Ugh, my lateral epicondylitis is really beginning to act preventatively. I haven't been to the gym in about a month. I keep telling myself that a sore elbow doesn't prevent me from riding my bike, but that doesn't do any good. I can hear my heart being slowed with steak, and pork, and biscuits, and strips of delicious bacon. My habits act as a boa constrictor in love with my vital organs. I need a good sweat, to work some things out of my system, but beer is delicious and cold, and never very far off.
My good and true friend from Bellingham has sent me a bottle of cold sake in the mail, and his lovely daughters have sent a hummingbird feeder for the boy and I to set up here at the house. They also have one at the corner of their house and we had a pretty good time watching the marvels of nature come and gorge themselves on the welfare system of free seed. My friend, who is Filipino by descent though born and raised American, is not near the fan of sushi and sashimi that I am. I insisted that we go out to oyster bars and sushi restaurants while I visited recently. We drank cold sake, and now he has become a fledgling connoisseur and convert of sorts.
I am no aficionado, by any standards, though I do prefer cold sake to warm, where the light-bodied and dry flavors can be enjoyed more. I have promised to have him eating like an Asian within the year. Are Filipino's considered Asians or Polynesians? Little matter, we can orient my readers to my inherent racism and ignorance any other time. That's not the real point of the story. It is only that I have formed, by will and from chaos, a new true lover of cold sake.
It still disappoints me that there are not better sushi restaurants available to me in Sonoma. It is one of my abiding regrets and recurring sadnesses of the place. I really should have done my research…. Ah well, at the time we just wanted to be closer to Fukushima.
I feel as if I have come out from underneath something, finally. It all happens in degrees, this living. My life has fluctuated back and forth between the various stages of loss. I have come full circle and worked my way through "acceptance" back to "denial and isolation."
The circle of loss is complete.
I made a rather significant financial decision this morning that will allow the boy and I to travel more. We will be taking extended weekend trips more often, and perhaps even beyond just the weekends. I'll have to check with Mom. She and I have signed a new agreement that allows for one week a year each, though I suspect that from time to time each of us might wish to exceed that limit. For all that has gone terribly wrong there between us we still do pretty well when it comes to reaching an agreement on the boy, thankfully.
Others have filled me with horror stories, describing how things started off well but steadily devolved. Mine and the ex-wife's story is hopefully that story in reverse. We did not get off to such a stellar beginning to our end, but found some sort of middle path that seems to have allowed us a temporary reprieve from mutual misery.
The boy and I are doing great, anyway.
Having a son has turned out to be a near miracle in the life of an anestheistiologist (a non-believer who specializes in putting people to sleep).
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