Friend #3 groused that I was skipping the impending music trivia night in favor of my previous engagement to watch The Magic Flute.

”Like you can’t watch Mozart on YouTube,” she complained. “You have to go to the opera.”

”Well actually,” I said, because all the most insufferable sentences start with that, “Opera season is over, so I’m watching the opera at the symphony.”

YES HOW INSUFFERABLE AM I?

Still not as bad as if I had seen an opera involving a ballet sequence at the symphony.

I always thought Mom was very against a divorce from Jerry. The narrative I heard was that she visited Saint Louis, then met up with my (step)Dad again, and henceforth was heartily pro-divorce.

Well, the new letters have revealed that Mom filed for divorce from my father Jerry six months before visiting Saint Louis. That surprised me.

Later letters revealed the true story.

1. Jerry started a new job FOR Lockheed, contracting AT NASA, encountered stepmother Susanne, realized he hadn’t loved my Mom the last three years, and saw this marriage had to end.
2. However, as a Catholic, he couldn’t just bone the new blonde Susanne while married, and also, as a Catholic, he couldn’t file for divorce. So Mom would have to file for divorce. (And, readers, I tell you, I have never felt such kinship with my father. That type of hair-splitting bullshit is the kind of nonsense my younger technical-virgin self would do.)
3. Mom almost immediately alerted Jerry’s doctor to say, “This man is spending money recklessly and accidentally setting fires and getting into car accidents and longing for blondes. I think he needs a psychiatrist because he’s losing his mind.” The doctor said, “No, I’ll just give him a stern talking-to.” (1968. Texas. How ill would someone have to be for a manic-depression diagnosis? I don’t know.)
4. Mom soon got disgusted enough to say, “Fine, Jerry, you can pay for a mortgage and an apartment, and I’ll file for a divorce, and we can make it official when I find a job.” Six months of job-hunting later she took a break to visit St. Louis with my little five-year-old cock-blocking self and the rest is history.

So the pieces are falling into place. I couldn’t find Jerry in the government NASA directory because technically he was a Lockheed contractor. Mom got divorced so fast after finding my Dad again because she’d already filed. Still don’t know who drove her back from Mizzou when Dolores died, but that will be revealed I am sure.

This is a Facebook ad for a tiered chiffon skirt from H&M.

“That’s a man modeling that skirt,” I thought, and it might be. H&M has started hiring trans people to model clothing.

I love the inclusion, I do. But wasn’t it bad enough that I had to look as good as a model to look good in one of their skirts, now I’m expected to look as good as a man?

Friend #3 is the only one of the Numbered Friends still at TeddyJ. And even that will not last for long: today was the first of her two (two!) two retirement parties.

It was well attended by thirty coworkers from the last 18 years, and they all went around and shared stories of her generosity and expertise.

My turn came early and, instead of sharing a work story, I related this story of how we saw a man dressed as a slice of pizza and she made me laugh so hard no noise came out.

She was appalled, and said immediately, “I’ve known you since the nineties and that’s all you’ve got?”

“Well, you make me laugh,” I said. And I know she would have preferred I talk about her technical acumen, but she’s my friend first and my co-worker second. And every time someone said how much they’d miss her, I thought, “I’ll see her at music trivia on the 20th.”

I saw a man in a hat recently. At work. The idea. Brazenly wearing a hat in mixed company at work.

And not a sedate and modest hat, like a bowler, or a deerstalker.

No.

The man was wearing the most provocative of all hats.

A fedora.

At. Work.

Here I am, stitching up necklines so I do not appear untoward, while men get no criticism as they publicly clap on a fedora, with the excuse — I suppose — that it is winter and they are headed into the cold.

What is next? Vests? Spats? Even more clothing until every man is parading around like Cary Grant? It’s very distracting.