The story so far

Guess it's time to introduce myself here. So I copied what I wrote in my (almost) first post at efx2 about two years ago.

Name: Peter. I don't have a dog, either. Two cats, tho. I adopted the name from the Firesign Theater. Anyone remember them?

Place: I live in the western Upper Peninsula of Michigan. In fact, though, we are part of Wisconsin in every way except politically. (Unfortunately, I might add.) Small town (about 3,000 peoples) in a rural, mostly forested with a very low population density. But, yes, I do like to visit cities, too. It just takes time and money, both of which I have in short supply.

Age: Just turned 58.

Occupation: I work at a weekly paper. I write sports, news, features, editorials, and I take a lot of pictures. I enjoy the sports and pictures the most. I think I'm pretty good at it, too. This is not the kind of job for those who want to be rich, though.

Hobbies: With my job, I don't have a lot of time for my own pursuits. I enjoy computers and the internet. My first real blog was at ModBlog. When that crashed and burned, I went to efx2, which is now efx2blogs. Recently, I decided to start a new blog here. Maybe I'll post the same stuff at both places, but this gives me a chance to write different kinds of things. I know it's all in my head, but I seem to be in a rut, just writing about the things I do and the photos I take. I want a place to try different things. So I hope I'm dealing with open-minded people here.

Let's see. I also enjoy sports (hockey and football especially, and even cricket!), reading (when I get the time, which isn't often) and movies. My favorite directors are Kurosawa and Fritz Lang. Love many kinds of music: Jimi Hendrix leads the list. Howlin' Wolf. John Lee Hooker. Great stuff!

Family: I had a brother, but he died in 1985. My dad died in 1994. My mom is 85 and moved into a nursing home two years ago; she is mentally sharp but in frail condition physically. Her place is about 50 miles away, and I'm in charge of her, also. With such a small family, there is nobody else.

I'm on my first marriage, which is, let's see, 36 years old now. My wife is my best friend. I also have a very special friend, named S, who lives about 150 miles away in Wisconsin. We used to be lovers. At present we are not. She is living with her husband, and I'm living with my wife. Both the other spouses know about our past.

Two sons. Both out of the home. The older son (nearly 31) lives in the north Detroit suburbs and works at a bank corporation down there. The younger one (25) lives in town, about five blocks away. He's autistic--works at a wood handling plant in the area. Doing pretty well.

Belief system: I've fallen far away from organized religion. Don't believe in guilt as a basis for a belief system. I believe in love and in caring for one another and our planet. God lives in each of us--it depends on whether you want to look for it. Best spiritual experiences in recent years was a neopagan camp where I met S and reading Robert Heinlein's "Stranger in a Strange Land." I feel life is moving in a positive direction for me, and though I miss S (we sent e-mails back and forth), life has been good for me in recent years.

In the recent past, my wife's father died, and we attended his funeral on Christmas Eve. That sort of put a damper on the holiday. But my older son did come up for two quick days, so we did have Christmas together after all.

That's the basics. I know it wasn't brief. If you want brief, read USA Today.