Brenda took me out to dinner last night to talk about how I was handling everything. I haven't been home much at all, and naturally she reads lauralore.com daily...and I occasionally key a heavy post here...

Hi, Brenda!

I told her that I am best on the days that I double my mood-enhancing supplement. It's an amino acid called L-Tyrosine that I originally started taking in September to help me through the winter slump....little did I know then how slumpy my winter would get! My working knowledge of supplements is staggering, and completely useless in any facet of my daily life.

I offered this piece of information shyly, not wanting my aunt to worry that I was doubling a recommended dose. I needn't have worried. This from the aunt who, whenever she goes to the doctor and they find something off, asks, "Is there a pill I can take?" When detailing what my stress has manifested physically, Brenda generously offers, "We've got lots of pills here. Feel free." Silly me. We have a pill drawer. An entire drawer in the kitchen dedicated to pills. And a cupboard that contains the pill overflow, and your run-of-the-mill OTC drugs.

So, it should have come as little surprise for Brenda to offer, in response to me taking extra amino acids, "They usually list low-end doses anyway." Do you think this applies at all to the tolerated upper limit of sugar? Hmm.

I went to my grandmother's condo on Sunday, for the ritual corned beef and cabbage Irish celebration that my fully Norwegian family holds every year. I drove there alone—which was highly symbolic, as I've felt so alone at all my family gatherings since Mom left—and prepared for the waterworks. I'm ill with tears, and March 19, 2004 was the morning that I got the surprise call that my grandfather died. Reading through that dusty post gives me chills. Life is so cyclic. Dad knew his father would pass quickly, even when the doctors said there was still time. I wrote, and forgive me for being redundant with this after posting the link, "The bonds we form with our parents can be so tight that the echoes of logic ricochet off of our ears, never penetrating."

Much the same, after Mom's last scan, when we were advised of her tumors stabilizing, a big thumbs up in her treatment...I mentioned "Weeks....we were expecting them to give us mere weeks. The suffering has been evident." I remember my shock at the opposite being true. I remember my disbelief that she was getting better. I remember never fully accepting this verdict...and my momma was dead in less than a month's time. Yeah, it is definitely chilling to feel your world has an orchestration that you cannot interrupt whether by will or by science. It is what it is.



These ideas cloak my thoughts, and the survivor's guilt has now become rampant. Why wasn't I tagged instead of Mom? Look what she DID with her life, look who she TOUCHED...she lived life, and I feel like most days I'm just trying to survive mine. What am I meant to do? Who am I meant to touch? I close my eyes and see her face, and I wake with tears. I get so many pats on the back for the time I dedicated to Mom during her illness...but I feel wrong accepting them. I would have gladly sacrificed the rest of my life to caring for her if I had been called for. It was an honor, it was spiritual, and it was love. I live for love.

But now I struggle for my purpose.

It was with this mentality that I drove stag to my first family gathering. It turned my stomach, the thought of it, quite a lot, and I was fashionably late. My father and uncle were on lawn chairs in the driveway, soaking in the beautiful March sunshine. I exited my vehicle shakily, smiling convincingly. Dad had an inkling, though. I made my way to the front door and he called, "Do you want somebody to go in with you?" I shook my head...I need to get used to being alone. It isn't going away any time soon.

I entered my grandmother's home and found an abbreviated gathering of family, some of them having had prior engagements. They were in the process of clearing the table—I told you I was late—but looked generally pleased to see me. It's the first time they've REALLY seen me since the funeral...and I was less of Laura that day, and more of a sniffling idiot. They ceased all of their well-ordered task and took seats at the table, serving me two heaping plates of summery salads. I was more than a little tickled to see that my meat-loving family has accepted my love of things meatless.

My aunts, my cousin, and my grandmother kept things light. We laughed, and it wasn't forced. It was natural. The glee of a sunny early Spring day...loved ones, memories, and continuance. My father and uncle returned indoors...the recollections of the day were offered in fondness, and I did not know pain.

Everybody filtered home, and I stayed back to speak with my aunt Rose and grandmother. Grandma hugged me hard, a rib feels a little bruised on my left side, and mumbled, "I feel so bad for you, you lost your mother so young." My grandma lost her mother during my lifetime, and she still remembers the pain. I found a little bit of my mother cascading forth as I eased their worries. That was Mom; it didn't matter what she was feeling or where she was headed, she left us all showered in reassurance and joy. It was her gift to all who knew her. She was a master at fronting her fear with acceptance.

I found myself doing this at her visitation as well...when there are others to comfort, I am in my zone. It's when the world is at peace that I cry. I'm exhausted. I took up cooking sometime in 2002, you know. I got somewhat-okay at it, and advised to all who wanted to learn that the key was in being unafraid to fail. Well, that's the key to living, too. I've got to stop trying to be unafraid to fail in my purpose, whatever it will be. Easier said than done, naturally...but this has always been my problem, this reconciling my spirit to my philosophy.

I have a beautiful life, and I feel its glory and its pain so keenly...I hope to always nourish the energy it inspires. My biggest lesson from last Sunday, and forgive my rambling thought-process...it's taking the scenic way to the point (but now you understand why I get so many damn headaches!), life goes on...laughter goes on...love goes on. I'll go on.

