PennSilverTaco's "Perfect 5-Lug Regular Cab" Build, Aspergers, and General BS MegaThread!

I am happy to say that I was only told not to cry if I was crying because I wanted something and/or because I was throwing a tantrum. My maternal grandfather (Papa Charlie, who I am named after) died seven years before I was born, due to complications from Alzheimer's, when he was only 61 years old; I was lucky enough to not lose any grandparents until my paternal grandfather (Pop Pop) died from cancer in November 2007 at the age of just 71. I cried at his bedside when he was still alive, and my Uncle Kenny saw me crying and comforted me. He passed away a day or two later, and I held it together for the entire viewing. Somehow we ended up being short a pallbearer; I forget how this came to be, but I overheard the conversation between my step-grandma (Nana J) and another relative in the kitchen of Nana J's house, and without hesitation I offered to be a pallbearer. For some reason, Nana J had not wanted any immediate relatives to be pallbearers, but I really wanted to do it and numerous other relatives were fine with it. As such, I ended up helping load Pop pop's casket into the hearse the next morning. Uncle Kenny took a picture of me with his phone that is probably still floating around somewhere.

My cousins, one who is just under four months younger than me (we were both 18 at the time) and one who was 15 at the time, were overcome with emotion the day after the viewing (right before I helped load the casket into the hearse) and I can remember hugging both of them at the same time while they cried into shoulders. I did not shed a single tear during the viewing, but I can tell you that at one point during the precession, I became upset when the preacher's Ford Explorer ended up in front of my mom's minivan (which I was riding in) and I lost sight of the hearse. I am autistic, and being able to see the hearse carrying Pop-pop's body gave me a sense of security.

I finally ended up losing it at the very end of the funeral, when they started playing taps, I lost it and had to excuse myself. Seeing me so upset in turn made my mom upset, and she started crying. That was almost 15 years ago.

 

@crashngiggles

Seeing Pop-pop laid out in the casket didn't particularly upset me back then, but while I will be strong and go to open caskets for the good of my family and friends, I really would prefer not to go to one for someone I was extremely close to if I can avoid it; I have been to three open caskets in the last five or six years, but none of them were for immediate family or even people I was incredibly close to. The first two were way before COVID, for my cousin's husband's grandfather and grandmother, respectively. They did not die too far apart, and I think it was 2017-2018...?

The third one was my neighbor's wife, in October 2021. She was diagnosed with breast cancer and died maybe a month later. She was 41 years old and left a husband and two young kids behind; I wasn't as close to her as some of my neighbors were, but it was a beautiful service. I did get tear up a little bit during the service, and one of the reasons I don't like open caskets that much is because I prefer to only have memories of the people I love from when they were alive. Nearly 15 years after I saw Pop-pop at the viewing, I still have vivid pictures of him in the casket in mind. My neighbor's wife died less than a year ago, and I still have mental images of her in the casket.

I have lost my paternal great grandmother (Age 98; 2012), my maternal grandmother (Age 88; 2015), and my paternal step-grandpa (Age 93; 2017) in the last decade; I was extremely fortunate in that I was spared having to see them after they passed away. They were all cremated. As such, all the memories I have of them are when they were still alive.

 

@crashngiggles

On another note, my only time seeing a dead human body up close prior to Pop-pop's death in 2007 was at the Body Worlds almost two years prior in January 2006. I don't know if you've ever heard of Body Worlds, also known as Plastination, but I thought it was one of the coolest things in the world. There was one exhibit where you could actually touch a preserved human lung, and I thought it was the coolest thing in the world.

The key difference is that these people were not anybody I knew personally, and the specimens had been so well-preserved that there were no smells. A funeral home is a different story. When Pop-pop died, it was the first time I'd ever set foot in a funeral home, and the smell of embalming fluid is not something you forget. It doesn't bother me, but it's not something that easily leaves my mind.

That said, I observed several people at Pop-pop's funeral touching the body, typically in the form of placing their hand on his hand. Nana J and my aunt kissed his forehead before the casket was closed for the final time.

