Soapbox

It’s been a roller-coaster.
The logistical aspects of living down in what is basically an efficiency apartment haven’t been too bad. But the other parts are harder.

It seemed likely by Nov. 5th that Joe Biden and Kamala Harris would win the election, when all votes were finally counted. By Saturday it was mathematically impossible for Trump to win and the election was called. Although counting was still going on, the end was obvious.
Well obvious to everyone but Team Trump.
He doesn’t do math. He only does Trump.

There were cheering crowds in the streets around the nation and the world, and bells ringing in Paris as if it were the end of a bitter war. (Live your life in such a way that the world doesn’t not rejoice when you lose your job I read.) It has been a war but it is not over.
Screaming in all-caps on Twitter things like “STOP THE STEAL!” and “I WON THE ELECTION- BY A LOT!” and “DO SOMETHING” Donald Trump kept up his campaign of lies, even as Joe Biden began putting his transition team in place. Declaring that they had “mountains of evidence” that “illegal votes” were being counted, Trump lawyers began filing lawsuits to “STOP THE COUNT” in states where Biden’s lead was widening, (while demanding “COUNT EVERY VOTE” in states where Trump was ahead. Make up your mind). So far over a dozen cases have been summarily dismissed by judge after judge, all saying “You have lots of noise but no substance. This is all hearsay and accusation with nothing to back it up your contention that anything illegal has happened”.

Trump’s high-powered professional team just quit, no doubt recognizing that their reputation was not being burnished by working on such a frivolous and hypocritical case to undermine democracy. (The fact that Trump has a history of refusing to pay his debts to contractors and even lawyers probably didn’t help.) In one case they filed a brief that literally had a post-it note attached as “evidence”, handed in by someone who said someone told him that they had seen… Many are now calling it the Post-It Defense.

But that hasn’t stopped Donald Trump, who refuses to concede and has his surrogates and idiots fanned out declaring that he actually won if you don’t count those illegal votes (by which he means votes for Biden, apparently) and will dance at his own inauguration in January.
And while simply refusing to surrender doesn’t mean that you get to win the war, it is making things much, much worse.
Trump reportedly hasn’t taken a National Security briefing since October, because he just doesn’t even pretend to care any more. And yet he has refused to allow Biden to get Nat Sec briefings. Which means, literally, that no one is driving.

Of course no one has been driving for, well, years, and that seems to be fine with the GOP, as long as they are in power and still able to line their pockets.
While only a few are openly supporting Trump’s ridiculous claims, most of them are mouthing meaningless s**t like “It is important for democracy that every legal vote be counted and no illegal ones and until that has happened we do not know who has won the election…” blah blah blah. But we DO know. The Secretaries of State- even Republican ones- in states that voted for Biden by narrow margins are all saying- No. Look, we don’t like the results, but we ran a clean election, our votes were counted honestly and Donald Trump lost”.
So now Trump is calling for them to resign, or be impeached, for the people to rise up and… and overturn the 5+ million vote advantage Biden has and install Trump on the throne, because he thinks he deserves it. Because it’s not fair for Biden to win just because 5 million more people want him to win. Because f*ck democracy and the Will of the People: Trump and the GOP is entitled to stay in power.

From my sofa in the basement while I wait to see if I have contracted the disease that has hospitals in places like N Dakota at 100% capacity (but still no mask laws- because Freedom) I am one tiny voice pushing back, encouraging people on my political page (over 100k followers, so not that tiny) to do the same. Calling, emailing my idiot Republican senator and others, reminding them that history will remember them as aiding and abetting a criminal. But Ohio, despite the hardship and loss, despite the deaths, despite the corruption, open attacks on democracy and sheer not giving a damn, voted for Trump. And they won’t be around for most of history.

Yesterday there was what was billed as a “Million MAGA March” in Washington to Stop the Steal and keep Trump in power. It was attended by the Proud Boyz (on the verge of pulling out their white hoods and admitting that hell yes, they want to put the blacks and browns back in their place) and the QAnon delusionists (who insist that there is an international cabal of pedophile killers whom Trump is fighting) and the gun-wavers, woman-haters, angry entitleds and guys who just like to have an excuse to swear at people.
Despite the fact that they say they are there to worship and keep him in power, Trump just drove past them and waved on his way to steal more taxpayer money at his golf club. Because even fighting to stay in power takes a back seat to his favorite grift.
Trump’s latest spokesliar bragged that there were “more than a million” great patriots turned out to protect democracy (out to overturn democracy, you mean) when overhead camera shots showed no more than a few thousand. A nice crowd, but she was off by a factor of 100. Fitting, though, given that Trump started his administration by sending his first spokesliar out to insist that “Donald Trump’s Inauguration had the highest attendance of any inauguration in history, period!”
Because in Trump’s world, a lie becomes true if you just state it emphatically enough.

