I got up and got some coffee while the computer booted, then took care of my free book & paid emails. I got dressed for church and asked Casey if he wanted to join me. He said he wanted to stay home. I got some coffee and headed out.
The church service went well. It was the last service of the Goliath May Fall series. Mindi didn’t make it again, she’s been having a really bad IBS flare up for a few weeks now.
As I was leaving the church, I got a message from Mindi asking if I wanted to get together for brunch. She hadn’t wanted to go to church because she didn’t want to keep getting up to go to the bathroom every few minutes, but felt she needed to eat anyway. I stopped at our usual place while she and I confirmed plans, but she wanted to go to a different restaurant in case people from church would see her and wonder why she was well enough to make it to brunch but not well enough for church.
After we ate, I headed home and got my last hour and a half of work done for the week before heading out.
I heard from Brad, which was a surprise, and we confirmed plans for me to go over to his house at the usual time.
I stopped to get gas and then went to La Crosse to drop off the Operation Christmas Child boxes I’d put together. After I dropped off the boxes, I tried to get a delivery in for PostMates, but nothing came in even after I sat in the Walmart parking lot for a while. I was ready to head home.
I headed home and got in the shower, excited to see Brad again already when I had just stayed over Friday night. I got Casey ready for bed and tucked in, then got on Fallout 76 for a while to kill time before going out.
Brad had music playing and was doing some dishes when I got there. We chatted for a while, as usual. It’s so comfortable talking to him. I told him how I was struggling with managing my time. I explained to him that the job is way too easy for it to take 30 seconds per review. He offered me his 3rd monitor so that I could do other things more easily. When I try to look at Facebook, I get distracted. At least a second monitor would allow both to be open and I just mouse over from one screen to another. I didn’t want to take one of his monitors, though.
He was talking about some of the things from the war that I was always so surprised to hear about. Dave never talked about his time overseas. Brad referred to it as what it was — a war. Dave pitched a hissy fit if anyone called it a war, saying it was a “deployment.” Yeah, you were deployed. To war.
Anyway, he recalled to me about the time a good buddy of his got blown up at Thanksgiving. Then, a month later, he had to call his mom and tell her everything was “fine” when it was anything but. He got incredibly somber after that, and rightfully so. I can’t even imagine what that must have been like for him. He was struggling to reign in his emotions, which was understandable. The best I could think to say was that I wished there was something I could say or do. He said that was the perfect reaction. Everyone always says “Sorry” but that doesn’t change anything.
Eventually, after changing the music and focusing for a while, he came back around. We kept talking for a while, then headed upstairs.
I swear, every time we’re in bed together, it isn’t “sex” it’s “making love.” This time it felt even more so that way.
Once we were “done,” we went to sleep, intertwined. Bliss.
