Two big events happened in the lives of us at Chez Evil within this past week. Having Evil Dad away for the past few days has a little something to do with it, but I honestly forgot. They are, in chronological order:

• As of November 14, Evil Dad and I have lived in Colorado for 10 years. This is the place we’ve lived in the longest since we were first married. Double digits. Damn, it’s been a long time. The people are like everywhere else – some are good, some are epis and some are just plain mean and evil – but the land is magical. Living here has given us the second place we’d like to retire (besides Asheville, NC); northern New Mexico. It’s also given us the second big event that happened this week…
• School Girl’s finalization hearing happened 7 years ago Sunday. That day was one of the longest days we had up to that point; first a big luncheon celebrating “National Adoption Month” (oddly, we were only one of two families who finalized that day), then a death-defying trip back to the house to change School Girl into her “fancy Judge-meeting clothes” and back to the courthouse for our hearing. School Girl even tried to say something to the judge. That even made the judge laugh. It was a weird day, and not nearly as big a deal for us as our placement day (both for good and for bad), but we were finally a family in the eyes of our state and (more importantly) our agency. That was also the turning point for one of my latest rounds with depression, but you don’t want to hear about that.

We don’t really celebrate either “anniversary”. Certainly not our finalization day, for reasons that are obvious if you know our family. But to have just slipped my mind completely…

Maybe it doesn’t mean anything at all. But I feel as though it should mean something.