Joe Biden has 306 electoral college votes (Trump tried telling swing states who went blue that they should just refuse to appoint any electors who would vote for Biden, so that he could win (see “F*ck democracy and the Will of the People). Those states have said- Er… no. Absent strong evidence of an unfair election, we are required by statute to appoint electors as determined by the popular vote.
But thanks for making another strong argument for why the Electoral college should be eliminated entirely.

Meanwhile, down in the basement…
In just a few more days I will have passed the 14 day mark, the point at which virologists assure us that is the longest it can take to start exhibiting symptoms. I can stop worrying every time I have to clear my throat, or realize “Crap- my glands are swollen- am I getting sick?” I can go upstairs in my own house without first putting on my mask and sanitizing my hands, and people won’t have to wait for me to leave the room before they enter. I can sleep in my own bed and put my arms around my husband again. Ted won’t have to sit at the top of the stairs and talk to me. We won’t have to text each other goodnight.
Until the next time.

I find myself unable to detail here too much about the ongoing (and worsening, because Trump!) pandemic. Yes, there has been a vaccine announced that seems to be 90% effective. (Trump immediately claimed credit for its development and Pfizer had to push back and remind the world that they took ZERO money from the US government for their work. Trump would take credit for the sun rising in the east if he thought it would get him something). But it will be April before large scale immunizations can begin, and it will be a 2-step vaccine that won’t really confer immunity until after the second dose.

In the meantime, despite having the highest new infection rate in the world, half of America seems to want to get Covid-19! An incoming state Rep in Georgia was all over social media proclaiming that “Masks are oppression! My Body- My choice!”
Dumb ass. It’s NOT just your body! It’s the bodies of everyone you come in contact with, and everyone they come in contact with!
A group of parents held a secret prom for their kids (they’re now called Superspreader events) and sure, parents, kids and staff at the venue have started getting sick, but still they refuse to tell health officials who all was there so they can do contact tracing and get people to isolate themselves— because freedom!
“We made a lot of kids happy, and we’d do it again” one father said. And if a few of them end up in the ICU, or pass it to their grandma who dies- oh well.

Thanksgiving us coming up, and there is no doubt that millions of people will go ahead and host their traditional large family gathering. Because it won’t feel like thanksgiving without Uncle Bud and Grandpa arguing over football while Aunt Sally makes her famous gravy…
Honestly, if these people had been living in America during the 2nd World War, we would have lost. They would have refused to ration,  buy bonds, plant victory gardens and put up black-out curtains or any of the measures the measures the population was asked to make, because How dare you inconvenience me! How dare you ask me to make any small changes for the greater good, to help our country overcome extreme peril?

The “Masks are Oppression” lady never had to drink from the Coloreds Only fountain, or went to apply for a job and saw the “No Irish” sign.

Take it from someone who wore a mask for 15 hours in a crowded room and can’t even go up to get something out of the refrigerator w/o masking and sanitizing: masks aren’t that hard. Breathing when you have Covid is 100x harder.
Being a doctor or a nurse at a hospital that is overwhelmed- who had to put staff in garbage bags because they ran out of disposable gowns, who has to give people some IV fluids and a shot of steroids and send them home with a wish and a prayer because they are no beds to admit them; who has to watch people struggle mightily for weeks to overcome the virus only to have them suddenly die… ask them if wearing a mask, or staying away from the gym, or not having a big Thanksgiving dinner is too damn hard.

I’m angry. I’m scared. I feel guilty because I haven’t had to bear the brunt of this. In any war there are front line troops who carry most of the weight, but hopefully, the civilians back home pitch in to help however they can. Not this time. This time they’re denying that a war is even going on.
Doctors, respiratory techs, ambulance drivers- they are our front-line combat troops, and they are getting blown to hell. And instead of doing SMALL things to ease their burden, half of this stupid, stupid country is making it harder. By refusing to contain the spread of the disease they are planting land mines in the road ahead, blowing our troops apart. Helping the enemy.

