daveymars

As a kid in the 70s 80s. I loved Xanadu... Still do. I always saw Gene Kelly in it and thought, what a way to go out!? Love the story...

Well it's a sign that he needs more work with Jo to learn how to ask for and get what he wants... and to overcome the need for substances to overcome guilt, shame and PTSD to get in the mood.. and to stop being a moth to flame with Nathan. But... I am curious about what you're going to do with Alex.. and his brothers.. and do we notice that Robbie still loves him? Because he doesn't wince at 2k... just that he can't get it fast enough! And that is what is so awful about date/acquaintance/partnersexual violence, it makes things extremely complicated... and Dodger, you were extremely clear about Alex having been consistently abusive with Robby, yet consistently abused in his family so why would Alex have any CLUE as to how to express love to or for anyone? You've done a good job of making us understand how this all works...

I'm expecting that Stephanie is pregnant and Robbie ends up marrying her because it's easier and they have a kid... and then divorced her and leaves the kid with mom and sods off to the UK... sending money... she gets cancer and you, Dodger get to write the sequel reversing the ocean crossing. How's that for a surprise ending. Of course she could die in childbirth, and leave Robbie to graduate, emancipate himself somehow to move to UK with Tom and raise the kid in his mom's rented flat. Alex is tweaking and not long for the world... How's that for unexpected? Lol

But, he is getting a little better--he used Daniel to extricate himself graciously! A bit of judgement he wouldn't have had before Jo! He ACTUALLY gave a damn about his own safety for once, and did something to protect himself! A major milestone!

And I wonder if Robbie decided to go all investigative on Don's ass if he could wangle emancipation for himself...

I still wonder how much he has embezzled out of Robbie's accounts?

But, a very, very, very SMALL thorn!

Oddly, I also have a telecommunications degree (radio/tv) and actually was a news geek...by training lol (I have a talent audition tape from back in the day for both radio and tv...somewhere lol) the ethos of the tie and jacket as providing the talent as "authoratative" has some truth to it... (If you saw some of the sports dudes wearing a jacket and tie over tight athletic shorts...Woof!) Seeing them on camera and off camera they went from trustworthy looking and sounding to looking like the party animals they were who prolly had 60 beercans stacked pyramidically in their college residence... Having a great face for radio (although I was well loved by my profs in talk-show format!) and a completely different motivation for why I was studying telecom to all of my classmates... (As a 4-year-old I watched and understood the Watergate hearings, lionize(d) Woodward and Bernstein. My professional idols were Phil Donahue and Fred Friendly.) During my senior year Mr. Friendly came to my University... (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fred_W._Friendly) Mr. Friendly ran one of his well known community ethics in journalism Socratic discussions with the entire student body of our Journalism school. I had watched and loved these on public television since I was in the second grade! His premise that day was that while covering and touring an anonymous AIDS testing site in your city, the Director is called away to a phone call and leaves you in the hands of one of his lab techs to continue the tour. SAID tech regales you with the names of local government and sports celebs who have come in for testing... ending up with dropping thw name of the local football quarterback. Do you run it? (Print folk and me from broadcast, No!, ALL OTHER BROADCASTERS: yes! The public has a right to know!) He gives you results of the guy being HIV positive? Do you run it? EVERYONE except me... Yes. me No. He asked me why... and I said well first of all the concept of what the story here is, is incredibly wrong. The story to me was that the anonymous testing site isn’t anonymous... so then he asked me if I would run that... and I said that since I now know I can't trust my managing editor to understand this... I won't tell him. Instead I will file the tour story and find people who can help me find watch dogs for the clinic, and report the clinic's deficiency directly to them so changes can be made quietly so that the public doesn't lose faith in the process and learn their HIV status so they can seek treatment and protect their partners. Well... needless to say my classmates laid onto me about protecting my sources and about not trusting my producer... and not telling the public the truth... I went right back at them about the fact that I didn't and wouldn't ask the lab tech and thus he wasn't a source... secondly, the public interest is served by fixing the site's anonymous testing protocols, by extorting compliance if needed, than by the public knowing the state of the clinic's deficiency or an individual's HIV status.) Now if they can't demonstrate improvement in their protocols and staffing almost immediately, then I have to go public with the deficiency, and I would. But giving them a chance to fix it under supervision from the appropriate people is better than causing hysteria at a time when even being tested for HIV could cause you to lose insurance coverage and be branded as either a drug user or a gay man. Though I was widely complimented by faculty, all of them, let's just say that day, one of my childhood idols accidentally, but personally rescued me from even attempting to apply for broadcasting positions after graduating because I realized I did not belong with these people they looked good on camera... lol but... not so much in real life. I have no college friends from this major. Strangely, this experience helped me to crystalize my understanding of the bs involved in dressing in a shirt and tie to 'impress' folk professionally.

