Wanna Hear a Sort-of Depressing Story?

You know you do. Schadenfreude says you do. This story will make you feel better about yourself because of how smart you are in comparison. Luckily, this story is not about me, so I'm not the one feeling dumb. Although, I don't know for sure if the subject of the story feels dumb about this. I don't think that registers with him.

I have a cousin who has had a very hard life, and as he got older he kept making it even harder all by himself. He's a drug addict and had a stroke in his early 30s due to cocaine use. We also think that the cocaine may have brought out schizophrenic tendencies because of some weird behaviors he's exhibited in the past. He's disabled due to his stroke, which also left him with severely diminished social skills. Due to this he can't hold down a job.

Depressed yet? It gets worse.

He got kicked out of his apartment (or had to leave for some reason - no one but him really knows what happened) and so decided to move back in with my grandmother (we all get mad when she takes him back in, but she's a loving grandmother, so she'll do anything for any of her grandchildren). However, he has a dog, and the apartment complex she lives in does not allow dogs, but he loves this dog and therefore won't get rid of it.

So it lives in his car. Which can't be on the property with the dog in it.

So he drives it around and parks it in different places so that he can still keep the dog and can also still live with my grandmother.

Well, he also has to let the dog have some free space to roam around in sometimes, so there is a dog park he takes it to, which he did early in the week of Thanksgiving. He drove to the dog park, let his dog out, and watched as the dog ran across the park and started attacking another dog.

Worried that his dog might get hurt he decided that he needed to break up the fight. So he went over and got between the dogs and the other dog (not his) bit off his finger.

Just when you think his life couldn't get worse - he loses a finger.

He's had surgery on his finger - a skin graft and whatever else to make sure that it doesn't get worse - so that's all taken care of. Thanks to whoever pays in to Medicare because you helped my cousin after he did something dumb once again. You also helped to pay for the pain medicine prescription they gave him which he took all at once. So now he's complaining that he doesn't have any more pain pills, and can't do anything because he's in too much pain.

Now, don't get me wrong, I feel bad for the guy. Always have. But, it always gets worse - something always happens and someone (usually my grandmother who is in her mid-to-late 80s) always has to bail him out (sometimes literally).

But now you can also see why on the Friday after Thanksgiving, in the morning at about 9 am after I talked to my mom and she told me this, I started drinking early. Very early.