And most of that comes back to Donald Trump, and his year-long campaign to simply SAY that Covid-19 is not a problem, say that “We’re rounding the corner” and “it’s almost gone” and “Masks don’t help they’re just a political attack on me” and “doctors are lying about how many people are dying”.
Who are you going to believe: me, or all the evidence all around you? And millions of people put their heads in the sand and believe what they want to believe: that’s its all a plot and nothing bad is happening.
Trump, by his refusal to wear masks or have any White House safety protocol is directly responsible for hundreds of infections and dozens of deaths. His refusal to form any sort of coherent national strategy to contain the disease makes him indirectly responsible for 10’s of thousands more.

Joe Biden already has a Covid staff. Donald Trump’s staff has Covid.

Clearly humans are too stupid as a species to survive, and too reckless to deserve to. God should have put dolphins in charge. I can’t write about it any more. I don’t believe in putting my head in the sand but I need to protect my mental health. It’s getting harder and harder to sleep at night, thinking how many people will be dead by Christmas because their family refused to just spend Thanksgiving being thankful that they were alive

So I have what amounts to a mask stand in my front yard. After weeks of mailing them across the country and having people come to the door to ask for them, it occured to me that, with social distancing, people who need a mask might not want to ask for one face-to-face.
So I put a big sign in my front yard and a large plastic jug to put the mask in. I sew a few almost every day. Sometimes they build up as days go by without any takers, then other times they disappear as fast as I can make them.

Last evening there were 7 in the jug (2 child and 4 adult-sized) and this morning I saw that the cupboard was bare.
So to speak. I wondered if several people had stopped by or if it was one person who needed a lot. And then I had a thought: I hope someone isn’t taking free masks and selling them!
Yipes. That would suck.
I chewed on that though as I added the three I made yesterday and went about my day.

About 3:30 I saw a minivan pull into the intersection and stop. A young girl, maybe 7 or 8 and looking to be of east Asian descent, jumped out, ran into the yard and started going through th bin. She held up one mask packet towards her driver, then another.  I didn’t want to scare her off by coming out but it looked like she was after something she wasn’t finding, so I put on my own mask and stepped out.

“Hi honey. Can I help you?”
Rather than be intimidated, she gestured me to come over. “Hey, are these mask really free? she asked excitedly.
“They sure are” I said. “What do you need?”
“I need a mask” she said.
I nodded. “Yes you do. That mask you’re wearing is much too big for you. These should fit you much better.” I turned the packs over. “Which one do you want? This one has little dogs on it, and this one has astronauts.”
“Can I have them both?” she asked.
“Of course”.
“And this one too?”
“Well that one is grown-up sized,” I said pointing to the lable on the back.
“It’s for my dad,” she explained, gesturing to the van where the driver waved and called “Hello!”.
“Then you should take it too” I said.
“And this is all?”
“Well if you come back tomorrow or the next day there will probably be more. I usually sew a few every day so it just depends if someone else has been by or not”
“Oh good!” she said “’cause I have cousins!”
I sat back on my heels and laughed as she scrambled to her feet.
“Take care now!” I called.
“Stay safe!” she shouted and waved as she climbed into the van and slid the door shut.

What a little charmer she was!

I made a mental note to myself to be sure to work on kids masks- for the cousins. And I’m no longer going to worry about people taking them to sell.

• So I’ve got these kids…
  Well, foster kids. In a way.For a few years now I have been raising caterpillars: ever since a common field milkweed popped up in my yard. Every school kid recognizes the beautiful monarch chrysalis with it’s gold tracongs, and knows the story of the amazing journey south to just one valley in Mexico to overwinter. I know  how monarch butterfly numbers are dwindling and how only about 1 in 100 eggs makes it to butterfly, and I wanted to boost those numbers by a few.And so I did- by a few.

  After the first year, I increased the size of my operation, and the scope. Last year Steve did some research and planted fennel in the butterfly garden. Apparently, “If you plant it, they will come” because the black swallowtails started laying eggs too.

  

  And now it’s 2020: the year when everything went to shit. The year of fear and hardship and death. I really needed some extra joy and hope and life, and butterflies seemed to be a good way to do that.

  By this point, the designated butterfly garden has become a mini art installation too.

  
  My birthday gift from my sister really cemented the look- and the feeling- I was hoping to achieve by having it: a place of peace.

  
  For Christmas last year Ted bought me a really cool pop-up screen house and I decided to use it for the swallowtails. I left them in the garden last year but so many caterpillars hatched and were promptly eaten that I decided to step in and hand-raise them. It has worked so well that I bought a smaller one for the monarchs, to keep the large ones from crawling out of the old plastic terrarium I used for the hatchlings.

  Pretty soon the Meisky maternity ward was humming along nicely. At one point I had 7 swallowtail chrysalises (chrysali?) in the habitat at once. Hatchings have been a regular occurrance for the past few weeks. One morning Ted and I had breakfast on the deck and watched a swallowtail and a monarch emerge within about 10 minutes of each other.
  
