These things can take years...yes.

Yes, the picture was becoming clear. My biological father, part con man, part Howard Hughes and part tortured musician might have actually done something for me after all these years of doing nothing. While money couldn't replace the true relationship that a father and son should have, it's better than nothing. But there was still that issue about getting in touch with my uncle who was overseeing the settlement that seemed a bit off. I have never had a quarrel with him, he's always been a noble enough man. But the dying "gentleman" that I was talking to at the moment.....is this an agenda? Is he covering his tracks? What's the con? The impact of my fathers death is not something that hit me hard, we weren't close and I never really liked him. Rather it would be maneuvering the dangerous waters of severed family ties that could be most lethal.

This is true story about betrayal, dysfunction, rejection, anger, manipulation and reuniting. I will write about it here, on this blog, in full detail for your reading enjoyment. You will have the chance to catch a glimpse of people you thought only existed in fiction and then realise that my reality is stranger than fiction and perhaps yours is too. You will read about it all here........


But not tonight

Tonight I will let all of this news settle and digest. Tonight I will also distract myself with visions of fun and frolic with beautiful women and expensive wine. Tonight I will rest because tomorrow I may not have the luxury of doing so.

Up next on U N L O A D E D, the late farewell part II

I know the last few posts have been unlike what you've grown accustomed to reading here, but this will be my final post on my grandmothers passing. I have told you about her, my feelings leading up to the funeral and now....the funeral itself. It will be a long post but worth it if the previous entries spoke to you.

It happened this Friday, a low key event that was punctuated by freezing temperatures and a chilly atmosphere among most of us there.

The Gathering

There was no church service, apparently that was held in Puerto Rico just before transferring my grandmothers remains here. Instead, a wake was held at a funeral home which would be immediately followed by the funeral. I pulled into the home's parking lot. It was a familiar place as this was where my Grandfather had his service several years before. Some kind valets greeted me and offered to park my car. I was reluctant at first because I was hopping to pull myself together in the car before entering. I wasn't a mess but the armor hadn't been properly fastened on. It was that that key component that would help me deal with the one group that viewed aggression toward me as sport; my family.

Upon entering I was warmly greeted by the people who were on the peripheral of my clan, some friends while others were very distant relatives. It felt wonderful to have this be the first kind of contact received. However it was only postponing the inevitable. Through the corner of my eye, I could see my grandmother in the casket. The visual impact turned the words people spoke to me into faint cries that were blotted out by what seemed to be the sound of blood rushing into and out of my head. If there is such a sound, then it was certainly what I heard.

The immediate family was there. Some sideways glances, some nods and little else. Some mustered up a "hello" if I got too close. The sharp hooks they once used to sink into me during my life and grandfathers funeral service had grown dull. They appeared weak, broken, worn down. The years of bitterness, anger and combativeness to the world at large may have finally caught up with most of them. Some asked me what I was doing for a living. I told them I was in television and worked with TV stations around the world. Flip on the right network at the right time of day and you might see footage of something I had a hand in sending out for you to see. This was a far cry from the job that they felt I had the capacity for; a grocery store bagger.

They were wrong as they have always been.

The Whispers Amongst Them

I heard bits and pieces of why certain family members were not there. My mother was flaked out and claimed that her shrink or doctor won't allow her to fly and the "special" medication she was on did not allow for it. Others were either too busy, drugged out, preoccupied or too distant. Those who were there were an assembly of emotional train wrecks. My aunt, who took care of my grandmother till the end, told me of my grandmothers final days. She told of how my she would awaken from a semiconscious state to ask if I was OK and if I had eaten anything. Till the very end, she was a mother to me. That overwhelming bit of info almost made me take a seat, she did remember me after all. A strange sense of happiness filled me. I gave a faint smile and a nod.

This seemed to agitate my Aunt who had once told me, point blank, after learning that I would be homeless from many actions she had taken, "We don't give a damn what happens to you." And they didn't. In fact, they went out of their way to prove it by avoiding me. Basically, I was left for dead and believe me, certain situations during that period could have left me that way. I know what it's like to go to sleep on floors fearing for your life but here I was, still standing, stronger than them, bigger than them and with a place of my own.

