I had a call earlier this week from my Dad … he said there had been some kind of an accident with a gun and my cousin Ronnie was dead. I hadn’t seen him in probably 15 years – there had been a family reunion at his farm in Lovettsville, VA – back when I was still living in Laurel with Jeannie. It was a gorgeous place – a big 10 acre farm – across the road was another farm, and mountains on the horizon …

That was a long time ago for me – before my changes – and a long time ago for him – before he got divorced. That side of my family was baptist/fundamentalist – so I never was particularly close to any of them, but its still a big shock to my aunt and the rest of the family, so, out of respect to the family, Emma and I’ll will be going to the visitation on Sunday.

Dad’s sister’s son (he was the eldest of her two kids) died around 20 years ago – on reflection, I’d say he may have been part of the first wave who died of GRID … no one says anything like that – but looking back on it, he had the signs of being “family”. Dad’s brother had 4 sons, and Ronnie was his eldest … Of course, I’m the eldest of Dad’s kids – and I’ve had my struggles over the years … but since I met Emma and finally sobered up, life has been great.
Anyway – this makes me the remaining eldest of this generation of cousins …

We’ll see how the service and all that goes – I expect to be as low key as possible about everything – but I’m sure there will be the inevitable questions of who I am “… oh – I used to be … ” ” and this is my partner, Emma”
I’ll take it as low key as possible … but its over 10 years since the change
I’ll be polite and educate them gently … “we are very nice people and
we want to go to Massachusettes later this year and get married!”

Ah well ……. we’lll see …