15 deadtimeson

.  that he ci=onsidered the  oidea of his nephew becoming the child of " strangers " to be incomprehnsible .
lauren and i were the "strangers" that brother martin was dismissing . the reality was that jonas had lived yards across a dusty lane from us since the day he was born . other than his parents , and maybe one or two luminescent pearls in a long string of forgettable nannies , he was closer to no one than he was to us .
although we were anything but strangers to jonas , we were strangers to martin , and that , apparently , was what was most  important to him as he manueuvered in the shadows cast by his sister's  death . i forced myself to try to find some empathy for martin 's position . it wasn't hard to do .
martin , however , made it hard to hang on to .

adrienne had been estranged from her family , who had questioned every choice she'd made since she's decided to attend medical school . when she had shown an inclination for biology in college , they had been hoping she  would become a radiologist or a pharmarceutical researcher , certainly not a clinician . when she made it clear that she had a passion for patient care , they switched tracks and made it equally clear that they thought she should become a dermatollogist ,  they haad been appalled by her decision to become a urologist .
adrienne 's take was , " bottom line ? they don't like that i have a job that involves pricks . my mother  won't tell her friends what  i do . she thinks i'm one step removed from beng hand job judy ."
although i'd been tempted at the time , i had never asked adrienne about the eponymous " hand-job-judy ." i really wished i had . that provocative omission was a poignant addition to the long list of conversations i would never have with her .
the familyal disappointment didn't stop with carrer . adrienne's familly didn't like that adriene had fallen in love with , and then eloped with , a woodworker . a carpenter . they hated that she's settleed with him in the west in general , in colorado specifically , and in boulder in particular .