I'm such an ass. I said something really, really nasty to my sister out of anger. We got into a fight and she was being so good and not saying anything too terrible, calling me "kettle" (as in the kettle calling the pot). She's been keeping it together so well that sometimes I forget this is just as hard on her as it is on me. And my patience is thin and I'm exhausted, and she is, too, and if she's tense it's because of that, and I'm such an ass cause she's grieving just as much as I am and I was completely mean and not understanding when she was having a hard time. I'm sorry, honey. I feel so awful.

She consoles herself with the same thought I do -- that my mother's at peace, that the sad things that troubled her no longer do. Death isn't hard on the dead, it's only hard on the living who're left behind. And I know this and I know I want her back for selfish reasons, but I still want her back.

I've been trying to find a picture of me and my mom I'll want to put in her casket and I've been meaning to make a card (Jess's idea), too, but I feel overwhelmed. I know the idea of putting things in someone's coffin seems silly -- what's a dead body going to do with those things? But I can't stop myself. It's just another way to keep myself busy remembering her.

I am so tired. I go to bed late -- busy all day long with cleaning and getting things ready for the funeral and if I'm not busy for any period of time, I'm anxious that I should be doing something. I can't sleep during the day, I can't go to bed early -- I'm jittery and don't want too much down time to think.

Yesterday we made a big back yard effort and Amy, Jess's friend, did a whole heap of work out there and made a section of it look lovely. My aunt was out there scooping up piles of leaves with her hands and putting them in the trash bin. My uncle was madly trying to throw stuff away that I told him he couldn't. We left one section of the cluttered backyard mostly intact for my sanity -- I don't want all of it to change all at once. My sister's allergies wouldn't let her join us outside, so she scrubbed the toilets clean (better her than me I guess).

We ran errands -- Jess & Amy, and Frank & I separately, and had a seemingly normal day. I had begun to think that it got easier every day, and that at the rate my sobbing had ceased, my mother would be a distant memory in a couple of months and I'd grow used to her absence, forgetting about how much I missed her. But it doesn't get easier; every day is just different. Sometimes there isn't enough to do. There are times when I'm too tired and aimless to concentrate on any given task so I wander the rooms, drift off looking at pictures, sobbing my little heart out. I think the days are catching up to me, up to Jess, too. Sometimes my sister drives me crazy -- her tone of voice, her extreme moodiness, but I don't say anything.