I was curious about what a dead body felt like, and this was my grandpa, so I reached out and out and touched his hand but quickly retracted it. His skin was obviously cold, but it didn't feel particularly weird. Nobody said anything, so I reached out and placed my hand on his for a bit longer. Once again, everyone knew I was his grandson, so nobody cared; I felt like holding Pop-pop's hand was an appropriate way to say goodbye. My parents, and later my therapist, assured me that both a curiosity about his skin felt like and the desire to touch his hand one last time were perfectly normal.

 

@crashngiggles

That brings us to Jim's sudden and unexpected passing. The last time I saw him before he died was on Monday, August 8th; I don't work on Mondays, so if I was bored I'd drive up to Jim and Helen's and hang out, sometimes for several hours. Sometimes I'd bring my dog, Porter. My dog was not with me this time, but I did spend a couple of hours chatting in their living room. I am 95% sure that I wished Jim good luck with his surgery before leaving, but I feel really bad that I didn't call or text him the night before or the morning of the surgery.

Regardless, my last memory of Jim on this earth is from an afternoon chat in his living room, and that is just the way I want it to be. What really gets to me is that Jim's death was about as unexpected as could be. Less than a day before he died, he was chatting with his neighbors and a road crew doing work in front of his house. He was supposed to come home from the hospital this past Sunday. When my grandma on my mom's side died in January 2015, she had been in an unresponsive state for two or three days, and her health had been in steady decline for close to a year. As my cousin put it during one of the last times we saw her, "There's life, and there's living". I was sad when she died, but I was glad that she died when she did, because I wouldn't have wanted to see her suffer. The same was true of my step-grandpa when he died in April 2017. He had good cognitive health, but his heart was failing and he was bedridden. At one point he told my grandma "I'm tired and I want to go home." I last saw him two or three days before he died, and not only did he have enough strength to sit up in bed and carry on a conversation, but he mustered up the strength to thumb wrestle with me like we did when I was younger and actually give me a run for my money!

 

I am still in absolute fucking shock about Jim's death; I knew he had his health issues, but some of Jim's family and friends are probably even more shocked than I am!

And you remember that my 41-year old neighbor Bessie died of breast cancer barely a month after the diagnosis. What's really heartbreaking is that her husband revealed on Facebook that no long after she Bessie was diagnosed, she told him that she didn't want to die. My aunt got breast cancer back in 2005-2006 when she was like 44 or 45, and had a double mastectomy, and she has been cancer-free ever since; I don't think my neighbors have gotten over the shock of Bessie dying at such a heartbreakingly young age, and it's been almost a year!

 

@crashngiggles
@shakerhood

At Bessie's funeral (see above), I cheered myself up by chatting with the guy who drove the hearse. The quintessential, stereotypical hearse was a rear-wheel drive Cadillac. Lincoln Town Cars were fairly common, but the one that took my grandpa on his final ride back in 2007 was definitely a Cadillac, and I definitely see more Cadillacs than Lincolns leading funeral precessions. Some funeral homes may have older hearses in their fleets, but I'm pretty sure Cadillac hasn't made a RWD vehicle since like 1996, and as such all newer Cadillac hearses are FWD. The hearse at Bessie's service was a Lincoln, and it was AWD. What is one step below the Continental in terms of size and price is what carried Bessie's casket, and I had never seen an AWD hearse before, so I was intrigued. It is against regulations to leave a dead body in a church overnight (something I also learned from talking to the hearse driver), so the hearse was on standby to take Bessie back to the funeral home. The driver was sitting in the hearse with the engine running, watching something on his iPad, and he was all too happy to answer my questions about the car.

On another note, I would like to buy a hearse someday, but my mom refuses to let me park such a vehicle in her driveway and also worries that people will think I'm weird; I really don't give a shit with regards to that last one...

 

I think that would be awesome!! Heck....put a 3 inch lift and 33's on it and technically you have the world best overlander. It's not like it hasn't been done lol

 

I'd like it stock, with the exception of the stereo system...

 

And there is absolutely nothing wrong with that as well.

 

Did you read my other posts, specifically the one about my grandpa's viewing back in 2007?

