#pear bailey

Pear's Journal: 18/12/200X

I'm so mad at Mom and Dad right now. Dad's half-retired now, so he's home more often, and it means that we get to watch them fight and make up and fight again. We got to watch a really great show at dinner, I'm pretty sure Sterling learned some new words he hadn't even heard on the playground yet. I'm so MAD!! Honestly sometimes I think Mom is so selfish that if all three of us dropped off the face of the Earth she wouldn't even notice. Sterling ran away after dinner and I didn't find him until it was dark out. It was so hard not to freak out, it's dangerous where we live and he's just a kid. Anyhow I managed to convince him to come home, but who knows where we go from here. I can't wait till I graduate and I can get out of here, and maybe take him with me.

(Pear: Practice Makes Perfect + Goofball)

Amanda is getting on my last nerve. She had her friend Miko over, and little did I know they had a plan to DYE HER HAIR a really hideous, patchy black...I have no problem with hair dye, obviously, but at least get it done professionally! And choose a colour that compliments your look...not...whatever she's just done! I think there were scissors involved, there's pieces of her beautiful brown hair in the bathroom trashcan!

Pear's Journal: 06/09/200X

Mom doesn't get it! I just want to dress up as Pineapple Bear...all the time! He's my favourite character in the whole wide world. If I was him, I could just be funny and cool and never have to do homework or chores ever again. But Mom says that I can't wear my pineapple bear costume to school, because it's not 'appropriate' and the other students will get distracted. Plus she says it's important to dress fashionably so that other kids know that you're the most popular and the coolest. I just want to be Pineapple Bear....

Jeez, I'm starting to really look like a mom these days. I guess that's what happens when you have three kids. I'm trying out a new colour and a shorter cut, hopefully it makes me look more like a M.I.L.F. than a frumpy middle aged lady.

(Pear: Independent -> Practice Makes Perfect)

(Sterling: Wiggly -> Silly)

Now that Pear is old enough to start school, suddenly I'm realizing how much I'll miss having her around. I miss Mandy while she's off at school, and I even miss Sterling when I leave him with Juniper so I can do errands. I guess that's just how this works - you spend so much time which them when they're little, and they're really vulnerable and can't do anything for themselves, so it feels so wrong to let them go off on their own where you won't be able to keep an eye on them.

Everything has sort of gone to shit. Mom died. And then Dad passed away not long after. The sibs are taking it pretty hard, especially Bee. At least Todd has Angela and Oscar has Lou ... Bee doesn't really have anybody. I guess I'll like, try to be there for her and whatever.

It was a fricking nightmare and a half trying to wrangle three kids at the funeral. Mandy was okay - I mean, she's really sad, but at least she was quiet and stood still. But it's like Pear and Sterling were trying to win a screaming competition. And Thorne was totally useless, being all, like, "Can we go now?"

Dear Diary,

I can't believe it...Angel died. It happened when I wasn't even home. She seemed fine in the morning...but she's old, and she'd been getting more feeble every day. We buried her behind the house, somewhere nice, where she would have liked to run around and play fetch.

I don't know what I'm going to do. The only thing I want to do all day is crawl under the covers and cry and cry and cry. Nothing could cheer me up like her little wet nose against my hand when I petted her.

Dad made me get up and he's trying to get me into yoga. It's nice of him to try, but I'm too miserable for this...