Later on in the Avenues

It's been a while since I posted here. I tried to resurrect my first post--from 2007--but it appeared as being fresh, and not the original post. OK. So it's May 15th. Just got out of a law school graduation for one of my mentees through the bar association. Two and a half years, I've helped him--we've both helped each other--academically, and personally. I am so proud of the guy. This is the second mentee I've seen graduate. I hope my help during the years has been beneficial to them. There were several deaths in the family last week; two funerals. The first was everyone coming together; the second was filled with drama and bloodletting. D-1 and I had a chance to talk; I hope her anger over my coming out is something she can work through, since instead of directing it at me, she's blasting it all over the family, and had been creating harm and havoc, hopefully not irreparable. D-2 has re-enrolled in school to change professions from saving the Earth to saving people medically. More immediate results; better pay. She studying to take the MCAT, in fact. The Mrs. and I have been working our way through structuring a new relationship. We deeply care about one another, and have psychological profiles which leave us involved with one another. I've taken in a tenant, a 20 year old college student, for various reasons. I had not counted on raising another kid, though, and he's doing all the stuff kids that age do. Phone calls in the middle of the night 'cause the car got booted; broken heart stuff; lots of energy and drive but no direction. And an absolutely total absence about what laundry and kitchen cleanup is all about. Work continues, and intensifies. Busy from sunup to sundown. In Public practice I find I work harder than I have ever worked in my life. As as for me? I'm lonely. There's no one there to make me feel special, to make me feel safe. To make me feel like I count. And at my age, that's as deep a void as it is for anyone else.