A series of Updates, taken out of time and context, yes what fun!

So I have not updated in any sense of the word. When I started this trip, I totally though that I would have been able to keep up a daily correspondence with myself, but I am just too busy and not always in the mood for writing. Recounting the events of the day happens so much more slowly than I would have thought.

But we will work backwards, and start with my time in Florida. I came here on Friday, January 21^st. It was crazy getting here because I made a grievous error. Throughout my week in Pittsburgh, I had said that my flight left on Friday at 5.45pm. At 1am, Thursday night, or Friday morning, your choice, I checked my itinerary in order to make sure that everything was kosher. To my utter dismay and surprise, my flight left at 7.45 in the AM rather than what I had thought. I screamed obscenities and woke up Josh and told him we had to leave in 4 hours to make the flight. He was none too excited. I gathered my crap as quick as I could while at the same time calling the airport because it had been snowing all day long. And all night long. And the roads were awful, and I was hoping for a 5 hour delay so I could get some sleep. No such luck. Everything was on time, and I fell asleep for like an hour. It was bad sleep too because I was such a nervous wreck. Josh and I had to dig his car out of the snow and drive very slowly to the airport.

But all was well and we made it. I arrived that afternoon around 1pm with my grandmother (Mom Mom) and my cousin (Bobby). We went for lunch and I got settled and then I went and hung out with my cousin and his friends Marty, Jen, and Robby. Marty and Jen are married and Robby is a couch surfer. They are major major hippies and go to festivals and traveling music ish and all that. Totally rad dudes and I was happy to spend some time with my cousin.

One of the benefits of this trip is to connect and reconnect with people I may have fallen out of contact with. As most people know, I was literally lying to myself for most of my adolesence in terms of my sexuality. Even the Catholics realize that sexuality is a 'gift from God,' and when you are hiding such an integral part of yourself, then you also hide all sorts of other ways to open up to someone or your own true potential as an individual creative being. Not that I came out to my grandmother on this trip, but I think that I will because she seems pretty OK with a lot of things, and she is pretty forward thinking.

Same with my cousin. He and I are basically the same age and we have lots of similar interests, but throughout adolescence, we never talked or hung out besides the random visit to see his family. Something funny I talked about with him is that we were both into music and shows growing up. However, he is from Middletown, DE which is a little bit, not too much, South of where I grew up. So where did he go for shows and such? Philly and Baltimore. Where did I go for the same? Philly and New York. Slight differences led us to not interact in meaningful ways. He even mentioned it as we facebook messaged before my trip. It was something to truly reflect on, and I did come out to him. I'm glad because he was cool and understanding and it made the trip that much more meaningful.