Memorial day

I don't remember if we just remember veterans or all people whohave died today. I thought veterans had their own holiday,but I guess it would be rude to exclude them from today. I need to know because i am working and my work is on the campus of a VA hospital (hence my fight with the VA police a while back) so I need to know if I should be nicer than usual to them. Actually, I don't since they are not dead. And i am pretty much always nice to people at work, saving my bitchiness for those closer to me and of course my blog.

I am not a big go-er to the cemetary on Memorial day or any other day for that matter although I do not mind the plant people having their big sales of cemetary pots. How often do they get a chance for that? I don't think that once people are dead they stay where they are buried. Even though my mother's grave is very close to Doyle's Bar in Jamaica Plain and I think she would like that.

When I think of dead people, as opposed to when I think of people I wish were dead and there are a lot more of them, anyway the dead people I think of are my mother and Emily, my niece who really did fight cancer, really was courageous and wonderful and beautiful and did not get a wimpy-ass cancer like mine, and ultimately did not survive. She died from leukemia at age 19 4 years ago on tax day, April 15th. So April 15th is usually my memorial day. Anyway i am sure that Emily is the motivation behind my making fun of my own cancer because she went through so much more and was really much nicer and more gracious about it than i am. She never demanded a better parking space or a free meal because she had cancer. I did that for her. I also taught all the kids in the resource room at Children's hospital when their parents or other adults set a limit on them, or said they couldn't have that particular toy or whatever, to just look at them and say, "How can you say that to a kid with cancer?" So maybe this is payback.

So I do not need cemetaries because: 1. Emily is cremated and I have some of her ashes in a sephora bag on my bookshelf. The rest are scattered (By me, Meghan, Laura and Cindy- other friends have scattered her elsewhere) on the Spanish and French Riviera, the Seine River under the Eiffel Tower, somewhere in Monaco, Hanalei bay in Kaui, Hawaii, waikiki beach and my soon to be former swimming pool. and 2. People I love stay with me. Well mainly, my mother is mostly with Meghan because she didn't like me very much but made up for it by really really loving Meghan. And Emily I don't doubt is always around, playing little tricks, usually involving prescription drugs (long story.)

So my main thing about memorial day is that it is the day after which one can wear white shoes. Uniforms and sneakers don't count. But remember one of my favorite movies ever, Serial Mom? I think the crime was wearing white shoes after labor day, but it is the same concept. We are now safe to wear white dress shoes until Labor day without getting hacked up by kathleen Turner. Just get it from netflix, you will know what i am talking about.