So, it's off to PUERTO VALLARTA for me!

I was on the Sunshine Coast this past couple of days, for the fourth time in the last couple of years, trying to pin down  my estranged uncle.  He just happens to be my favorite uncle.  Let's see....the last time I saw him would have been when I was two or three,  and I was looking at him through a plexiglass window at a prison. That's right folks, he was in the  (that's a big house for those who can't figure it out!)  LOL!  My uncle Brian is really not such a bad guy.  i think that was his last visit to the big house....He did stop by to say hello once more, but I was supposed to be in bed so I sat upstairs and listened to him talk, then listened to him leave.  My uncle disappeared for years.  My mom never knew what happened to him, but I always remeber the day I sat staring at him through that glass.  And the cheezy 'hand-on-the-glass' moment we shared.  Growing up I always wondered where he was, always wondered if he was still alive, in prison, into drugs, living on  the streets, who knows. 

God spoke to me in a dream one night.  It was totally a visitation.  Amazing!  And from it all, I knew that my uncle Brian was alive, and that he was living a straight edge life, and that everything was ok.  Ever since then I have been trying to find him.    It was found out a couple of years ago that he was living on the Sunshine Coast in Gibsons, where me and my siblings were born.  He was running a business there and travelling back and forth to Mexico every so often.   So every so often I would hop a ferry up the coast and try to see my uncle.  Unfortunately, every time I would go to see him, he would be on another one of his timely trips to Mexico!   Four times I have gone now! And four times I have NOT seen my uncle!  I can't even begin to say how much this upsets me!  I can't even begin to say how much it means to me to establish this relationship!   Uncle Brian is my mom's little brother - her favorite brother - her closest sibling.  She recently told me that she understands why I've had such a strong bond to him even though I have grown up not really knowing him.  She says that I remind her of him.  I act just like him.  I look like him.  My attitude, my eyes, expressions in my eyes, my personality - I remind her a lot of him. 

It was sort of nice in a way to have that conversation with my mom.  She was missing her brother and missing me, of course.  But to get a small glimpse of her brother, you know, the memories and the times that she shared with him and missed so much.  I think it was nice for her.

Long story not quite so long....I'm leaving on a jet plane....I was just on the coast, as I mentioned, and yet again my uncle was not there.  It turns out he has packed his bags  and moved on down to Puerto Vallarta, Mexico.  So, my friends, I suppose my next move is to save my money  and buy myself a ticket to find my uncle Brian.  I am determined.  And I know I can find him.  I did find a guy who knows him and he told me about a bar in 'Old Town' called 'Endele's'.  The owner there knows my uncle and can tell me where to find him.  That is, if my uncle isn't at the bar already!

sam