So, I picked Robert up from Lime Street at lunchtime and brought him back to Crosby.
Ross gave us plenty of space and we talked. Not all of the time but enough.
I'm not going to go into details but it was all about our relationship and what we want and don't want from it. We covered some past history but really the main point is what we wanted for the future.
I guess that one of my main problems in all of this is that the only role model that I have had to base myself on has been Albert. However, the circumstances were quite different. Robert wasn't brought up in a traditional nuclear family. In fact, had I been more of a heterosexual man and had I demanded more of what you might call "my rights", I doubt that Robert and I would still be in touch.
One of the main positive moments for me was to hear Robert say that I was important to him and that he wanted me to play a part in his life. Well, we carefully haven't defined what that might be but at least I do feel wanted. My only request of him was to give me a bit more information about what he was up to; after all, it's no use remarking that I am often out of date with the circumstances of his life if I don't get any updates on the data.
Monday evening took us down to the waterfront at Crosby for a picnic in the sunshine. Robert was interested to see the Antony Gormley installation Another Place. They've now finished installing all one hundred of the statues and they make a splendid sight stretched out across the beach and the sandbanks to the far waterline.
We had a good couple of hours soaking up the sunshine and chatting and walking out to the sculptures. Every time that Ross and I have been there now, the tide has been way out. I'm quite looking forwards to seeing them sometime with the waves crashing over them.
On Tuesday, Robert and I went off to Formby Point to see the red squirrels in the pine woods and then out onto the sand dunes. We took a trip inland to Haskayne for lunch at the Ship Inn. All in all, Robert got to see a number of different landscapes which were quite different from his received impression of the North West consisting of constant Inner City.
All in all, it was a very enjoyable couple of days and one which was probably much less fraught that either of us thought it was going to be.