Dead Ex-Wife Tour

It’s half past I-don’t-give-a-shit, and I’m playing with homicidal fantasies while the LeStrange Family (‘we take the fun out of dysfunction’) is out for a drive up the coast. Having done the laundry yesterday, in a major break with tradition, and having made my second double vanilla vodka martini mixed with ginger smoothie, and I feel up to the challenge of describing my recent vacation.

Went on the Ex-Wife/Girlfriends tour, with a final stop (two actually) at the cemetery to “pay our respects” to his ex FIL and MIL – I mean to some stones in the grass with their names. I was extremely respectful as I photographed said stones in the ground. Good thing their actual souls are up in heaven preparing for that big family reunion in the sky, or I’d find the whole cemetery thing creepy. I should say, more creepy. The second trip was to try to find the stone for the dead ex-wife, but it seems her second spouse hasn’t yet (Note: >8 years: what?) approved the content of the stone, so her grave is unmarked. Thanks to the soft-spoken cemetery people who are trained to deal with the bizzare, we located a bare spot between regulation-sized stones for an overweight 40-something guy who needed a shave (his color picture etched on his stone) and who probably died of heart failure and/or DUI, and a Greatest Generation Vet whose friends called him Buster. Seriously, rest in peace?

Due to all this extraneous recent fun, my homicidal fantasy plans remain pretty sketchy. That, and recent email chatter. The famnet recently counseled me that, despite my crystal clear memories, I couldn’t have written a What I Did on My Summer Vacation story about how we took Pa’s truck to pick up Ma upon completion of her sentence connected with an unfortunate meth lab accident. They insisted that nobody had meth labs in my boomer adolescence. Apparently, weed was the thing then. Pretty sure.

But homicide is such an ugly word. I’d prefer to stick to terms like informed consent and assisted suicide, crossing the rainbow bridge. Lately, I find great comfort in the idea of going to live with a nice family in the country when I die, possibly to be reunited with all those childhood pets who were there one day and missing the next. Grandma is baking a pie and strange cousin Arny is playing his cello version of Smoke on the Water. I need another drink.