I was going to write about the Pluto (power, death, transformation) transit to my Moon (home, family, emotion). I had outline in my head but skipping all that for the moment, check this:

Yesterday I was hanging out with Scott. That’s right. I came to the desert (my home) for the weekend on an impulse. And we’ve been driving around, scaring up all the ghosts like you wouldn’t believe. But never mind that. Stories for another day.

So Scott (a Cancer) is family to me obviously. What else could he be after thirty years? And we were hanging out. We had his laptop and he popped a cd in. “I wanted you to hear this,” he said.

“Ok,” I said.

I assumed it was going to be a recording of his playing (Scott is a pianist) but when it fired up, I heard people talking. Whaaaat? I quickly realized it was Scott’s voice, though it sounded kind of strange. But who was the other person?

“That’s my grandmother,” he said. “That’s Nana.”

My jaw dropped. Scott’s “nana” has been dead for 23 years! “You’re kidding,” I said.

“No. That’s her.”

“I’m a genius,” he boasts on the tape.

“You’re a jackass,” she answers.

I roared. I knew her, of course. I have a very queer story about her. But anyway, they go on and on talking. They talk about other family members. They talk about sex, and graphically. Scott would have been 20 at the time. They talk about various women he knew (who I also know) and eventually they talk about me!

“That Elsie…now she’s a nice girl,” she says.

“Yeah, yeah,” Scott answers, sounding all cocky.

She goes on goading him about me. Can you imagine this? What it’s like to hear this shit 23 years after the fact? They talk and talk and talk. They talk about homosexuality. Nana is as liberal as they come.

“You play better than Liberace,” she says.

“Goddamned right!” Scott answers.

His grandmother lovvvved Liberace.

They talk for about a half hour. “I’m 71,” she says. “Your mother says I’m 73…I’m 77,” she laughs. “Who gives a shit? Who gives a shit how old I am?”

::smiles::

They also talk at length about Scott’s sister, who introduced us. The conversation comes back to her again and again and here’s the thing:

A year later, a year after this conversation was taped, Scott’s sister was dead. She was 25 years old. Two years after that, Nana died.

So just imagine this. I’m sitting there hearing this and so is he. And we look at each other and what the fuck do you say? Nobody knows what’s coming. You just don’t know what turns your life will take.

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Read more on my Pluto transit…