We had some good times together, he and I. It was the nineties, when the world was young(er). I had come out of the closet only a couple of years previously, and had started going to the local gay bar/dance club about a-year-and-a-half after that. I was gradually becoming more comfortable in my own skin. Dad, and my beloved maternal grandmother, Gummy, were yet to become sick and die from cancer. I was going to the local community college. Life was, if not great, good.