Apologies for the past two incredibly personal funeral/death posts, but, as you may imagine, I have had some unbelievably complicated thoughts I needed to put into words. Not sad. Not angry. Just…complicated.

This post’s title references this Tweet.

As I walked past my chain-smoking relatives the irony hadn’t yet set in for me that the woman whose death had brought us all together had died at the age of 69 from complications from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease brought on undoubtedly from her constant cigarette smoking for the majority of her adult life.

That’s because I didn’t know what had actually led to her death, but it was also because I was trying to approach the entire funeral experience with tact. I wanted to be open-minded to the woman and family that never seemed to embrace me, if only for my mom’s sake.

But then I met my aunt/cousin Rulinda (see previous post for explanation) and she walked toward me smelling of smoke and tears. She hugged me and said as she was pulling away “Thank you for coming.”

And I think I gave her the most horrid face that I’ve ever made at a woman above the age of 50 (who wasn’t an educator), saying with my expression “Why the fuck wouldn’t I be here? This woman was related to me through blood. It’s a matter of respect and she and I were family.”

She was taken aback and I immediately regretted my expression. Sheepishly she said “I don’t know what to say, I just say what I think,” showing she knew exactly why I had scowled and, unbelievably to me (the asshole) that she was human.

I vowed to be more understanding from that moment on because, in truth, no one ever knows what to say at funerals. “It was a lovely ceremony.” “He/she looks great” referring to whoever’s in the casket. What? And that brought me back to the truth I’ve always adhered to concerning funerals: the fact that everyone ends up going to more funerals in their lifetime than they ever want to.

So I adjusted my tie and prepared to meet and speak with family members, because lo and behold, it turns out I am related to the deceased! My name was listed first as her grandchildren (nearly solving the mystery of whether I should follow legal or biological genealogy to know my place in the family), and I was expected to stand and receive friends and family.

And so began a parade of people that used to know me when I was this big. The fact that these people live less than an hour from where I’ve lived my entire life and haven’t seen me in more than 10 years only compounded my anger that these idiots were assumed relatives of mine. Some gems:

“Are you a rock star?” – from an uncle(?) who lives in Raleigh, no less. Clearly he wanted to say something about my hair, but he just choked.

“I haven’t seen you in a long time. We’ll have to do something about that.” – from a great uncle that used to visit us twice weekly when my granny was alive but since 1999 has visited my mom perhaps a dozen times. Oh and he married a woman who was accused of killing her husband, lives 10 minutes from my house and my mom changed his gauzes daily for him following his surgery in the early 2000s.

My response? “We just did.”

Then Rulinda comes by with a friend of hers to introduce to my sister. “This was her…granddaughter…I guess…”

What the fuck? You can’t read the program? Let’s just go with what’s printed there to keep things clean today…

So after hugs, handshakes and two trips to the bathroom to wash my hands because the idiot pastor insisted on shaking my hand after my first sanitation trip (even as I shoved my hands into my pockets and made it clear I didn’t want to shake) it was time for the ceremony at which the idiot pastor preceded to talk about how hard Faye worked for her family.

I laughed. Silently, of course, so I didn’t disturb those grieving, but it was hard to keep it quiet as I leafed through the program, complete with a bio indicating that Faye graduated in 1959…yes, a year before my mom was born. She began her work career as a high school graduate (no college) to begin saving enough money to provide for her other three daughters while my mom was being raised across town by her biological grandmother. (Though, as noted in my previous post, I have accepted this was for the best).

So my complications with that side of my family were compounded today though my ride back to Raleigh with Taylor let us both vent.

Big surprise: we were thinking the exact same thing at every stage of the funeral.

The closest we came to crying was when we imagined our other grandparent dying. We got pissed off every time someone brought up how long it had been since the last time we had been together. We talked about how disconcerting the entire affair was and which songs we wanted played at our funeral. (Friends: please assure this is played).

And so while the entire weekend has muddied my emotions about my mom’s side of the family and complicated further my understanding of my family tree, I came out of it with even more understanding about my connections within my immediate family: my sister is my best friend.