  I was able to see some moments I hadn’t witnessed before, like a swallowtail pupae shrugging out of his caterpillar skin, and we got some great video of the moment of the butterfly emerging.

  So despite being the summer of mask wars and bleaching doorknobs and anger, it has also also the summer of life. Tiny, flutering life. Other than 2 or 3 little caterpillars that died for some unfathomable reason, my kids were healthy and grew and perhaps 3 dozen have already flown away. I figure 85-90% of the eggs I found survived to get their wings!
  

  Now summer is waning. The swallowtails are all in pupae stage or hatched and flown and I am anxiously urging the remaining monarch caterpillars to eat faster.

  I try to put the habitats out for as much of the day as I can. I figure that these little guys (having no functional brain) probably get important cues from temperature and light and the angle of the sun, so I want to expose them to those things. The larger habitat has so much surface area and is so light that wind gusts are dangerous, so I have taken to putting a large rock inside each morning after I clean it and add new forage.

  A few days ago I took the rock out for some reason and forgot to put it back. I looked out and saw the large habitat was on the deck instead of the table! I rushed out and was dismayed to find all the contents in a heap in the corner of the container, including greenery, climbing sticks, 2 fat caterpillars and the broken remains of the glass vase their leaves had been tucked into.

  Feeling guilty for being so careless, I carefully extracted the kids, got them onto fresh leaves in plastic bottles, vaccumed all glass shards out of the container and put everything back in place. Within 10 minutes both caterpillars were crawling around and eating again. What a relief.
  I jokingly dubbed them The Crash Test Dummies.

  Yesterday I had some errands to run. The weather forecast called for for pop-up showers here and there, but when I left there was little wind and blue sky showing, so I left the  habitats outside with rocks inside both to anchor them.

  While I was out I heard thunder and texted Ted (who was working from home), asking him to bring the caterpillars inside if it looked stormy in our neighborhood. A few minutes later he replied that he had been working in the garage and didn’t realize that a storm was coming. By the time he did, the habitats with 2 chrysali and 5 caterpillars, had been blown- not just off the patio table but off the deck entirely. The 2 swallowtail chrysali in the habitat seemed fine but he had no idea the condition of the caterpillars.

  I drove home through driving rain, berating myself for being gone so long, not bringing them in before I left and generally being a bad foster mother. I arrived and found a mess. Ted brought both screen houses inside and set out old towels to sop up the water that was still dribbling out of them.

  I stood and surveyed the wreckage.  Disaster for Scotland!

  I knelt down and got to work. Cooing gently “It’s alright guys- I’m here now. You’ll be just fine” and other inanities that caterpillars can’t even hear, let alone comprehend, I set about extracting and separating the various elements of the habitat: soaked cardboard from the bottoms, plastic bottles,  pebbles used to weigh down the bottles, half-eaten leaves and 4 shell-shocked caterpillars.

  I got my microscope and looked at each one. Caterpillars are basicaly just skin bags with guts inside, and since none of them were… leaking anything, or had crushed antennae or legs, I decided that once again, they had somehow survived the disaster. And indeed, after a few minutes, they all started cautiously moving around on their leaves again.
  “I never should have named you the Crash Test Dummies” I said, shaking my head. “It was asking for trouble”.

  There had been a 5th caterpillar who was much smaller than the others and of him I saw no sign. I looked carefully at everything I took out of the houses. On the bottom of the big rock I found what looked like a cast-off skin from an earlier molting, but it was about the size of my missing charge. Since I couldn’t find him anywhere else I decided that he must have been squashed.

  I loaded the 4 big guys into the large habitat and decided to wash out the small one and put it away for the year. I sprayed a few spots with an organic, non-toxic cleaner and turned the hose on it, thoroughly rinsing it, and set it out to dry. Then I went down the basement to sew more masks.

  “Hey Trace” Ted called  a few hours later, “there’s a caterpillar in that little habitat.”

• “No” I said, getting up from my machine. “No there’ not. No WAY. I looked really carefully at every inch! Then I washed the hell out of that thing with a garden hose!”
  I hurried outside and looked where he was pointing and there, clinging to the seam on one side of the screen house was a small caterpillar, not much bigger than the paring from your little fingernail.I got down on my knees and genuflected. “It’s a miracle!”I called. “Thank you, oh God of caterpillars!”
  Behold Lazarus the Unbreakable.

