Yes, it was a full day, but it didn't end there - I left there at 2pm. Picked up the children at school and had a heart-to-heart with J about her day until around 3:30. Took a lengthy bathroom break. Bounded down the stairs to visit with Mom and Dad and FRANK PERDICHIZZI is on my sofa!!!!!! Frank - Pizza - has been my friend since 1988 during my first marriage. 1st hubby and I were best friends with Frank and Kat and we lived right next door in an apartment complex just north of Atlanta. We played monopoly, went to concerts, had stupid (wonderful) luau parties in the dead of winter, trips to Hilton Head SC, hirings, firings, and all the stuff new couples can face. That song by 10,000 Maniacs - These Are Days - always reminds me of the years of Adam and me and Frank and Kat. You don't know how good it is until you don't have it and look back.

Well, I left Adam, Atlanta, Frank and Kat and moved back home to Bham AL in 1993. They since adopted my hubby Monty, and we've visited about three times in the last ten years. Frank usually stops in when he passes through town - which is why he stopped in today!

Seeing him and his middle daughter just FILLED me with joy! It's like a brother, YES, like a brother! I know Frank, we've had so many talks - when he was having trouble with Kat, when I left Adam and he tried to talk sense into me, when he offered his apartment as neutral territory for Adam and me to try to work out a solution. You REALLY know someone when you go through hard times together. Frank has a deep love for me, totally cool, totally appropriate, and so returned.

I must just be completely hormonal - EVERYTHING is making me tear up!! I just watched Notting Hill with Julia Roberts and Hugh Grant and SOBBED during Elvis Costello's "She." TWICE - beginning of the movie and at the end!!

GEEZ! I've shed enough tears this week to lose significant water weight!

ANYWAY, Frank was here for about an hour or two, and we totally downloaded to each other the highlights, exchanged email addresses and promised to keep in touch better. I made sure he got my Christmas card - theirs hasn't gone out yet. Kat usually gets them out in Jan, but I know she'll come through at some point.

Maybe the tears are just because of leftover birthday angst. Or the fact that Notting Hill wasn't as great as it could've been. Or my period. Oh, well.