Last night, something happened that I’ve been thinking about since I was 11 years old: my mom’s mom died.

You may be wondering if she’s been battling an illness for the past 12 years. Nope, it was kind of sudden as far as I could tell. You’re probably also wondering why I didn’t call her my grandma, or some variation of that word, but that’s what has made this moment in my life something I’ve wondered about since 1999.

It all started in 1960 when my mom was born. Her biological mother, Faye, felt she was too young to raise a child, so my mom’s grandmother, Myrtle, (Don’t you love these old people names…) drove my mom home from the hospital. She completed adoption papers for my mom a few days later, and just like that my mom’s biological granny became her adopted mom while her biological mom became her sister legally.

All of this was kept from me when I was younger so I wouldn’t get so confused, but in 1999 when Myrtle died, my mom explained it all to me.

I had always called Faye “grandma” and had always called Myrtle “granny,” and also had a great aunt that we grandkids always called “granny Fox,” but in a year when I learned Faye was legally my aunt and granny and granny Fox died, I felt like a kid who had lost three grandparents in a single year.

But beyond that, Faye and her other daughters never had anything to do with my family except for Christmas, so I grew very resentful of my mom’s side of the family. I remember one time when I mentioned my birthday was the following week and Faye hadn’t even realized while she spent most of her time with my “cousins.”

And so it happened that I began to wonder what would happen when I learned what I heard yesterday about my aunt/grandma. Would I cry? Would it even matter to me? What emotions were going to take hold of me when I learned of her death?

It’s a morbid thought, I know, but with such a weird family history, it was something that came up in my mind countless times throughout adolescence.

And so when my mom delivered the news last night between Taylor’s volleyball match and my Wake Christian football game, I was speechless.

I had since come to terms with my grandma’s absence in my life thanks to my mom, who pointed out that within her side of the family (the portion that spent the most time with Faye) there were three teenage pregnancies out of wedlock, at least two jailbirds and exactly zero college ATTENDEES.

But with learning of Faye’s death, all I could feel was regret over the grudge I held for so many years.

I would have liked to have said goodbye, or at least to have seen her within the past five months, but it’s not so much about missed opportunities as much as I was just ashamed of adolescent Ty’s grudge against a family member.

Do you guys have any regrets concerning relatives or weird family tree stories?

The appeal for spicy foods had always eluded me, somehow.

I love to try different things, but anytime there’s a chili pepper logo or flame attached to a dish, I tend to stay away, preferring to err on the side of mild.

I just felt I had burned my tongue too many times on hot coffee to want to put it through pain on purpose, though I appreciated the flavors of hot stuff. Jalapenos sometimes would sometimes make an appearance in my diet, and sometimes I test ed myself with wings and hot sauces, but mostly just to assure myself again that spicy foods weren’t for me.

And then something happened. I was at Sammy’s for trivia one Tuesday night and Brent and Kate got the idea to order ten super-hot boneless wings. I can’t remember what Sammy’s calls their hottest…nuclear or inferno or something…I’ll find out sometime, but the idea was we would race. The first person to eat all three of their wings would eat the final, tenth wing to signify their winning of the contest.

And so I shoved hot, spicy chunks of meat down my throat as fast as possible. Of course I lost (Brent finished first, then Kate) after a lot of water and an unscheduled tearful lap around the restaurant in case I vomited, I celebrated quietly inside. I had eaten hot stuff on purpose and survived.

Then I received instructions to eat something spicy to help me get through a rough spot from Obi-Wan KelseySchnellobi. I never told him that he was insane and that I hated spicy food (mostly fearing another patriarchal tongue-lashing) and decided to push the thought of spicy food from my mind.

But it wasn’t long before peer pressure (from a very large man) had me staring down spiciness again.

I was interviewing Lamar Adams, a former Garner High standout and recent inductee into the Elon sports hall of fame, at Buffalo Brothers, a sports bar on Capital Boulevard. I had arrived late (as usual) and he had already ordered appetizers.