  Today here is where we stand:
  The 2 swallowtail Chrysali are still hanging there and will probably hatch in a day or so.
  Of the big caterpillars, one moved to the top of the box and is hanging in his J shape, soon to pupate. The other 3 are stuffing themselves at a ferocious rate and no doubt already feeling that mysterious caterpillar urge to crawl away and change.

  And Lazarus, the cleanest caterpillar in the world, is at least 30% bigger than he was yesterday and seems as healthy as can be.

  He will be my last baby of the year to fly- assuming he successfully manages all the incredible internal re-arrangeing that butterflies must undergo to get to that point. He will be such a late hatchling that he will probably be one of those who sets out flying south and west, crossing a thousand miles on delicate wings, looking for the monarch valley to spend the winter.

  So if you’re walking down the street or through a park in a few weeks and you see a beautiful monarch wobbling his way south- take a moment to say hello.
  It just might be my little Lazarus.

  (What is Disaster for Scotland about, you ask? Here you go)
  

Covid is such a mind-fuck.

I have had covid living in my brain since March. I mean it has moved in and taken over half the closet! I think about it a hundred times a day. I and millions of other Americans (the ones who take it seriously) self-monitor constantly… do I have it now? No? Ok good.  What about now?

That’s one of the worst parts: noticing and examining and fretting over every headache and cough and scratchy throat. Because these days it seems like almost any symptom you can have could be a symptom. I’m becoming a hypocondriac! But the alternative is to be reckless, and to risk spreading it to other people because I didn’t take the early symptoms seriously.

The worst part, though, is feeling fine today and not really being able to relax and enjoy it because its entirely possible that I already have it and just haven’t started feeling sick yet. Or could get it on my next trip to the grocery store. Or the one after that.

Yesterday was the 4th in a series of very stressful days for Ted. He had 3 high-pressure days at work (board meetings for which he had to co-ordinate and run the tech) culminated by what he thought would be a simply plumbing repair of a leaky shower head that turned into an emergency evening call to a plumber, who needed a part (they always do) so we had to go all night with the water shut off to the whole house.
So when he woke up Thursday feeling “wrong” and asked if he felt hot to me, even if he had, I wouldn’t have gone to red alert. Stress sometimes makes his Epstein Barr flare up and aches, low fever and general malaise are typical symptoms.
He didn’t seem to have a fever and after I made him eat lunch (he was too upset about the plumbing to eat dinner the day before and barely touched breakfast) he felt better.

Then Steve asked me late in the afternoon if he felt hot.
He didn’t have an elevated temp, but he had those fever eyes people sometimes get; slightly glassy and slightly red. He said he had muscle aches and a nasty headache, which were exactly the symptoms Ted had complained of all morning. Danger, Will Robinson! Since his temp was normal I brought him tylenol, reminded him to push fluids and tried to push it aside.
At 11:45 PM he came to me with the mercury thermometer in his mouth because he couldn’t figure out how to read it (the cheap digital one was giving ridiculous readings like 96.8 so I roll old school now when there’s reason to suspect a fever). He was 99.6  Technically doctors don’t even consider that a fever: its still within the body’s normal temp fluxuation range. But he had taken Tylenol 6 1/2 hours earlier, so was there still residual fever suppression from that?

He actually looked a little better than he had before dinner, and was enjoying an on-line game of Dungeons and Dragons. I told him to wait about half an hour, take it again and see if it was higher.

Then I went to bed and stared at the ceiling. It’s not normal to worry abot a perfectly healthy 33 year old man having a temp of 99.6 but that’s what covid does. It turns everything into a possible crisis!

He took his temp again a little after midnight: still mid 99’s. So he emailed his boss that he wasn’t coming in, played a little more D&D, took a shower, gathered up his things and quietly crept down to isolate himself in the basement “Bug Out” room, just in case.

This morning the trusty mercury thermometer said he was 98.4. I took it twice because he wasn’t sure how long it had been since he’d had a drink of water, and that will cool the mouth down. He took the vitamins and black elderberry I brought him and devoured a short stack of pancakes. No cough. No loss of smell or sore throat. Still… I told him to take it again after lunch and if it’s normal then, it was just one of those things, and to let his boss know that he’s ok to come in. And I can completely unclench.
For now.

Just about every symptom known to man, including digestional symptoms, have been reported by somebody to be associated with Covid 19. So in a person my age, a lot of symptoms that we have, off and on, all the time, could be an early sign.
Or not.
Which I assume is why people are so darn bipolar about it: either we say “To hell with this BS!” and ignore it (deadly stupidity) or we guard and worry and fret just a little all the time, and let it live in our minds, if not in our bloodstreams.

