An update just in case you are still reading

I feel like I left this blog hanging, like there should have been an end and there wasn't.

The stories in this blog continue, but generally we are all well.

Andrew is completing his MAT and expects to be a high school teacher. He is still with Alice. Alice feels like she has two bad choices: the wedding her mother wants to give her or the anger her mother will experience if they elope. So she continues to take the third path: the frustration her mother feels that they continue to live together. When she tells me about this Andrew just listens and smiles. It is clear he is ready to do whatever Alice decides, whenever she decides to do it. She is a graphic designer who likes her job. One of my small gift certificates at Christmas for the kids was a gift card to Albertson's (grocery store). She grinned and said, "I designed this one!"

Brian is living at home again. He is working at the Humane Society. Right now he is a lowly animal attendant. "My life is poop!" he says grinning. The Humane Society is expanding and he is hoping to eventually work in Animal Control. He has far too many animals. As long as they stay in the basement I can deal. He brought home a rescued tortoise a month ago. It disappeared from the gardening box in which it lived. We searched the back yard daily assuring ourselves that there was no way he (Vladimir Pushin) could get out. A week ago he came home having announced that Vladimir had got out and had been turned into the reptile rescue in the next town. I was skeptical, but he showed me the identifying marks. Brian went to dig out the gardening box so it was deeper and harder to get out of -- and, you guessed it -- found Vladimir happily burrowed and hibernating. So now there are two tortoises.

Carl lives in Portland. I've erased the paragraph I wrote about him. I will say just that he faces may struggles and we love him.

David lives in Florida. For the past few years he has been managing a hotel for a national chain. He is no longer with the young man we liked so much, but he seems happy. I do miss him.

Evan is the one I see most often. He has been with same young man for more years. They are lovely together and wanting to move out of their apartment and into a house. There may be mixed feelings there. The partner wants to move partly so they can have more pets. Evan would like to move so that he won't feel so crowded by the pets they have. There may be some concern that the the crowding would not be better for very long. Evan is 'the IT guy' in a company you have heard of. He is happy.

Gary is mad at me. He moved back in after my mother did. We told him at the time that we were happy to let him live here, but we could not take care of him as we did when he was a teenager. Most particularly we would not be his taxi service. That went about the way you would expect. He didn't want to get a job here because he really wanted to move to The City (or what passes for such), but he couldn't move because he didn't have any money. It didn't end happily. We have gone through rocky stages with the other boys and I am confident we will get through this too.

My sister did divorce her terrible husband. She graduated from college, currently works for a bank and lives with a very nice man who wants to marry her. She says she just can't get married again -- ever. She is happy.

My mother ... well, that might be a new blog. I may need to do that. She currently lives in a long-term care hospital. It is just three blocks from where I work so I eat lunch with her just about every day.

I want to thank all of you who helped me keep my sanity through the foster care years.  Be well.