Dodger, You are damned right Jo doesn't like risks... having lost a student or two in 20 years of non-clinically working with them, to suicide, I can tell you I required several months of clinical counseling of my own after these experiences. And they weren't remotely my fault... but damn it, I love my students as any human version of a laborador Retriever/St Bernard mix would. As I have 'famously' said on many occasions "I am your advisor who loves you--and not in that 'icky' way." (Think about how it should be at church, where people should be caring for and lifting each other and cheering each other through their challenges AND their joys--that's the kind of love I am talking about... it's pure, beautiful, idealistic, and rare... but damn it, it is powerful!) When you work with someone on hard problems, and you see them struggle and try and work, I don't know how you can't care deeply and do everything that is legal, moral and ethical and help them. Sometimes that means helping them face logical consequences for action/inaction. People are amazing--and for me it's impossible not to feel for them. I suspect that you have written Jo this way because it's the only way to truly reach folks who are in as much pain as Robbie and Ginny are/have been. You're a beautiful person, Dodger... because you see these things, frailities, strengths in real people in your life, and you transform them into fiction that is sensitive and compelling. That is difficult-- seeing it in the first place AND transforming it to a page as you have... it's amazing. Thank you for sharing.

As a guy with a master's degree in mental health counseling, I would agree with this 'assessment.' I am not licensed (by choice!) but my paying job works primarily with adult (25+) colodge students attending or thinking about attending a metropolitan state university in the blue collar, Midwestern United States, that serves some very Coberg-esque areas. Consequently, I wear a lot of jeans and khakis with sweaters and polos, eschewing ties at almost all times, and am blessed to work for a woman who understands that every time I wear dress slacks or a tie, I have have to take 2-3x's as long to get students to talk to me about what is really happening in their lives, so I can guide them through whatever non-clinical financial, academic or interpersonal issues they are trying to navigate as a student or perspective student. Because I am given similar fashion dispensation to Jo, although I am not nearly as edgy, I can really cut through a LOT of crap in their heads about education and their former school counselors... an truly reach them. That's not conceit it's just happens because I have 4 rules that I go over with each student the first time I meet them... 1. I am going to ask you a whole bunch of questions that are none of my damned business. YOU DO NOT HAVE TO ANSWER THEM!!! I will still like you! I will still help you! All I ask is that you understand that I ask to be of support to you--not judge you. 2. If I piss you off, wierd you out or otherwise make you not want to come back if you need more support. I need you to promise me that you will see my boss whose name is ___________ and tell her, so that she helps you, because supporting you, is THE most important thing. If I am not the right person, that's OK! You not getting support is not. 3. I promise I WILL make mistakes. If you aren't think I am wrong about something, I need you to tell me, so I can double check things for you and make things right for you. 4.) If you are ever leaving my office, and you feel that I don't respect you, believe in you, or that I think you aren't a capable student, truly, I have f'd something up royally. I want you to call me on it, let me know and give me a chance to work on it with you, or to refer you to a colleague so you get better support. This takes me 2 minutes and cuts hours off of the time I need to get the student to talk to me candidly about deeply personal, private things in ways that let us work together to make school work for them. It only works because like Jo, it is clear to my students that as messy as my office is, as disheveled as I may look, I truly give a damn about them and always want to help. Well written dodger!

You know, Ricky as your firstish of the child narrators had a pretty lively narrative voice... whereas Josh was always warm and overly concerned/anxious, whereas our favorite pediatrics practitioner has that more yeoman-like practicality needed for his situation... Great Job as usual!

You know, reading this is almost like reading a letter home from your own adult kid about their family happenings or something like that. Since I don't have that, this kinda fills a niche I didn't know I was missing... lol! Thanks man!

Narcissistic folk, tend to be charming, and well turned out--at least initially....

Friends, I don't know if this is all of it... https://www.nifty.org/nifty/gay/young-friends/for-the-love-of-pete Its copyright info allows for reposting 45ish chapters... so if someone wanted to... they could! Let ME know if there is more of it???

Hey! (Grinning!) Ward NEVER cheated on June! Never! not once! Ok... so there were those frequent dalliance with Eddie Haskell off camera... lol kidding... couldn't resist.