Facing Her

I went up to the casket and laid eyes on my grandmother for one last time. Next to her was a case containing my grandfathers ashes. The body in the casket did not seem like my grandmother. Her life essence was gone and this was a mere shell. If there is an afterlife, I hope that she and my grandfathers spirits are together. I also hope, for the sake of my grandfathers spirit, that she will not nag him into oblivion as that's not a good afterlife for anyone.

The Burial

A small procession of cars made it's way to the cemetery. I drove a younger cousin there who had just turned 18 and was in dire straights. Everyone was avoiding her and she subsisted on the kindness of adopted families so to speak. Where have I heard this story before? Why does this pattern continue? We took comfort in each others unorthodox existence because we didn't feel as isolated. We were part of a group of family members from around the world that are forgotten, but never gone. Within her, I saw what grew and came to be within me; a lack of trust in others, cynicism of the concept of family and unconditional love and self sufficiency to a fault. My walls are standing, fortified, as hers are being built right before me. The battle is won not by who you let in anymore, but knowing who to keep out.

The ground was a sheet of ice at the cemetery. As we carried the casket from the hearse, I was mindful not to slip on it while holding tightly to my grandmother. The physical situation became a metaphor for the day. I navigated a slippery slope to remember who I was there for. We made it to a platform where we laid the casket down. The ground was too frozen to lower it, at least that what I had heard someone say in the distance.

My aunt, who had been swinging from different degrees of anger while flirting with grief, gave a parting shot to me. She claimed that I didn't really care who lived or died and that I never called, but where were her calls when I was in danger? In reality she had nothing to stand on. It was just anger. I told her that I made arrangements with my rabbi to mention my grandmother at the Friday night service and that I would say the Mourners Kaddish for her. A bit stunned, she thanked me and moved along.

The Means to an End

With the burial of my grandmother, so is my contact with the family and with it, a weight is off my shoulders. A tremendous one at that.

They had derogatory names for me, a concept of me, a false image of someone helpless, dim and weak. All of it can be encapsulated into one name that is not mine but rather the host for their own shortcomings and insecurities. They made me into things I wasn't because they were hiding from themselves, hoping that it was the right thing to do. Seeing me that day proved them wrong, I could see it rattled them. They would need a new face, a new target, a new symbol to rally against.

I'm not perfect, I've made mistakes, I've grown and I've learned as best I can. They never took the time to know the real me but many of you who have read this blog over time, have.

While the name of it has changed to U N L O A D E D it's nothing more than what we all do on each of our blogs in different ways.

It's still me.

You know who I am.

You know my name.

After the news of my grandmother's passing, the weight and magnitude of the loss has finally caught up with me. Yes, I wrote about it extensively in the last post but I'm really feeling it now. This is, in my estimation, the grieving process at work. It's phases and nuances taking a bite out of you each day with no predictable pattern.

I've been corresponding with numerous people (friends and blogging buddies) throughout the week and have played it cool and tried to help many of them with their problems. I've even corresponded with people over frivolous things to lighten the mood. In doing this, I find a surge of energy and renewed strength in many ways. I'm not thinking about myself and going into a depression filled death spiral. This is a good thing and keeping busy has worked well for me the past few days.

Tonight I'm going out with some friends to clear my head and keep my wits about me. But come tomorrow I'll be laying my grandmother to rest alongside my late grandfather. It's this event that will probably hurt the most and really hit home in ways that couldn't be possible with the news alone.

This is the final, most painful hurtle I will face before feeling closure and acceptance. In many ways I already do feel these things, but this event will make it complete and leave my mind at rest in the most bittersweet of ways.

I've wavered for the last day or so on writing about this as it's not the most pleasant of topics, but I've decided to unload it here. This weekend, my grandmother who raised me and was more or less my mother, passed away from complications of pulmonary fibrosis. She was four days shy of turning 95 years young.

