Lawn Chairs Are Everywhere

I have little talks with Me about Us.

Tata: I am sad! Waaaaaaaah!
Tata: Listen, princess, how do you feel? Do you feel I Want To Die! bad?
Tata: ...No...I don't!
Tata: Do you feel It's Hopeless! bad?
Tata: I don't!
Tata: Right, then you're not depressed. You're appropriately sad.
Tata: I am sad! Waaaaaaaah!
Tata: Okay, so what do you want to do about it?
Tata: Blow my nose on Our sleeve?
Tata: Yecch. Listen, I've noticed we're currently running up a flight of stairs. If you think back, this is how we've always gotten over the bad breaks. This stairwell, lap after lap of the stairs over the last twenty years.
Tata: Sniff! ...I remember! Man, there ought to be a plaque!
Tata: And you know what else? Everyone who has ever shared an apartment with you knew that if they opened the door and smelled bleach, they should walk away - just walk away!
Tata: Yeah yeah, I used to throw furniture but polishing it is miles better!
Tata: And what else do you do to recover from something?
Tata: Start smoking?
Tata: Yeah...let's skip that one, huh?
Tata: Oh. Okay. What then?
Tata: You're an artist. Get off your ass and get to work. Your best work has always come out of surviving something awful.
Tata: Huh. So I could've spared myself the years of writing band reviews by -
Tata: Yep, one craptastic trip to a shark tank.

Siobhan, who nearly died a week ago Thursday, and whose doctor kept exclaiming like a broken cuckoo clock, "You almost bit it!" until she threatened to punch him in his mechanism, is at home, finally. Last night, I called her with a commission.

Tata: I have a job for you you will enjoy, oh Queen of All the Net Purveys.
Siobhan: I can't fucking imagine but go ahead. Try me.
Tata: Larry, the little black cat once bent on stealing your soul, peed on the couch and told me he peed on the couch. I cleaned it but this couch came from Daria's house, where children and a dog peed on it. It must go.
Siobhan: ...Bored now...
Tata: Buy me a couch.
Siobhan: ...Really bored now...
Tata: I will give you my credit card. These are the rules: it must be less than $400, it only needs to last a year, it must be delivered before St. Patrick's Day, comfortable, stain-repellant and red.
Siobhan: Hmm. That challenge is worthy! Red, eh?
Tata: It's the color of life. So said Isadora Duncan.

Even with the random bursting into tears, I feel pretty good. I'm out from under the weight all caregivers feel when a sick person or animal dies. I went as far as I could for as long as I could, and the outcome was exactly as it should have been. I loved him madly. We are free.