Sometimes when I am writing journal entries (see the end of July....), I have A Day where I just have a hard time saying what went down. I end up writing a bunch of entries that come after it and then eventually have to circle back to the roadblocky one. And yeah, guess who those ones involve these days, ahem. So now I’m writing it around 11/12 and I have been in the same suck mental place since this went down and that’s not fun to inhabit, remember, write about.

Sigh.

Anyway, here is how Scott’s grandma’s funeral went down:

I got obsessed with the idea of wearing black velvet to the funeral. Fine and dandy when I already have a black velvet skirt and long top, less f&d when it’s gonna be 80 degrees at some point during the day, so I ran around buying another top with short sleeves that week and then on the morning of realized it was kind of cold, so I went out and bought a(nother) velvet jacket since I couldn’t find mine.... sheesh to all of this, mind you, but the outfit was nice. Who was into this? His still living grandmother, who at one point asked to pet me. Which was so cute. As he’s said, she is adorable.

I met his parents upon going in and they are very nice. I was the first friend rather than relative to arrive, so I sat in the dead back. When Robert and Janene got there, they sat in the back with me too. I can’t speak for them, but I felt weird for a variety of reasons: (a) always feel weird at funerals, but then again who doesn’t have their issues come up, (b) I wasn’t a relative and I have issues being around other families anyway.

His dad gave the first eulogy and it was adorable. He started out by publicly wanting and taking a shot of tequila ... and saying that you never knew what his mother was going to say. He told a story about how he likes to do home remodeling and on their old house, he was going on about remodeling Scott’s new bathroom and putting in a new toilet and bragging that you could flush 24 golf balls down it. (My apartment manager would have some comments about modern toilets now...) To which his grandmother was all, “Well, when Scott starts shitting golf balls....” Scott’s response was “so far it hasn’t been a problem.”

Now, I had been told by my coworkers to well, not be me at this thing, don’t be loud and obnoxious, etc. and don’t cackle. I kept thinking of the line “she’s the giggle at a funeral” from “Take Me To Church” and how I did not want to do that. I’m already the weirdo in my gene pool without acting like it around someone else’s family, right? So I was basically falling over in the back choking and trying NOT to laugh so that anyone heard me. I managed it, thank goodness.

Scott then got up and was also, “Where’s the tequila?” followed by “I don’t even drink.” As per being in The Viewing Room recently (which was pretty weird synchronicitywise...I guess there was some coincidence between the play and this funeral about it, but I forget what since I don’t know the script as well as the rest do), he gave the eulogy in the play as well and made a joke about how his was two pages rather than the three in the play, though he was up until 2 a.m. writing it. It was about how his grandma was his buddy growing up, especially after she moved in with the family. He also gave a shoutout to “my friends in the back” (that’s very nice) and said his grandmother would have liked us.

His other grandmother (the families have been happily merged for decades since his parents met/got together in high school, seriously, how cute is that?) talked about the dead grandmother’s history. Then his dad got up again to share another story. She had been married at least five times that they know of(?!), and Scott’s grandfather died before he was born. The grandfather was husband number four. On the day his grandfather died, ex husband #2 had this psychic feeling that he needed to find out what had happened to her. So the guy gets on his motorcycle that day and starts driving across the country. He gets to California a week later, after the funeral, and they got remarried a few months later. That’s adorable.

I have to say, I find it reassuring that his family is cool and froody with weird/witchy stuff like that going on, even if that is not Scott’s thing per se. Like, they were all really nice and his dad was making the “beans, beans, the musical fruit” joke later and I was all “my dad would have said that.” It did bring out the occasional thought that I have of “hey, could you adopt me?” but under the circumstances, good lord to that thought.

After that was over, we hung out with and met Scott’s best friend Lewis and his wife Rachel and chatted about various things. Mostly I remember it was stuff about how they went to Berklee and a lot of people drop out of there and last night they were in some panel about Berklee success stories, just them and a third woman who’d just been fired from Google or somewhere big deal and was all, “I shouldn’t be here.” Oy vey.

The reception was at the living grandmother’s house and we hung out at the friends’ table and it was all a very good time, more or less. Though I guess me and the living grandmother were the only people who were NOT getting notifications that the power was going to be turned off at their house for days. Lewis and Rachel left after a few hours. Robert and Janene left for a few hours and came back later after they unplugged things in the house, leaving me as the only friend there for a while and getting weirded out and hiding in the corner, as I am wont to do at any family gathering. His grandmother wanted to take a picture and I felt like I should bow out, but did not since Scott was there and he was all “you’re my friend, it’s okay” about it.

This was all very sweet, and then Cameron finally got there and well, he spent a lot of time paying very close, scrutinizing attention to her for hours. Like trying to figure out her eye color, noticing the earrings hidden behind her hair, oh I just happened to look at your customer record at the store, all this fucking stuff and I can’t help but think, “what am I, chopped liver?” Yes, yes I am. After a while it got so much that I started staring at the back of the couch waiting for it all to be over. Someone told me later that I should have gotten up and left, and yeah, maybe I should have.

Sometimes I wonder what the hell Cameron is thinking about all of this. If it were me I’d be uncomfortable as fuck/avoiding him, or at least I have done so in the past when it’s been me on the other end. But unlike the dudes I’ve dealt with, it’s not a concern that things might Go Bad with him (one friend I didn’t reciprocate for tried to throw me in a dumpster) so I guess it is not an issue for her. I suspect after As You Like It she suspects he also likes me, because there’s the occasional thing that comes up out of her that makes me wonder. Like, why are you bringing up how when you have to kiss him onstage that you have to avoid eating dairy for the day? Uh....I have heard this before, I am aware of that... And she brought it up again at rehearsal a few weeks after this, still within my earshot. That may not be all about me and I may just be being a raging narcissist here, but it’s odd. Like...you’re telling this to TnT’s, we all know that from that show. I think he’s aware that you do that. Who is the audience for this information?

Look: I genuinely do not care/mind/what have you that he has feelings for other chicks and me. This is fine. That happens, and I was in a polyamorous relationship in college and I was fine with that. Hell, he has good taste in ladies and if I suspect that if Laurel and I were bi, we’d be into each other (hah). As long as it’s “and” rather than “or,” I’m cool. However...back in the day my ex treated us equally well. It wasn’t “fixate all on one girl while ignoring the other” and she and I were friends and would have Said Something, Together, had that gone down :p

My shrink was all “this is not your ex or a polyamorous relationship” and I know that, but...seriously, this night and the weeks after that when I’m writing this later, I keep thinking of the immortal words of Sally Albright: “I am not your consolation prize.” I do think it’s sad that he’s pining for the ex and Cameron when they are not into him (Laurel might be a bit, but I somehow don’t think that will get off the ground with either of them.) but I reasonably assume that will eventually get old. Jackie seems to like to pine for the unavailable as well and I definitely had that phase in the past, but ... it’s one thing to pine for someone who’s not interested when there’s nobody else in your brain. I think it is another to say, be a little grumbly about being the single cousin and say this in front of both of us when uh, theoretically something could be done about that with one of the folks you are supposedly interested in.

Anyway: this has been annoying me, and the “consolation prize” thing was even clearer when Cameron, Robert and Janene left first. I was going to stay around longer for him (why?!) but then five minutes later his parents decided to leave and he rode with them. He insisted on walking me to my car, which was literally across the court. I’m flattered every time he wants to do that, mind you, but... uh, “consolation prize” and “only interested in me when she’s not around” are definitely things that are happening.

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