I got a beer (Sam Adams Summer Seasonal…ahh…) and we started talking about the NFL. Before long, there were eight jalapeno poppers in front of us and he TOLD me to eat.

I tried one and he made me eat another. Before I knew it, the waitress was asking if I needed another beer. I realized that if the spicy food continued, I would be too plastered to ask any questions.

Next came the hot wings…I was sure to eat slowly and drink even slower, but Adams had ordered 20 and was insistent that 10 of them were mine. They paled in spiciness to the Sammy’s wings and the jalapeno poppers, but it still kept me on my toes as the interview continued and I fought to appear manly before one of the Triangle’s all-time most feared defensive tackles.

So that was twice I conquered the sinister of spice, but there was another challenge to come. Outside of spicy mustard at The Flying Saucer and helping my mom with Asian Zing wings from Buffalo Wild Wings, my next heat against heat came Sunday when an old friend took me out for sushi.

I allowed her to order, since I knew nothing of sushi and only offered her distinct instructions not to order anything too spicy.

Sure enough, everything the waiter brought had spicy in its description. Spicy tuna, spicy mayo, spicy whatever…I don’t remember, but I decided to grin and bear it. Or, as Kelsey would put it, I “manned up.”

And that, my friends, was the greatest sushi experience I had ever had. The spices played off the tunas and seaweeds and whatever the hell else I ate perfectly.

It was a taste explosion, and that’s when I realized that despite of all of my liberal food explorations that had ranged from alligator to snails, I had built up one rule: nothing spicy – a rule that needed to be broken before understood that it was one meant to be broken.

With the final barrier broken, now I’m finally free to explore any foods that tickle my fancy, not matter that there’s a biohazard logo beside it. I won’t go overboard by any means, but it feels good to open up a menu with no encumbrances.

Was it the guiding force of Kelsey that led me to this awakening or just a series of peer-pressure-riddled situations? I don’t care either way, really. Just get me two glasses of water with whatever I order and let’s eat.

1. To avoid the staggered half-apologetic posting schedule of some of my closest blogging friends (I’m looking at you, Derek) I have been busy for the past week doing what I do best: thinking about writing.

I can’t begin to guess how many leads I’ve written in my head in advance of even transcribing my notes and how many Tweets, headlines, blog posts or chapters of my memoirs I’ve composed in my head only to forget them before I could chronicle them.

But beyond remembering deja vu-like phrases and strung together sentences, the biggest deterrent to me blogging over the past week has been you: the reader.

When I was at Technician, and even now at The Garner Citizen, it’s fairly easy to pick out what stories are newsworthy. Anything an average student would need/want to know belongs in the Technician and anything concerning sports in the Garner area probably deserves a mention in the Citizen’s sports pages.

And that brings me to the articles (and a video) that first dragged me into this pit of overanalysis concerning my web presence from The New York Times Magazine.

NYTMag’s most recent series of stories has been concerned with “The Way We Live Now” and has had an increased focus on social networking and how it has changed…well everything.

Here’s an excerpt from an e-mail I wrote to Daniel and Jessica concerning the articles:
“Even when we write in our personal blogs or Tweets or whatever, often we have to think twice about how others will perceive us. How many times have you done something and immediately thought, “Wow, I can’t wait to write about this on our travel blog” or began thinking about how to write it while you were still experiencing it. … If you’re constantly chronicling your present, are you ever truly experiencing it?”

And so, NYTMag gave me a writer’s block that I couldn’t shake. If I blogged, was I really benefitting myself since my posts would be tid bits about my life packaged in a way that you, the reader, may find entertaining? If I discuss the strangest class I’ve ever enrolled in (see below) in a story-telling manner am I sapping myself of my ability to appreciate it by trying to convince you to as well?

