Living Trust

Thursday November 5, 1992

A new pain and a hard knot near my belly button, a tumor? Later in the day the pain is gone but the knot remains. I think I feel a little better today.

Frank calls from the senior center to say he can get free tickets for the Moorpark Melodrama tonight. I hope I'll feel good enough to go.

I go to the dentist to have my teeth cleaned. Later Frank and I go to get some papers notarized. My will and papers are all in order now.

We have an early dinner and go to the melodrama. It's good fun. My bowels are angry; I spend a lot of time in the bathroom.

We stop for dessert on the way home.

Nothing like having a terminal illness to spur anyone to have their will or living trust drawn up! Ric and I have been talking about it for 20 years, but still have not had our living trust drawn up. I suppose most of us think that if we don't talk about dying, it won't happen.

Glad Mom got to have a fun night out, although it sounds like she missed alot of the play. What a strange feeling that must have been to feel the tumors growing in her belly. Suddenly her cancer is becoming very real.

Frank's Dad Has Bone Cancer

Thursday January 30, 1992

Up early and hurry to get ready to leave at 10:30 for Frank's folks house. I'm coughing much less but Frank is coughing alot. We are getting better but it is sure taking a long time.

At 12:00 the living trust attorney arrives and Frank helps him explain it to his folks. I read a magazine outside. Good, that's done.

Mom tells me the bone scan shows Dad has bone cancer. That accounts for alot of his pain. They don't plan to tell him. He won't go for more treatment. I agree that's best but he should have some good pain pills.

Dad tells me he wishes he could go back in time and relive his life and don't I? I say I love my life and always have. I wouldn't change a thing.

Mom tells Frank the only time she was ever happy was when the children were small. How sad. She's hoping to be happy again someday. I feel very sorry for both of them, and I feel so fortunate to be so happy. Life is wonderful!

Frank's dad John, pictured above at his granddaughter's wedding a few years before, was well into his 80s. I guess that's why he didn't see any reason to get cancer treatments, but withholding the fact that he had cancer seems wrong to me. Perhaps he already knew even though it was unspoken, and that is the reason they are having their living trust prepared. John outlived Mom, but only by a few months. That is so sad that he had so many regrets about his life, and that Frank's mother Florence was only happy when her children were small. Frank only had one sister and she died young. Perhaps Florence never recovered from the loss. She was the typical Italian mother who loved to cook for her family. Perhaps she always wanted a big family. Mom did her best to include John and Florence in all the family get-togethers, and from what I could see, they always enjoyed themselves.

The Living Trust

Friday January 10, 1992

I try to sleep in a little but a telephone call wakes me. It's Kathy Murphy. She tells me about Echo, her daughter who's expecting her first child and her hubby is in the Army in So. Carolina. She doesn't have anywhere to go when the baby comes. Kathy tells her she cannot come home, though they have room. Echo decides to move to So. Carolina to be with her hubby. Kathy disagrees and says she should find a room in a home here. I think Kathy is heartless. How can she continue to treat her first-born this way. Our kids are always welcome.

I feel fine today. Frank is still disturbed about the living trust. We talk. I assure him I want him to have all my estate if he needs it, but I want what's left to go to my kids. I don't want his new wife to get one penny of mine.

We go square dancing, plus level in the valley and have a good time. We do pretty good considering how little "plus" dancing we've done since June.

I am assuming that "plus" dancing is a more advanced group of square dancers.

We went camping with the Murphy family 3 times every summer for several years. Echo loved babies. When Justin was a baby, on his first camping trip to Lake Don Pedro he was 7 weeks old. Echo wanted to hold him for hours on end. She was pregnant in 1992 just as I was with Derek. Considering how Mom always wanted to spend as much time with her grandson as possible, she must have been shocked that her good friend Kathy Murphy preferred to have her daughter and first grandchild living across the country in South Carolina where she had no family, than to take her into their home.

As for the living trust, I still don't understand what Mom means here. Is she saying that Frank gets everything, but when he dies, her estate will pass to her children? Frank's still going strong 20 years later, so I'm glad he passed her 3 rental houses on to my brother Gary and I. I'm kind of amused that Mom says she doesn't want Frank's new wife to get one penny. I wonder if she would feel that way if she knew that Frank ended up married her friend since second grade Carol Ziegler!

It's A Boy

Thursday January 9, 1992

Chris called last night to tell us the tests say the baby is fine and is a boy. She and I are disappointed but Ric is pleased. She's still sick and throwing up after 3-1/2 months.

I awake at 5 a.m. sick and vomiting. I guess it's from kemo yesterday. I throw up every 45 minutes until 11 a.m. I have to hurry and get cleaned up for the 1:00 appointment we have for our living trust.

Mr. Robert Otis arrives in a new black Rolls Royce. He is very nice. He explains it all to us and we tell him what we want. It's clear to me. I want Frank to enjoy whatever I leave but what's left will go to Chris and Gary and same goes for visa versa.

Frank wakes me in the night. He thinks I'm leaving everything to the kids and is upset. We talk it out. He goes to sleep. I lay awake for 2 hours.

Early genetic testing was done on the fetus because of my age. I would be 39 years old when the baby came. I was disappointed not to be having a girl this time. My first husband John got the boy he wanted, and now my second husband Ric was getting the boy he wanted. I wanted a daughter so I could have a relationship like I did with Mom with my own daughter. I tried one more time in 1995 to have a daughter. By then I was 42 years old and it was my last shot. My third son was born May 2, 1995. I never did get a daughter. My husband worries so much about his boys, he always says it's a good thing he didn't have any girls, as that would be so much more worrisome.

As I type this, it's ironic that Mom and I are both puking. Maybe part of the reason I was so sick was anxiety over Mom's cancer and her chemotherapy. Obviously, Mom is hanging in there in order to meet her next grandchild. 6 months to go until baby Derek is to be born.

So Attorney Robert Otis drives up in his new Rolls Royce! I would have run quickly the other direction. I don't know how much he charged Mom and Frank for preparing the living trust, but after Mom passed away, he charged my brother and I several thousand dollars to "execute" it. Not only that, but he took his sweet time. With my share of the inheritance I bought a condo at Lake Tahoe as an investment. It did not close escrow until more than a year after her death. You would think a year would be plenty of time for this rich lawyer to process the paperwork. No, it took him more than 18 months! Every time I spoke with him on the phone, he was an arrogant ass who acted like he couldn't give me the time of day. He probably charged me $100 for every 5 minute phone call! He had to pay for that brand new Rolls Royce!

I'm not sure what Mom means when she says that she wants Frank to enjoy everything she leaves and Gary and I would get whatever is left over. No wonder Frank was confused. As it turned out, Frank got their house in Simi Valley, and he was the executor of the trust which managed Mom's 3 rental houses after she died. Within a few months, Frank stepped down as executor and gave the 3 houses to Gary and I. Why should he have all the hassle of managing 3 rental houses, when they would be going to Gary and I eventually anyway? After hearing how much work he did on the Lemona house, I feel bad that he did not enjoy the fruits of his labor. Managing real estate is alot of work and alot of headaches. Ric and I manage 9 of our own and 6 for my mother-in-law. It can be extremely stressful and hard on our relationship. 5 years ago, at least we had some equity to look forward to cashing in, but after the real estate bubble burst, we don't even have that now. Just lots of bills and lots of headaches.