Yesterday I got to see Deb, Merv, Lisa, Moja, and Sami. It was lucky, because Deb and Merv are about to head out to the other side of the world for the whole rest of the time I'm here. I'll still get to see Lisa, Moja, and Sami again though.
Seeing family is sometimes odd to tell about, because not much might happen, but it's still a lot because of all the impressions and reminders. Deb was taking care of medical stuff, because of the inconvenience of bringing her equipment to a place where they may be no clean water or syringes. And Merv was doing stuff about Lisa's business. So I mostly hung out and read for the afternoon, although Deb did make us some hard shell tacos.
I also got to see their new endless pool, which really works, and looked gorgeous because they'd turned their outdoor patio into a whole little pool room that was part of the house, and looked as though it had always been part of the house. I told them I wanted one in my bedroom instead of a bed; and I'd just sleep on a flotation device.
Eventually Lisa and Sami got home, and we all started hanging out for real. I met the dogs, that had been in Lisa, Moja, and Sami's house. They were all adorable lap-sized puppies, super friendly and all different breeds. The poodle had apparently been abused, and had not taken to my mother at all when my parents had visited; but he took to me right off, and I swear he would gaze earnestly and longingly into my eyes as I scritched his head and back.
Things almost became tragic though, because at one point there was a little mouse doll on a string, and I was trying to intrigue the poodle (I don't know why, he already loved me), and accidentally hit him on the nose with it. He immediately cringed, and started backing slowly underneath a chair. So I got rid of the mouse, laid down on the ground, and spoke soothingly and moved slowly, encouraging him to come over to me. Fortunately, he decided to give me one more chance, but he was clearly very scared. I stroked him extremely gently for a long, long time, and gradually he warmed up again. Lucky thing.
Sami was great to be around. She's essentially fully grown now, about to start high school. In October she's going on a class trip to work with AIDS patients in Los Angeles. Dang! Now that's the kind of class trip my schools never took me on.
Sami's highly cogent. I loved watching her argue with her parents and grandparents, because whatever it was that she wanted, she made very convincing arguments. Nobody stood a chance; they just had to resort to trying to change the subject; or else explain the real reasons. For example, she wanted to know how much the LA event was going to cost her family, and they didn't want to tell her. She explained very calmly, "I'm part of the family too, and I want to be involved in these kinds of decisions." There was a lot of hemming and hawing on the other side of the discussion. Finally I said something like, "it's the pride of the parent - they want to do nice things for you, without you worrying about how much it might cost." That's how my dad felt when I was a kid, and it seemed to satisfy her, but whether it was because I made sense, or because she didn't want to argue with Cousin Zack, I don't know.
We ended up meeting Moja at a Chinese restaurant, the kind with the big rotating platform on the table, and everyone shared a bunch of entrees. Then Merv and Deb drove me to the BART.
That's the big problem with visiting them. They live almost at the end of the line; and Kar and James live almost at the other end of the line. And when I made it back to Balboa Park Station from El Cerrito Del Norte, I still had to wait for the 29 bus to take me back to Miramar. But all in all, it wasn't such a long trip. And I don't mind anyway. The bad part is just that Deb and Merv always have to drive me to and from BART at their end, because there's not really any other way to get to Crockett. I prefer to come and go without inconveniencing people.
So that was the family visit, and the only time I'll get to see Deb and Merv this time around. But I'm going to make plans with Lisa, to come back, hopefully a bunch of times before I leave. And maybe they'll come into San Francisco for dinner, a time or two.
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