The "Update"

Okay, okay, I am experiencing some serious avoidance behavior at the moment, and have been putting off this post for the last four days. Here it is, I am getting it out of the way now, instead of waiting any longer.

Lee's mom was given a 40% chance of survival before we left. Her doctor, with brutal honesty, informed us that in his experience, about 6 out of 10 people her age, with her health history and injuries, die. Yup. Good news there.

On the family heirlooms and stuff front, all her things that escaped destruction by fire were coated in a fine film of Asbestos. As a general rule, the health department requires all such finely coated things be thrown out. However, it was too much to contemplate losing mom, much less losing her, and everything she ever owned. Especially since everything she ever owned included all the things Lee intended on passing down to our kids, and everything his mom had saved from other ancestors for the same reason.

Luckily the abatement guy in charge of this particular asbestos removal was very nice, and has agreed to clean a few of her things and let us keep them. We rented a 5x7 storage unit, and it should contain all that remains of her worldly possessions by the end of the week. (Thanks to Sanjin for taking care of the picking up, transporting, and depositing of these things, you have relieved so much of our stress by doing so.)

Moving mom out of her house into the apartment was a herculean effort requiring a huge moving truck and many of her friends cars. It is hard to deal with the fact that she is now down to a 5x7 storage unit and the few things we bought her at Target before leaving town. ( Two nightgowns, one of them a sock monkey nightgown, a tote bag, wallet, address book, etc. We didn't want to buy too much, simply because we still don't know if she will live to need it.)

So, that is the update. We are back home in New Jersey, busily cleaning, shopping, and otherwise preparing for school. It is a hectic couple of days. Soon I will begin on my practice in earnest, for Marlena will be in school, and not here demanding most of my creativity and energy, and Oliver is at a point where he naps several hours at a time. (Once in a while, anyway.)

I am excited to begin my professional life, it has been too long neglected. I have located several agencies that will fund attorneys with contingency cases in the pipeline, so I will be able to pay my self a modest salary while I am working, thereby relieving some of the financial stress we have been under. So soon my posts will once again have some law sprinkled throughout them, as I try to save the world, one poor near extinct species at a time.