He's Dead Jim...

I know these things are supposed to happen in threes but maybe the Myans were right and the world really is coming to an end soon...they were just off by a three years? What is going on?! Michael Jackson, Farrah Fawcett, that guy from the Kung Fu movies, and now...BILLY MAYS?! I am at a loss for words which, we all know, very rarely happens. I believe this has to do with me going to Rochester, Minnesota. The last three times I have been, something has died no matter how short or long my visit is. The first Summer, I arrived in early June for Nisswasammen, a folk dance festival in northern Minnesota. The day after we reach the music festival, my aunt receives a phone call from the kitty hotel notifying her that her cat has mysteriously died in her sleep and without an autopsy, they couldn't decipher the actual cause of death. Inky died of an incredibly rare disease completely unexpectedly. Once Inky was dead and (God rest her soul), on the mantel in a tin can; Mary was left with Max, the reason I hate cats. When I was three, Max decided I was in his territory, hunted me, and took me down with a swipe of his paw. Max was part of a Fat Cat study being organized by Purdue University in Indiana. On top of being obese, he was an amputee with only three legs and had an enlarged left ventricle. In early June again, I came to visit, this time I was going to be there for three months. Typically, Max and I were kept separate but ever since the amputation, I could finally run faster. Mary was out of town being trained in Feldenkrais Therapy when Max's breathing began to sound funny. I had taken Anatomy and Physiology with Mr. Comenda my Junior year of High School between these two summers and had dissected two cats-- not to mention I just had enough sense to know Max's breathing was due to fluid in his lungs. I called Mary and she told me to just take him into the kitty doctor and make the decisions. I had the vet tap Max's chest three times and on the third time, we decided to put Max to sleep and end the terror. I went from hating this cat to having Max snuggle up against me as tears were streaming down my face during his last breaths. I killed both of my aunt's cats within two years. That same summer, my dog that we have had since I was three passed away from another "mysterious disease" after coming to Minnesota for the summer with me. At that point, I realized that I should take a year off. No one died that year. This year on the other hand...

Michael Jackson
Farrah Fawcett
Billy Mays
That man from the Kung Fu movies (he died during some kinky sex game...now what have we learned?!)
Caroline Victoria Jenson (my great-aunt)
Dawn's aunt

They are all dead Jim, just dead.

Richard Feynman plays the bongos!

"...and I am going out sleepy, too."

"I suppose I came into this world sleepy, and I'm going out sleepy, too."
-Caroline Victoria Jenson

My aunt passed away last Thursday in her sleep at the age of 92. She is six years older than her sister and my grandmother, Norma Jurisson. My mom, grandmother, and I drove down to Kansas City, Kansas this week for Vicky's funeral. I hadn't met my cousins on that side of the family so the trip actually made for an interesting family reunion. Vivky will be buried in Norge, Virginia on July 8th.
Our family handles death in a very interesting way I suppose. When my grandfather, Jaan Jurisson died, with a sandwich in his hand from a massive heart attack, we all gained a sense of humor to carry us through rough times. Tradition and our ability to be labeled "cheap" with absolutely no guilt whatsoever forces us to buy caskets "one up from welfare." When my grandfather died my uncle Karl, my mom and dad went to the funeral home where the man kept attempting to go through his sales pitch for the ridiculously over-priced pine boxes while Karl and mom kept walking past the caskets crossing their chests with their arms asking "how would this look?" My father, I can guarantee, was truly embarrassed. I can see his bald head turning cherry red right now. The morning of the funeral, my aunt Mary and my mom were in the bathroom getting ready when they heard a "BOOM!" My grandmother was in the kitchen finishing up a few things. Mary looked over at mom and quickly uttered, "You go check." Mom responded with, "You're the doctor, you go check." What was said next would be considered the punch-line of the joke, "But she's MY mom!" Anyway, Mary and mom went to see that THEIR mother had fallen in hopes that she wasn't dead too. Grandma was face-down on the tile floor. She attended the funeral with two black eyes and a squished nose. Grandma told people at the funeral that she and her husband got into a fight and she won.
My grandfather never believed in cut flowers for a funeral, what was he going to need cut flowers for when hes dead!? Therefor, his wife and children brought a single green plant with no flowers on it to the funeral and placed it next to his casket. I can only imagine the thoughts running through his friend's minds when they saw the lone plant his family had brought to the party.

On another note, I have been reading a book titled, "Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman!" about Richard P. Feynman, a physicist born in 1918. Feynman had an alternative way of looking at life, he won the Nobel Price in Physics and taught at Caltech until he passed away in 1988. The book is a series of short stories from his point of view about getting into trouble and experiencing life in "all its eccentric glory." Feynman "traded ideas on atomic physics with Einstein and Bohr, cracked the uncrackable safes protecting the most deeply held nuclear secrets and accompanied a ballet on his bongo drums."



Maybe through reading about such an open-minded, free, person such as Feynman, we can all learn about living life first and worrying about death later.