Plus, unless/until they come up with a vaccine, we are probably ALL gonna get this bitch sooner or later.

See? Total mind fuck.

In a way this whole spring has been waiting for disaster: for someone I love to get coronavirus, for Trump and his Republican sycophants to declare martial law and admit that democracy was a failed experiment (they’re coming closer to that every day). But these past few days have really ramped up the negative anticipation.

On Friday, according to the Post Office tracking system, my cousin Andy H. got my letter informing him that I’m throwing in the towel and letting him deal with whatever’s left of Margaret’s estate. F**k him and his need to control and dominate everyone. Any hope I had that he wouldn’t be a jerk about this has been squashed. I’m cutting my losses and walking away.

OK, so I always knew it would be a challenge to be Margaret’s executor, because of her brothers. These are the guys who, when she told them she was going to seminary to become a minister, basically said “Why? You’re going to hell anyway. Why waste your time?” Who never once came to her church and saw what a true leader she was there, saw how her strength shown like a beacon. Who scarcely could be bothered with her at all in her (unholy, deviant) life. Andy is pretty well off, but he left her to beg for help from friends and distant relations when her total disability left her impoverished to the point where she couldn’t afford food.
I knew that he (and to a lesser extent his brother David) would be a jerk. But I thought it would be easier than this. For one thing, I thought there would be a signed will, giving me actual authority to do the things I needed to do. I also didn’t know that she would die suddenly right as she was getting ready to move into an assisted living facility, and right as the state was going on a widespread lock-down because of a deadly global pandemic.

So there I was: 5 1/2 days until Margaret had to be out of her apartment, no legal access to her bank account, no idea what to do with all her stuff (she had fallen way behind on getting ready to move) and no legal authority to do anything. When she asked me to be her executor Margaret told me that there would be nothing much to settle: she had no savings or belongings of significant value… for her family to get pissy over. That last part she didn’t say, but it was the subtext. They weren’t going to challenge me over pots and pans, tables and shelves.
Right?

It started off badly when it turned out that Margaret had not put either of her brothers on the list of people to inform of her death, so they weren’t called. Probably just an omission born of illness, though they had never cared much for her in life~ perhaps she though they wouldn’t care about her death. After their initial “Why weren’t we informed?!” upset, the first phone calls I had with them were fine.
They were happy with me acting as executor- why not? It saved them having to deal with things, and I live a lot closer than they do. They did push for me to request an autopsy, which I refused. Margaret had been given a terminal diagnosis months earlier. An autopsy would cost a lot of money (that they certainly wouldn’t offer to pay) and probably delay the issueing of the death certificate. And without a signed, legal will, I could do almost nothing without that death certificate.

I rushed to her apartment after picking up her effects and arranging for the crematorium to collect her body. A good friend of hers from the church was already there and gave me the bad news: she found the paperwork giving me medical power of attorney and her living will, but not the will itself. We all knew what the will had said: me as executor, her partner’s daughter (Margaret’s own child in the eyes of everyone but the law) to inherit anything that might be left after the bills were paid. The apartment was a mess, papers and unopened mail everywhere, half-packed boxes in a corner.

We started sorting through papers, filling boxes and throwing things away. This was Thursday afternoon. Her lease was up Wednesday morning. I was told (never found anything written down) what company she had hired to move her posessions to the facililty where she planned to move. I switched the destination to a storage unit down the road and agreed to pay the bill.  What else could I do with all her stuff? Several pieces of furniture could be sold at an antique mall where my sister sells things- but antique malls are all closed right now. The other things could probably get $200 at a well-advertized yard sale- but no one is having those for the forseeable future.

I designated boxes to go to her daughter Elizabeth (things pertaining to Elizabeth’s mom and brother, both dead now) and others to go to the Hawk family. With Becky’s help I took 3 carloads of stuff to a nearby Volunteers of America that advertized on their sign that they were still open. And I made phone call after phone call.
Her papers were in such a mess that I had no idea what outstanding bills needed to be paid. She had expensive medical equipment that needed to be returned. It was a race against the clock, but on Wednesday morning, as I sat a safe distance away in the laundry room, wearing a mask, the movers packed up what was left and took it to storage. Moving and first month’s rent was about $600, but at least I didn’t have to drive out there every day and spend hours sifting through her posessions.

