Paying One's Final Respects

Today, people from my church gathered together to say our final farewells to a lady of our congregation. She was 95 years old and lived a full life. A very sweet, amazing person to know. She had known my parents since they were like 13 or 14 years old. Mom had been quite sad to see her pass away.

After the memorial service, we went to the cemetary. Funny thing, most of the people who showed up for the dedication of the grave were women. The fellow from the funeral home and our bishop were a little dismayed. Who were going to be the paulbearers?? There weren't 6 men who were healthy enough to carry the casket from the hearse! In the end, the fellow from the funeral home rounded up 8 of us women and we carried the casket which held the earthly remains of our friend to her final resting place. Our bishop had thought women paulbearers were fitting. All 8 of us were her friends or children of her friends. My mother, my sister and I were 3 of those 8 people. It may seem a little odd, but it felt like an honor to help lay her to rest.

This got me to thinking. Why has it always been (to my knowledge) men who were the paulbearers? When it comes time to "plant me in the dirt", I think I want 6 or 8 of my female friends and family to lay me to rest. (Unless I have a husband or any male family or friends that want to be paulbearers, then they would be welcome to join the women doing the job.) I also think, like my bishop, that it is entirely appropriate for women to be the paulbearers for another woman.

Opinions?

The Fashion Industry Should Die in a Fire For My Amusement

So, done with my second week of clinicals. I get a week off to recover. I feel really sad. I really liked my patients last week, they were able to talk about things. My other patients had pretty much been non-verbal, so this had be a real treat for me. It was fun to be able to talk about religions and not have any bat an eye or give you the "that makes people (who aren't even a part of the conversation) really uncomfortable, drop the subject, or I'll go tell on you!" lecture. I got to hear about great-grandchildren, what it was like to ride a horse in the desert and all sorts of other stuff. I'm no great conversationalist, but I do enjoy getting to hear what people think about things, as it forces me to try to think outside of my comfortable little "bubble."

My weekend sucked. I went clothes shopping. If you know me in person, you know that this almost NEVER goes over well. Such is the lot of this fat girl, it seems. Mind you, I made sure to go to stores that sold the plus or "fat" sizes and to stores that sold ONLY the "fat" sizes. You know, so I MIGHT have better than a snowball's chance in hell of finding something that fit and looked decent on me? What did I find? Jack and Shit. And Jack was out of town. I kid you not. NOTHING fit.

You know what made me break down in tears? One of the clerks (at the fat clothes store, no less) told me, "You shouldn't bother coming in here until you've lost like 4o pounds." AT THE FUCKING FAT CLOTHES STORE!! Let's be real here. My current dress size is a 26. (Yeah, yeah, take those "fatass!!" cat calls and choke on them, fat haters.) This store advertized sizes 12 to 30. Let me see... 26 is BETWEEN 12 and 30!! Logically, this shop should have had clothing in my size. Well... do socks count? Bras are nice, but I need something to wear OVER them in public.... Aside from that, not a fucking thing was to be found that fit. As I was driving home, still in tears, I realized I wished I had said to the clerk, "If I could lose weight with a snap of my fingers, would I even BE here, lady? By the way, how you treat someone who WAS going to be a paying customer? Shitty. Same for your attitude."

"Oh, you must be mistaken about your size, Sarah, you DID put on some weight!" Oh no, I am NOT mistaken. I took my measurements and they were pretty much what a size 26 in a dress would be. (Minus the ginormus boobies, darn it! I am the only fat girl I know who is not well endowed in the boob department. ;_; ) I even had a friend who makes dresses double check me! What is the damn deal here?! 100 pieces of size 12 clothes, a couple 16s to 18s, one 20 one 22 and two 30s do NOT cover the entire 12 to 30 spectrum!!

I think I'll just start buying more of my nursing scrub uniforms and wear those around. At least I know those fit. I hate wearing scrubs, but at least I'm not made to feel like an entire pig stuffed into a 1 pound sausaage casing while in them! I'm debating if I have enough spare time from my studying for exams, writing 2 research papers and somehow finding time to sleep and bathe, to take up sewing. I'm way past frustrated. One more incident like this and I'll just walk my ass naked around town. I'm half way serious, too.