(Yes. Overanalysis. But that’s typically what I do. I search for motives and reasons and I just really like the question why…especially when I feel like I have a hunch it will lead to someone asking why not. I don’t really look for meanings in absolutely everything, but I have this divining rod within me that feels poetic justice wins out in the end. I guess I’m still convinced this life is just a novel I’m living and that each event and happening foreshadows something else. Yeah that sounds a lot like fate, but I like using lots of words to describe concepts…it’s good for the vocabulary and prevents me from falling victim to Orwell’s dreaded Newspeak).

And so I’ve decided to break down a few events I wanted to write about in shorter forms below. These are my thoughts of the past week. Enjoy:

2. So I’m a history major and at N.C. State, the jewel in the crown that is your useless History B.A. is a senior seminar known as HI 491. (Derek will remember this as well).

There are different sections and they’re all very specifically tailored to minute details in history. I wanted to take the one about the Jimmy Carter administration (My mentor’s favorite president) but ended up in one about NOLA and Katrina. Not bad, right? It’s exciting, it’s current, it’s history I lived through.

But then I received a rather disappointing letter from a former professor of mine. It was a D. I deserved it, but this did mean I needed to add a new class to graduate on time. After a few tweaks to my schedule, I was set to graduate, though I was now enrolled in a different seminar: Rule of law from a historical perspective.

Let’s recap: Need to pass difficult class. Enrolled in exciting class. Need to pass additional class. Enrolled in another class, plus a class that’s title draws me to sleep.

But then, amazingness struck! This class began when the head of the history department was talking to a colleague about blah blah blah…and then the TEAGL foundation (a derivative of Exxon-Mobil, somehow) sponsored the class.

So this is an experimental class of 11 with two professors who have some cash to burn. This means the hummus in my refrigerator was paid for by a grant. It also means the dinners we’re having later this semester (including travel) will be paid for by this grant, but that may not even be the best part.

This course, which is all about philosophy and deep-thinking overanalysis (see above for why this makes me excited), will include a final paper that may be published in a book my professors are writing about their experiment.

So I get free hummus, dinners, a degree and a chance to be published in a real academic book? Saddle up and ride!

3. I feel like this article is an essential read for anyone in any of my shoes right now. That is, in college, in your 20s, concerned about when it’s time to grow up, unsure about any career paths or goals, wondering if moving back home is a pathway toward a career goal, unsure about graduate school, Americorps, Peace Corps, the Armed Forces, considering studying abroad or taking a year off, contemplating what religion is, means or should be…pretty much any normal thought of a college student/20-something. Which is exactly what the article is about.

Take a look at it (it’s very long, though) and let me know what you think…I would like to devote a lecture to it…or at least find out if someone else was as encouraged and discouraged by it at the same time.

4. I love Ferris Bueller’s day off.

To learn a bit more about what you consider news (at least, the type of news content I can create), allow me to attempt a funneling of your comments. Post 1 was on blogging itself as I contrasted my views and experiences with that of some articles found in a recent periodical. Post 2 was a hyperlocal focus on a class I’m in. Post 3 is similar to Post 1, though I’d like to expand it in a way that focuses on how I feel like the article affects society as a whole. Post 4, well that’s just because that movie could be considered among my cinematic building blocks of life along with Anchorman.

So what do you, the reader, prefer? Wanna know what I think about me, what’s going on in my life, what I think about you and society and how much you disappoint me, or more about Ferris?

Comment away! This blogging adventure is brand-new for me, and I want you guys to come along with me.

So as I begin my actual blogging career, I’d like to share with you how I’ve arrived at this particular site.

I got this WordPress site in the spring to build a Web portfolio on for a class, though I quickly realized WP doesn’t have an easy-to-use Issuu extension, so I moved my portfolio here. See how awesome that resume scrolling feature is? Why doesn’t WordPress allow that? If I can ever figure out how to make that work, I’ll integrate that portfolio until WordPress, but until then I prefer Issuu and Blogspot.

But as I blogged on this site this summer for yet another writing course, I realized I really wanted a site to vent about the frustrations and irony of life, so I decided I would convert my classblog into this, so I started looking around for ideas.

