Rhode Trip

Rhode Island. It's such a funny little state. K and I will be there this weekend to visit the wonderful M, my former roommate and (more privately) interpretive dance partner.

I've visited her before, including once this February when I combined a work trip to Boston with a two-day stay at M's parents' home in Providence. A couple of weeks later, M lost her mother to complications from a surgery that was not expected to be life-threatening.

So this visit will be different. The goal is to show M a good time, though knowing her she will already have grand plans laid out for us by the time we arrive. Heaven forbid that she just relax and not worry about it.

On Saturday K and I are going to pull for a visit to a winery for a tasting. That would be a first for me. I still associate wine tastings with old, rich, fancy white people. By those criteria, I score only 1 out of 4. But I can go to a tasting too, darn it. I think we would all enjoy that. Let's just hope that one of us doesn't get really drunk, have an emotional outburst and go storming through the vineyards, like Miles in Sideways.

The wine tasting, therefore, will be my formal newbie of the week. Less officially, I've never had the chance to talk to such a close friend my own age about losing a parent before. This is the first time for that type of loss. I really want to ask M what it is like and how she is dealing or not dealing with it. I want to know if the ground still feels solid under her feet, or more like the shifting rubble of a bombed-out building.