the trip 2

maricella my sister in law is the center of the universe. shhhh. don't tell her that.

because of her, i've been able to make contact with many classmates of mine. it started last spring (2006) when i met up with issabelle at a ballet folklorico practice rena had. issabelle's daughter is in it, too. we exchanged info. later, when we went to texas in december, we had a get together and met up with many more classmates and that has yielded more contacts.

this time, we were going to see rena during softball practice. we called to make sure it was on since it was thundering and bad weather threatened. she said yes it was on.
we get there and she says, "someone wants to say hi." i saw the woman but panicked because i didn't immediately recognize her. luckily she went to dawn first and found out it was anna lopez. i haven't seen her in maybe eight or nine years. it was great to see her.
she knew my sister in law, knew their last name, my brother, but it was when she said my first name outloud that she questioned if it was the same guy she graduated with in '89. it was.
we made plans and the following day she, dawn and i had dinner at a local diner. we got to catch up and it was good. she brought back lots of memories (the rocks, reading books and other interesting things). i had forgotten things like the rocks, to which i am embarrassed about now. i am surprised she still talks to me. but that's the type of person she is. we had great catching up talks.

THE TATTOO
yes, i have one now. i'd struggled for more than a month about getting one. i decided maybe a month early then asked dawn and she supported it only if i got something meaningful.
i asked my friends. i got answers ranging from if you don't know what to get, then you shouldn't get one to get eddie maiden. well, i took those under consideration. eventually i went my own way.
i ended up getting the two chinese characters for Dawn. the word has many meanings for me, not only my wife's name.
i had called lois stephens who works at my old paper. she has a tat shop in alice. we talked. i dropped by when we got down there, and on tuesday, june 19, i went in. i got the characters on my upper left arm, black with some red trim.
i will save the picture for the newsletter and more details about it for that other form of communication (which should be out next weekend) i will say that after experiencing this one, i will get more on my body. details to come.

the inside joke for the few who may know the reference: i'm not a tattoed millionaire. my name's not even bruce.