I particularly liked what my MSCNE friends Rikki and Kelsey used their blogs for. It was an additional writing medium where they provided commentary on politics and journalism and whatever they were doing. It was great because while we follow each other on Twitter and spent a rather blurry week together last year, their blogs gave me a concrete opportunity to learn more about what was going on in their lives as fellow journalists even though they’re in Michigan and Washington. Then I realized if their opinions on life entertained me, there must be billions of people that want to know what I think.

And so I’ve removed the class-related posts from this site and now this will be the chief site through which you can find out everything I think about anything in 140+ characters. (For less than 140 character updates on my life, follow @tyjohnson1)

But what about the other Ty Johnsons out there? What if I want to follow in Mr. Schnell’s footsteps and get a real domain? What if I’m not the coolest Ty Johnson on the Internet?Trust me, I looked around on Google for quite some time (0.32 seconds) to gauge the Ty Johnson competition and the market out there for me-related domains.

And so here are some of my Ty Johnson brethren:

3D Modeler Ty Johnson of Oregon: http://www.tyjohnson.net/
This Ty most likely was late to the domain party, as well, but that .net definitely lends some legitimacy to his site. Here’s a bit about him from his bio at tyjohnson.net:
“For over four years now, I’ve helped studios bring their ideas into the third dimension. Most recently I was “Modeler” for LAIKA Studios and created countless 3D assets for developing feature films.
I realize the life of a model doesn’t begin and end with me. Instead, I take it upon myself to understand the needs of riggers and texture artists and do what I can to make their jobs easier. Time has also taught me to channel my fine-arts background into every project with a haste that could only come from commercial experience.”

Artist Ty Johnson of Kansas: http://www.tyjohnsonart.com
This story is awesome. Apparently he has been missing for more than a decade and this site is run by the son of a friend. Here’s an excerpt from his bio:
“Ty was born in Kansas in 1941. He did 3 tours in Vietnam. He was a boxer in the marines. After Vietnam he came and stayed with us for one night ….“then he disappeared for over 10 years.”After being a missing person for over a decade Ty sent an intricately drawn card to my dad that just said, “Still Alive” signed Ty. My dad said of him, “I knew him better than anybody, and I didn’t know him.” He was a very mysterious guy. He had a large vocabulary and was very well educated but liked the excitement of being in the ghetto. My Dad said about him”He wasn’t afraid of anybody.” “

The real Ty Johnson?: http://www.tyjohnson.com/
This is evidence that having the definitive domain name doesn’t mean you necessarily have the best content.

Photographer Ty Johnson of Virginia: http://www.tyjohnsonphotography.com/
This Ty Johnson and his Nikon have found some beautiful angles on life. Just sit through his home page slideshow. I really like the colors. Here’s a bit about him from his bio:
“Over the past several years I have come to love photography. I am constantly trying to learn as much as I can and take every opportunity to do so. Though I love shooting almost anything, my favorite things to shoot are vivid colors, candid moments, and movement.”

And finally, here’s the Ty Johnson site that made me saddest, and not because it was a domain purchased by a father for his son that just went back on sale through godaddy.com this month: tyjohnsonblog.com

Here’s the cached version: http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:POmVReku89sJ:tyjohnsonblog.com/%3Fs%3D+tyjohnsonblog&cd=4&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us

So, looking for a Web site domain (during a week that already sucked) I’m met with this message:

“Wishing you the best Future,Promising you the Love that you deserve.”

The sentence, as much as I don’t understand its choice of capitalized words, was almost uplifting. A random Google search of myself brought me to a nice thought during a dark time. But, of course it was followed with this:

“Sorry, but you are looking for something that isn’t here.”

So…that best future and love I deserve…that doesn’t exist? Great.

And so this concludes my blog introduction to myself by showing you which Ty Johnsons I am not. If you have thoughts or if you’re a Ty Johnson that wants your site featured on this blog post (or a Ty Johnson that wants your site removed from this post) let me know!

Thanks for reading!