Then the texts started. Did you find this? What did you do with this? Send me papers about the car loan. I need info on the car insurance. Nothing genuinely confrontational, but given the very bossy, even bullying history we have in our (blessedly few) dealings with Andy, they made both Ted and me nervous. When I asked them both for their assurance that they were so far satisfied with what I was doing, I got a reply days later that mentioned something about ‘consulting with lawyers’.
Warning lights went from flashing yellow to orange.

Twice I told Andy that if he had any problems with how I was handling things, hey, I would happily transfer all responsibility to him, as representative of his mother, my Aunt Patty, and Margaret’s legal heir, since her more recent will (which was supposed to name me executor!!) never was found.
(Part of that is my fault. I should have realized that, despite her assurances that she was “doing alright!” Margaret was NOT doing alright, and that her assurances that she was handling getting the will we discussed signed and witnessed was probably no more reliable.)

ANYWAY, he responded to my communication by demanding more information about the car.

Once of the few brotherly things (that I know of) that Andy did for Margaret was to co-sign on a loan so she could buy a decent car. For about a year Margaret earned money driving for Uber, and you need a decent car to do that. About 10 days before she died Andy and his brother Dave came to Columbus and collected the big roll-top desk that she couldn’t take to her assisted living apartment and Andy took posession of the car.
I assumed that when he did this he also collected what paperwork he needed for it. Why wouldn’t he do this? Margaret was right there, alive, to tell him where the paperwork was! He was driving it away forever.
The original plan had been for them to transfer the title to him at that time, but due to our old friend Covid, the BMV was only working by appointment (to keep as few people in the offices at a time as possible) and he didn’t think of that, and Margaret wasn’t well enough to go with him and sign the transfer anyway. So he just drove off with the car and, to my mind, it was no longer an issue for me to worry about.
Except rather than put on his big boy pants and deal with it himself, he made sure that it very much was my problem.

He bitched because he said she was upside-down on the loan, and owed about 2K more than the car was worth. (While simultaneously demanding I find paperwork on the loan for him. Really? Who co-signs on a car loan and doesn’t keep paperwork on the loan you are responsible for? And if he didn’t have any paper on it, how did he know that she was upside-down?)
As this was a rich man crying poor, I commiserated by saying that I was out 2K already too and suggested he just let the bank reposess the car, if he didn’t want to pay. (My credit rating!” he complained. Yeah, well, you signed for the loan so you took that chance) I mailed him everything I could find pertaining to the car (Including a death certificate as soon as I got them so he could get the title transferred) but he kept bugging me about it.

Then a week ago I got a text saying that 1) He and Dave needed to come ‘assess the contents of the storage unit’ on Friday and I should let them in, and 2) by the way the latest installment of the car insurance bill was about to auto-debit Margaret’s tiny bank account.

1) WHY? The stuff in storage isn’t going anywhere and, in case you haven’t noticed, we’re still under an “essential travel/business only” order.
2) WHY? Why is the estate paying insurance on a vehicle no longer in its possession? Why not just cancel the insurance on a car that surely you’re not driving now, since you say you haven’t transferrred the title yet? It doesn’t need to be insured.
And because I wasn’t named executor and I couldn’t go down to teh probate court (so things that normally take a day were taking a week or more) I still couldn’t see how much was in her checking account. For all I knew, there wasn’t enough there to pay for the insurance.

The reply was that
1) We want to make sure you don’t sell off stuff that the family should have (Bull. I’m not able to sell anything now and I sent 4 or 5 boxes of everything I found remotely related to his family off with his son Tim the day before the movers came) and
2) You need to get me a court order to switch the car title and I can’t get the insurance in my name without the title. (Ridiculous. See #2 above for why you do not need insurance)

Warning lights switched from orange to red.

After talking with several people in my family (including my Dad, who still has a bad taste in his mouth for Andy H. after the way he behaved when Grandma died and the family came to divide her posessions) I put in a call to the Franklin County Probate Resource Center to ask the staff guy (who had gotten me started filing papers) how hard it would be for me to withdraw as executor. Because this crap is just too much.
While I never had any illusions of getting a executor’s fee out of the job, I had hoped to get at least some of my expenses reimbursed. But if  Andy kept sucking money out of her account to pay things like car insurance bills, there wouldn’t be any money left even for her burial! And while I was willing to write off my entire $2000 expenditure in the name of That’s what you do for Family, I was not willing to have her brother sniping at me and casting insinuations that I was selling/stealing valueable stuff when I had no will saying I have the right to dispose of the estate.
I had shouldered all of the responsibility with none of the legal authority.