 

I did....and i am happy that you were able to show your emotion then as well. And having that feeling of wanting to touch someone who is not living anymore is actually fairly common. I was able to see an exhibit in NY a number of years back where they had something like that. It wasn't Body Worlds but something like that. The skin almost felt like a soft leather but colder. It was a very different visual and tactile experience.

 

And also as stated above, I'm glad I never had to see Jim after he died; He is at the funeral home and I believe he is getting cremated this week. Less than a year ago, he pushed my Tacoma out of his driveway while he still had a catheter bag hooked up. This should tell you how strong he was right up until he died.

 

I like the idea of keeping the conversation and interaction with him as your last memory of him. You are not disrespecting him or the family if you don't see him before he is cremated. It will help with the positive memories you have of him. Keep in mind that we are all strong until we are not anymore. Some people slowly go like an old NiCad battery. Jim was a powerful lithium cell......strong right up to the end. Sometimes it is unfortunate that we can't see each others battery Gauge.

 

I think Helen was the only one who saw him before being cremated; Helen says that Jim would not want an open casket or even to be buried, so he is going to be cremated (if he hasn't been already) and his ashes will be interred at the veterans cemetery.

 

I love dogs but with the travel by motorcycle that I like to do owning a dog just wouldn't fit my lifestyle. We have 2 cats we adopted right when Covid started. Cats are a little easier for us as a long weekend away just means some extra food and water with no outside help required. On longer trips we get one of our neighbors to come over once or twice to add food and water to their bowls and maybe scoop out the litter boxes.

Very fortunate to live in a neighborhood of animal lovers and fellow motorcycle riders so everyone helps everyone else as needed.

 

The hearse and professional car community is fairly strong around here, and I've got a few friends in that community. Contrary to stereotypes, the hearse people are some of the nicest people you will ever meet. This one guy bought a bluish gray 1997 Lincoln Town Car hearse that had been vandalized and was about to be totaled by the funeral home's insurance company. He bought it for $3,500 and restored it to its former glory, and it still has a clear title. That was about the most beautiful hearse I'd ever seen, and if I could have afforded the asking price, I would have bought it when he sold it.

I think of a hearse as a pickup truck with a camper shell that can't be removed. My mom still refuses to allow one in her driveway, so I'm gonna have to wait until I buy a place of my own before I can buy one.

 

@crashngiggles

I'm guessing that you know quite a bit about Aspergers Syndrome, and other autism spectrum disorders? I don't know if you knew that I have this thread partially dedicated to living autism.

 

@crashngiggles

I know you can't really do much without meeting a person face to face, but I'd like your opinion on this girl I had a brief casual sexual relationship exactly a year ago. She is on the spectrum like me, but much more lower functioning. She was diagnosed at a time when diagnoses of autism spectrum disorder and mental retardation could run concurrently, and I don't know how they ended up reaching a concurrent diagnosis, but I think the fact that her general lack of intelligence had something to do with it. Despite having both autism and MR, she is a relatively high-functioning individual. She has a driver's license (though she doesn't presently have a vehicle because she can't afford one), she's had jobs (though never for very long), and she's more promiscuous than many neurotypical girls I know. To put it blatantly and honestly, she's a slut...

She also has bipolar disorder, which is very poorly managed, as well as diabetes. She's lost two toes to diabetes in the last year and a half and has an even more voracious appetite than I do, which is impressive. The poorly managed bipolar means that the littlest thing can set her off, and she is not only unpredictable but potentially violent. She punched her former best friend's fiance in the face last year because he called her "trash" and a "lost cause". This girl is not a sociopath or the type of person who will go out of her way to do some drastic and potentially violent, but she is very impulsive and the type of person who would do something impulsive and stupid that could land her in prison for years or even decades.

I have severed all ties with her, and believe she will be dead before she turns 40 due to her obesity and incredibly poor health. She is not even 32, and she's lost two toes to diabetes. I brought her to two cars shows, and both times she had to use an electric scooter to get around.

 

@PennSilverTaco sorry for your loss man.

Here is some inspiration for your hearse: https://youtu.be/24J-kXf8F1A

Probably one of my favorite videos on the internet... "hit that button, microwave oven"