I received several calls over the weekend from family that she was unconscious, in hospital, and on a respirator with a very dim prognosis. The calls were brief and and businesslike, ending abruptly. Just 2 sentences of information then a dismissive hang up, usually in the midst of me trying to formulate a question. The temperature over the phone was much cooler than that outside. In fact, it was chilling.

The Back Story

I knew she wasn't in the best of health and her mind had given out long before this. One of my last talks with her revealed that she just barely remembered who I was. Distance separated us with me here in Connecticut and she in Puerto Rico. This wasn't always the case, however. She had moved to the mainland and started a new life in New York City in her teens where she met my grandfather, who also was from the island. They married, started a family and as retirement approached, moved to Connecticut. Their children, who were starting families of their own, followed. This is where I came into the picture. My own mother, unfit for the task of raising me for a myriad of reasons, was relieved of her maternal duties when I, at 3, ran out of her apartment, down the street and to my grandparent's place, banging on the door and begging for food. According to my grandparents, I was found in a filthy and neglected state. The decision was made that I would stay with them.

Thankfully the run to security and stability wasn't far as my grandparents and their daughters all lived in the same neighborhood. What must have been an epic journey for me at 3 was little more than walking across the parking lot of a shopping center as an adult. I took fast to my new surroundings, getting fed well, well clothed and most importantly loved as every child should be. My mother continued to mill around in the background. Pulling dangerous stunts with self destructive behavior which secured a deeper place with my grandparents. However, these things would come to a head as I got older. Perhaps I'll write more about that here.....but not tonight.

My Grandmother the Woman

I will always be thankful for her time. She and my grandfather should have been enjoying their retirement and not the duty of raising yet another child which made it number 5 for them. I will not buy into my families greater argument that they should NOT have bothered with me and that I was a waste of their time. If I had a nickel for every time a relative pulled me aside to give me that speech while growing up, I'd be pretty wealthy. What the hell was a neglected 3 year old to do?

She was a woman with problems, emotionally unstable in her own right but with the proper instincts to cancel those flaws out. She was not a sensitive woman with words but through action revealed it in spades at times. We had our arguments while I was growing up but so does any child with their parent. Some of them still resonate after all this time and leave a bitter taste because she was so wrong.

She was a highly insecure woman. Perhaps her age brought this out more strongly, I'll never know for sure. She would lash out at others for seemingly no reason. It was a source of stress and bewilderment at first but now I know it's the right of passage for many of the elderly. When you live that long you can say what you want, or so many or them think. Her relationship with with my grandfather didn't always seem like a marriage but rather a stalemate; too old to leave each other and too set in their ways. The marriage lasted over 60 years.

Aftermath

Her passing was not as cut and dry as the passing of my grandfather's. With his, there as a sense of relief and profound loss. He had been in a conversant home due to a stroke which left his left side paralyzed along with my Grandmother. When he died my family moved her out to Puerto Rico where she rebounded health wise for a bit. Must have been all the sunny beaches.

I was at a friends house yesterday and he now has a family of his own and knew my grandmother for many years. He took the time before dinner to say a few words about how he remembered her to his daughters. He spoke of how kind she was to him, how welcoming she was to him and how she would always cook extra to have him over for dinner. Suddenly I remembered those times vividly. The feelings all came back to me as his daughters listened on. With that, I was given the right note to focus in on as I prepare for her funeral. It's the note that rings most true. She was, indeed, a woman of immense generosity with the people she loved which elevated her to status that every mother strives for.

Although flawed, so are we all. We hurt each other, we sacrifice for one another, we forgive, forget, fight and love. I thank her for giving a damn about me and with her passing an end to my immediate family has been sealed. The warmth of her love is now in spirit, just as that of my late Grandfather's. Beyond that is the winter's chill of my extended family who felt I was a bust. I will not stand out in the cold with these people but rather take shelter in warmth of people that care.

Sometimes family is not blood, but the people that give a damn.