The reply was- there’s nothing you need to do to withdraw as executor because you are not and have never been the executor. You’re just the person who stepped in and did what needed to be done. And that’s fine, as long as the family agrees to it. And if they don’t… well, I can refer you to a lawyer. Who will probably charge $350 an hour.
Yipes.
All I had to do was- nothing. Formal probate proceedings had not yet been opened- that’s what I was in the process of filing, and with covid, it was taking forever. Now, without probate being filed by someone I couldn’t get reimbursed for my expenses by the estate and would have to rely on the Hawk family to do it. But there is no guarantee that the estate could do that anyway!
If the family decides to file, I will have 6 months to demand compensation, and with the paperwork and letter I have, the state will recognize my claim. If I don’t file, and they decide not to file either, I was definitely going to be stuck with the bills. unless they decided to do the decent thing and re-imburse me.
It seemed the better hand, and Ted agreed. “I don’t have a problem making a $2000 donation to take care of Margaret” he said. “I want you done with these guys.”

So I sent Andrew H a registered letter formally telling him that I am going to turn over the storage unit and its contents and all responsibility for anything else that needs to be done to him. You wanted to ‘assess’ the stuff? Come and get it. Or take over payments on the unit rental. I’ll give you whatever papers and notes I have, plus Margaret’s cell phone, wallet, checkbook, the cash she had with her- all the things I was not willing to mail to you. Pick a day- and be prepared to buy your own lock, because the one on the unit now is mine.

And now I’m waiting for him to reply.
Will he be belligerent? I’m betting no, because he REALLY doesn’t want this burden- he just wanted to boss me around while I did all the work. He knows there’s nothing of any monetary value there. But who knows.

I informed Elizabeth that I am withdrawing and will do my best to get all the things I set aside for her out of the unit and into my basement. I will have to let Andy inspect it and assure himself that I’m not smuggling out secret wealth and that there is nothing there that he can remotely claim the H family should have.  And I reminded her that I had found a paper about life insurance, though it wasn’t recent and Margaret had never mentioned it when we discussed her finances. I gave her the policy number, Elizabeth called and- son of a gun, the policy was still good, and yes, she IS the beneficiary! Some good news!

She said she could deal with it if they kept her stuff.
“I’ve got what matters: I’ve got Margaret” I said.
“Do you think they might demand her ashes for themselves?” she asked.
“If they do I’ll charge them $1200 for them” I said, (the cost I paid the crematorium). “Then I’ll take a small amount out for you and they can have the rest.”
She was good with that.

The Hawk brothers disdain Elizabeth, perhaps because she represents the ‘fallen’ nature of their sister: the daughter of her beloved partner Stephanie, who led Margaret into sin. (These are the guys who to this day refuse to admit that their 3rd brother, Kenny, died of AIDS- because he was gay also. He allowed them this fiction about his sexuality, so they covered their eyes and never kicked him out the way they did Margaret- even though they knew.)

So I suppose it is possible that they will demand the remains sister whom they never respected in life, just to foil her friends and loved ones from having her in death.
Margaret’s partner, and Elizabeth’s brother all have some of their ashes buried beneath a tree outside of town, in a park. When she is able to travel to Ohio at last Elizabeth and I plan to arrange a memorial service for Margaret, and then she will take her to the tree to be with those who went before her. A small portion is all she needs for that.

So here I am, waiting for that shoe to drop, to see if Andy will be decent about this or make it harder. I know I already discharged my duty to Margaret. I talked to her friends and packed up her belongings and helped her daughter so that SHE didn’t have to deal with the brothers. Hopefully in another week or so I won’t ever have to talk to either of them ever again.
When the time comes that we are able to have a memorial celebration of Margaret’s life and all the gifts she shared with others… I don’t plan to even tell her brothers about it. Someone else can- that’s fine. (I don’t get to say who comes and who does not) But I won’t. They probably wouldn’t come with all those gay people there, and no one will want them there.

Update:
After praising me effusively andalmost *begging* me to keep handling the estate, Andy took over.  Weeks later, shortly after texting me to confirm the amounts on the bills I had paid, I got a call from the crematorium saying that he had called and asked for a copy of the bill and of my payment.
I gave him a copy of every bill and receipt:  moving, storage and crematorium, months ago when they came up to clear out the unit. I showed it to him and made him look at it.  Obviously he still had it, since he quoted it to the penny in his text to me. The only reason I could think of to ask *them* for a copy was to let me know that he was making sure I hadn’t faked the reciepts I gave him.
Seriously?
But a week later I received a check for the full amount of those bills.
Good enough. He did the right thing- I’ll give him that.
My sister says I should block him on my phone and have no further contact with him at all. Tempting.