This evening, my great-aunt succumbed to lung cancer, brought on by a lifetime of smoking. She was the goddamned coolest relative I ever had. She moved up to my little town about a year and a half ago. I hadn't seen her in years, and when my family visited her, she didn't say, "My, how you've grown!" She said, "I'll call you young'n, and you call me ancient." She bought me my first Beatles record.
She was the black sheep of the family. Based on conversations held in hushed tones, I gathered that she was a stripper back in the '60s. She drank, swore, and had a wicked sense of humour.
We bonded instantly - I'd bike over to her house to hang out on the weekends, even bringing a friend at times. The last words she said to me were, "If you ever stop playing piano, I'll come back from hell and break all your fingers."
Rest in peace.
I think I'll go cry myself to sleep now.
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Everybody's dying just to get the disease
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