We spent a week with our son. We have not seen him in a year and a half.  It was great to see him.  There was the occassional spark of him that burned through but overall he is struggling with mental illness.  A very sad thing.

Nofirm inicator yet if he will remain in the service or if he will be medically retired.  Hopefully he will have the opportunity to serve the remaining ~5 years to make it to full retirement at 20 years of service. That is what he wants and what his mom and I think is best for him.  That goal and accomplishment will be a solid foundation of pride for him to progress in his life after retirement in his late 30s.

It was very good to see him.  As we we dropped him off at his apartment the evening of our last day he latched on to me in a hug and would not leg go.  He of course also hugged his mom, but his firmness and duration of hug with me was heartwarming.  I'm not sure what the motivator for that was though I suspect it is that I was very supportive of his commitment to working with his med and Psych team and maintaining his focus on work.  He and I did have a side bar on his depression.  I was direct and asked if he had any suicidal thoughts.  He indicated that he had not. I gave him the brief guidance that taking a permanent solution to a temporary solution is exceptionally selfish and that his mom and me and the rest of my family want him around for the rest of our lives.

After a week in Yorktown, we flew to Miami and then on to St Maarten for a long holiday weekend with dear friends.  The group ended up being 21 people that our friends hosted for the weekend.  It was a great time. Lots of happy hour libating, a day cruise on a catamaran with multiple dive stops. We saw a bunch of fish, turtles, and barracuda, and a few sharks.  I OD'd on Dramamine and avoided debilitating sea sickness but I did get a little green on the third of 4 legs that made up the day.  Interestingly the 4th leg was rocking and rolling. The swell, waves, etc... were rough but I loved that. It was the rough but moderate seas leg that got to me. More rhythmic in nature than the very rough 4th leg.

The food was incredible.  

We also did a dinner cruise on our last night on the island.  That was a beautiful sunset cruise.  Everyone had a great time.

One interesting event was the second night we were there.  We went to dinner at a popular waterfront restaurant with one friend and a new couple to the group.  During dinner a large table a few tables from us that had about 20 people at it got into a raging fight.  All women other than one man. Screaming, punching, hair pulling, etc....   A person in the elevated bar area started filming it which which sent the one man in the party into a rage. He stormed up the stairs for the elevated bar and attacked the older tourist who was filming the fight on his phone trying to take the phone to delete the video.  That is when the restaurant security got involved. They separated the two guys in the bar, and dragged the one who went after the phone of the other guy.  We stayed about an hour longer than we planned so that the fighting party could disperse once they left the restaurant.

Lots of apologies from the restaurant staff and free deserts.

Our condo was incredible.  A one room unit that was about 1100Ft^2 water front. Our large glass wall opened on our beach level patio that was right on the beach/water.

We flew out of Wed of this week. We were on a flight that left an hour earlier than everyone else in our party.  We made it, they all were delayed for 48hrs.  We had all checked out of the vacation club so they had to find accommodations at other places.  Not that getting stuck in paradise for an extra couple of days is a crisis.

I hope everyone had a wonderful Memorial Day weekend and that all who have family or friends who sacrificed their lives in service to our country honored them and gathered as family.