In Summary

I had big plans to blog about Chris and Sharon's visit in more detail. I planned to write about hearing the whole story of Chris breaking his neck diving into the Mississippi River in 1992 (his C-6 vertebra was crushed), and learning more about Sharon's involvement with the Socialist Party in NYC in the early to mid nineties (she was super active and it was cracking us up), and talking about their life in Quito and their future plans, and sitting out in the backyard till late, reminiscing about when we all lived together in DC in the apartment at Columbia and 18th, and listening to TJ and Chris reminisce about even earlier times (oh the drinking, oh the pot smoking), and seeing them with Eamon. . . . I was also going to say something about how funny they are and how funny we become when we're with them. Do you know what I mean? I think it's what happens when you're with people you have a history with, and they understand your sense of humor completely, and suddenly everything you say is hilarious, and everything they say is too. That's TJ's role when we're with Chris and Sharon. He cracks us all up. They get him, and I love that. There's a mutual "getting" all around. I've found that to be pretty rare between couples--when things click with all four people, individually and as a group--and not just on a superficial level.

I was then going to write about them heading back to Ecuador and TJ departing for NY, and E and I going to my parents' new house in San Antonio the next night (after I had an appointment with a new obgyn--more about that some other time, maybe), and about my psycho stepbrother's wedding in two weeks and what a freakshow it promises to be, and how hard my parents have been working on it day in and day out while my brother sits at his apartment doing nothing but being the narcissistic, controlling, selfish person that he is. His psychiatrist (who is also my stepmom's) says that we should all just be grateful he's not in a hospital right now, and Gwen is thankful since that has always been her worst fear, but I have a hard time feeling thankful for that. There's the mental illness on the one hand, but being mentally ill doesn't give you a free pass to walk all over your family. It breaks my heart to see Gwen manipulated by him. She loves him so much. He treats her like shit, and she just keeps giving and loving. Thinking of Eamon, I understand this better now than in the past, but it's classic co-dependency, and it scares me when I think of what the future holds for them. I just want my parents to be able to retire at some point and at long last have only themselves to take care of.

In any case, TJ is home now, and it's wonderful to be back to our routine. He had a fun and productive time in NYC, and spent an evening with one of my closest friends, Trish, and her new (relatively speaking, in that I haven't met him) partner, Michael. I would've given pretty much anything to be there. Trish and I saw each other every day in DC, and oh, how I miss that three o'clock latte, not to mention the six o'clock beer(s).

Well, I was going to write about some developmental stuff that's happened with E, but he just woke up, so I'll save that for another post.