A couple of covert eavesdroppings and observed on-the-sly glances later, and there is a debate as to the quantity and chronology of our father's marriages... I'm pretty certain that Chom is actually number 4. But then again, an off-the-cuff remark last El Paso visit had kristin and I faced with the possibility that dad had a marriage prior to our mother. Startling! to say the least as at the exact age I stand now, my parents were already married for over a year and I was en route--the cusp of third trimester, specifically.

and all this is really just [unnecessary?] exposition to the meat of the story...

I hear mum's side of things far too often as her slave-therapist (read: co-dependent child)... Stepfather Roger and her will eventually crumble to divorce, though i give it at least 5 more years. I never hear what Roger thinks... until tonight... disguised in an modern day explanation of Erasmus Montanus (the title character from Ludvig Holberg's most brilliant satire)'s main dilemma: that he is a man of university wanting to marry his peasant (this is set in 18th century Denmark) "high school" girlfriend, but her father won't let him until Erasmus denies that the earth is round, which at the end, he does (much to my dismay).

Roger (my professor/advisor/stepfather... SUCH AN UNHEALTHY POSITION FOR ME!) akins this to a man steadfast in belief of evolution wanting to marry a woman steadfast in belief of creation. What does the man do? Does he deny his education--the "truth"--and marry her and attend church and feign a certain christian-ness? and he does, but ends up "quite unhappy" and that "they both would probably have been fine and content and happy having never married and gone their separate ways." If it wasn't obvious enough that he was referring to my mother and himself, he averted his eyes and carried on with the scenario in shaky, nervous manner.