well

i haven't blogged in a really long time. and i really don't know if this belongs on my personal blog or here. but i'm going to put it here simply because this is the first one i clicked on.

i need to update my personal blog too, but nobody updates it.

first off since i started getting heavily into twitter my phone has kept me super busy. i fall asleep with no messages and this morning i woke up with 35. it makes me feel popular, hahaha. but i love quite a few of the people i follow. (not to mention you two steph and crystal...following you is fun too) i have a lot of people i really admire as people i follow so it's always awesome when you read their twitter updates.

but that's not what i really wanted to talk about.

what? ashley as a purpose for this blog?

well no, not really...but something has been sorta eating at me since last night.

my uncle was going through some of the old stuff in his room and came across an old polaroid. he handed it to me and i almost cried.

it was a picture of me and my pawpaw (that's grandfather for people who don't understand southern talk...is pawpaw just a southern thing?) when i was around 2 months old.

it's not that seeing the picture made me sad, because it wasn't. it was just unexpected. it made me really pause for a while and think about him. i can't believe he's been gone for so long. every year it seems like it hasn't been that long, but i guess it has.

i guess it just upset me because i don't really have a dad and when i was growing up he was more like a dad to me than anyone else ever has, or could have been. my dad screwed up when i was younger when he decided he really didn't want to be around us. now he's trying to talk to me and i ignore his calls. it might be the wrong thing to do and i may regret it, but i don't want him to be in my life. he wasn't there when i needed him.

and my stepdad? well let's just not. okay. there's just something about him that i don't trust. yeah i understand he's supported us with his job and stuff but that doesn't mean a person isn't a skeeze. my mom just doesn't get it.

but anyway, my pawpaw was--is--amazing. i remember the craziest stuff about him. random stuff when i was little like being half asleep and hearing him whisper to my grandma about me before carrying me off to bed. how he would come home when he was working and we would all sit and be quiet, no matter how loud or bad we were two seconds ago. he was funny and he was smart.

he's everything i want to be in a person. he was there for his family and had a strong sense of purpose and self.

and i'm crying like a baby writing this. i def should have posted it on my personal one.

sorry guys.

the hardest part was when he got sick. we (my mom, sister, the cats and her husband (my mom's husband)) lived in mississippi for most of it, but almost every weekend we would come over. i remember hating it sometimes, because i felt like i couldn't have a normal life, going out with friends on the weekends (not that i had any, but still) but i went almost every weekend. and now i'm so glad for it.

it was the worst thing in the world to see this strong person just turn into a shell. i watched him go from super intelligent and able to do anything to being bedridden and not being able to talk.

again, i'm sorry i'm writing this you guys. it shouldn't be here.

i remember the morning he died. it was during the summer (july 2) and we got the call from the hospital that we needed to get up there. we all got in the room just as the sun went up. it was his favorite part of the day. i sat on the couch and watched as he slipped away.

how could i have forgotten just how important he is to me? i mean i know i haven't forgotten but it seems like i never think about him anymore. he helped form so much of who i am that it's ridiculous that i don't talk about him more.

it's ridiculous that he inspires me so much and yet i'm a complete and total failure as a person. don't even say that i'm not.

I'm proud to be your granddaughter, Larry Allen Autrey.

i hope you know that.