Back from a long break!

First and foremost I would like to apologize and thank my readers for continuing to read and check our blog for updates.
The long break was necessary, we endured a personal life changing event, along with a harder than ever tough transition period back to Brazil, not entirely in Brazil yet, but working on it.
So, my dear mother, who I loved more than life itself passed away after a long and hard battle with a rare lung disease acquired from poisonous black mold (don't take mold for granted, it's a deadly force that medicine still knows little about!).
My mother suffered so much that at the end, believe it or not, I was shamefully relieved that she finally had a break, and could rest, and still feel bad about that weird relief, I wanted nothing more than to spend long happy years with my mother now that she finally accepted and respected the fact that I was born gay and this is not a "phase".
She spent 45 days in intensive care, doctors telling us each and every day that day was the day...an unimaginable roller coaster of emotions!  I had left Gilson alone at our house in the Boston area and stayed in São Paulo with my family.
See, this event hit Gil and I particularly hard, because back in 1998, when we left our happy Brazilian life, friends and family and embarked on this self imposed exile in the US, we did it for peace of mind, if you read our first posts, you will understand the whole family drama, my mother gave us a real hard time in the beginning. She was raised in a boarding Catholic School, and had a real hard time accepting the fact that her oldest son was gay.
Long story short, we finally made peace after so many years of pain and bitterness, and destiny had this sour surprise for us, finally, now that my mother was ok with who I am (the way I was born), and we were ready and looking for jobs getting ready to return home, no more reason to continue in our long time self imposed exile, she passes away.
Honestly, I am still trying to figure out/digest this one, if there is/ was something to be digested. I am trying to understand if there is a life lesson to be leaned here, if any.
This past weekend was really, really cool/relaxing/awesome, I spent with people that I knew very little but I already felt in love with just like if they were my life long friends from the days of high school.
We had a wonderful time in the beautiful mountains of Rio de Janeiro, great cool weather, we talked in front of the fireplace with good wines, yes, plural, great cheeses, an awesome Raclete maker, and great company into the wee hours of the night/morning.
Petropolis is up in the mountains region of Rio de Janeiro, a must visit if you are in Brazil and can go, only a short 40 minutes beautiful drive from the "cidade Maravilhosa", a visit to the Imperial Museum is going to be the highlight of your visit to Petropolis, I highly recommend.
One of the awesome visitors to this great weekend was our blog's God mother, Rachel, from Rachel's Rantings in Rio blog, we were guests of our also great and dear friend Mrs. Born Again Brazilian, Rachel basically kicked my behind, told me to snap out of it and get back to blogging, eh eh eh, I love her, and here I am, back in contact with you, our loyal readers that have followed our life dramas and funny moments of our split life between Brazil and New England from the beginning.
I am really looking forward to meeting flaky awesome friend/fellow blogger Alex from Bossa Breezes in Rio tomorrow, if he doesn't flake on us, yet again, he is swearing this time "e pra valer" and he will show up, possibly and hopefully Tom, from Eat Rio blog if he is around and available and Jim from "Qualidade de Vida", if we are able to get hold of him in time to make it work.
First blog post written from my best gadget friend, the iPad, I have to say, it as somewhat smooth, and it got easier by the end of the post.

Abraco a todos
Ray