Thursday, Chris came over to my cubicle tell me about the dessert she had at lunch. She knows that I am a fan of desserts and enjoy hearing of their splendor. I also feel that my imagination deserves a little gluttony now and then, even if the rest of me stays nutritionally sound.

She began describing the torte of sorts, and when she got to the layer of chocolate mousse, I interrupted her to ask if she knew what sound a moose made. This caught her off guard and she stopped mid-word in her weaving narrative of the Heath candy crumbles. I do that to people, distracting them from the task at hand with a question that holds little value and whose answer I care about only marginally.

But there is a power in this...because while Chris was dying to tell me about the angels that sang while she devoured her bit of delectability, she also wanted to answer my question...because everybody should know what sound a moose makes. It's just an American-thing to know. Chris is nothing if not patriotic.

And, I had asked so inquisitively, so innocently, and so sweetly—I can be, quite frankly, irresistible with very little effort. I know this to be especially true when I am on the phone with a provider set on ripping me a new one and I end the conversation with them complimenting my kind voice and wishing me a very pleasant afternoon...and note that "very"...it's important.

Chris began to answer me in earnest, her face set in determined lines and her eyes intent. The delicate curls about her face trembled as she summoned her reply. "Well, they make this sound: Moo—se." She laughed at what came from her mouth. She turned to Dawn, next cubicle down, and asked the same question.

"WHAT!?" cascaded over the impermanent walls, and Chris came back to my view, shrugging exaggeratedly about the response to such an answer-worthy question. She was so completely curious about what sound a moose makes, forgetting completely about dessert. I thrive on widespread illogical...breeds humor, I say. It's as though causing such discord is the meaning of my life, and I define it plenty.

I popped an individual bag of popcorn—a subject that Nick finds silly...because who can't finish a bag of REGULAR sized popcorn on their own? Yes, yes, Nicholas...but who SHOULD?—and Sally passed by, smiling in greeting while making her way to the copy machine. "Hey, Sally?" I called. "What sound does a moose make?" Her smile dropped and her feet stumbled haphazardly toward me.

"HUH!?" I repeated the question, and she began laughing uncertainly, waiting for the punchline. She was one of my mother's oldest friends, and tries to be generous with my poor attempts at joke telling. My timing typically sucks, so I stick with the puns. Anyway, moose calls: Sally pondered the situation, and when it was obvious that my question was delivered in all seriousness, she became curious in her own right, replying, "I have no idea!"

"Great!" I groaned. "Here I am, stuck at work, and I have no idea how to attract a moose." I stalked off like a cat trying to train her human. I heard Sally laugh in my wake, a little confused, but generous as I said. Suzanne was next, then Trixie, and Sheila the next morning. Sheila's my boss, my mentor, and as per last Thursday, my lunchtime shrink. If Sheila doesn't know, nobody knows. I ask her everything. Nobody knows.

It is quickly becoming the big topic at the office, all 8 hours it's had the chance to brew..."Did you figure out what sound a moose makes?" they ask. Few remember how it started, for few knew. It is quickly passing into the pages of inside-jokedom and, dare I say, lore. Chris never got around to describing her dessert.

Nick does not have what I term a grown up coffeemaker—that is, one that makes entire pots of coffee at the push of a button, quite literally. Instead, Nick owns one of these, which makes sense for the occasional coffee sipper in Nick. That being said, I see the usefulness in this single cup brewer for after-dinner coffees, for mid afternoon coffees, and even for the occasional I'm-bored-might-as-well-drink-coffee coffees. But, coming from an individual who can easily finish two pots on her own, the little red Melitta doesn't quite stand up to the morning-Laura's demands, and I find myself brewing cup after cup after cup...after cup.

Yesterday was cleaning day for the anti-coffee-chugging activist—who used to watch me drink coffee and chant, "BREATH! SIP!"—and his collection of bathroom magazines were thoroughly combed through. Of the stacks of Maxim, there was a single People magazine. Cheap or not, I am rather fond of leafing through People magazine. Dated May of 2005, this old issue belongs to the dark periods of my popless-culture existence—my time in the South offered other experiences...like fried pickles—I'm clawin' mah wah-ay back out to the light, boh-ay, but it ain't easy.

I was looking through the magazine this morning while my third cup of coffee drizzled into the mug. Suddenly, I was flummoxed: when did Rob Thomas stop singing with Matchbox 20? Puffs of smoke billowed from beneath my hands as I feverishly searched for more information...seriously? Rob Thomas exists outside of Matchbox 20? Like his own entity or something? My forehead began to throb as the confusion took hold and my scowl line split my brow. Nick chuckled.

I looked his way sharply, intense on the subject of my find. "I think this is a record," he smirked. What the heck? What's he making fun of me for now? Nick is a serial teaser, you see. He could find a way to play with your mind on the subject of your flossing form if you were stupid enough to let him see you floss. My gaze unfaltering, I watched his eyes shift briefly in the direction of the coffeemaker before returning to me. "I think that's the first time a cup of coffee has waited for you."



(By the way, did you know that Michelle Williams is pregnant with Heath Ledger's baby!?)