This was the plan for the summer

Wa-a-a-ay back at the beginning of July, I brought home a car full of paperwork that my mother has had squirrelled away forever. My job, self-imposed, was to sort it all into some kind of sensible arrangement, and catalog it.

Then life intervened.

But I got a start today, at last. I brought in the wooden filebox Dad made, the one Mom & I went through two days after Dad's funeral. That time we found both of Dad's parents' Bibles. This time, those had been removed, leaving a lot of photos and a smaller cigar-box sized wooden box of "Grandma's stuff." How do I know it's Grandma's stuff? Well, it's got a perfume bottle and a lot of women's handkerchiefs in it. But I could have told you it came from her house because--30 years after her death--it reeks of her. The smell comes out in tsunami-sized waves: suddenly I'm 4 years old and lying on her couch recovering from (something) and trying to figure out why her house smells the way it does. And I'm 8 years old and gagging on the scent in her nursing-home room (the same scent). And I'm 41, trying not to sneeze and thinking, "Why did Dad save this particular stuff?"

Now it's 3 hours later. I've sorted the photos into piles by size and started taking notes. In a way, I'm the worst person in the family to do this, being so much younger than my siblings. I have no idea if a picture of a boy is a Wilson or a Taylor. I don't know whose house these 36 stiff and sober people are standing in front of, nor do I know where it is (but it's a nice big house!). But I did find out that Floyd and Lloyd, who were apparently twins, were raised by someone other than their mother. I found her picture, taken with her husband. But I have no idea who they are in relation to me.

My notes look like this:

Polaroid in unk. front yard
woman w baby (L--- R----?)
labelled on back:

"This was taken in July
How do you like Sunbonnet Sue?
I think Marcilane has a pretty [maneuver?]

And that's a detailed note.

While doing this I turned on the TV for company (The Beast was sorting through medical bills and muttering in here by the computer and Sparky was next door). I ended up on the Travel Channel watching 5 Takes Europe which was following rapidly by Haunted Travels, which seemed perfectly suited to what I was doing.

Running though my head are stories of haunted dorms and lighthouses and haunted families. The books I'm reading even have some relationship to haunting and ghosts.

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I was interrupted at that point by Beast coming inside to tell me that our neighbor's grandfather died today. Plus she had two injury reports to write up at work today, one of whom may have to see a doctor (she works for the local electric company). Just a generally shitty day. More ghosts.

I was making spaghetti for supper anyway, so we'll just add more noodles to the pot and have them over so she can catch a break. That means I need to go cook.