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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Karin Schill" data-source="post: 15559">Thank you Silvie. I am glad that you think it's a great story so far. <img src="data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7" class="smilie smilie--sprite smilie--sprite1" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)" loading="lazy" data-shortname=":)" />Our next update brings us back to Southfork...The white ranch house, was standing proudly in the middle of nowhere, as it was surrounded by over 100 000 acres of farmland with nothing but cattle on it. In the middle of the land there was a lake and a river. Except for that there was nothing but wide grassy plains as far as the eye could reach. The ranch was located in the county of Braddock in Texas, with just about half an hour drive into downtown Dallas. In the otherwise metropolitan area around Dallas, Southfork Ranch represented a haven of tranquility, a place where cows, bulls and calves were still being moved from one section to another by cowboys on horses, much in the same way as they had been ever since Enoch Southworth had first bought the place in the 1850s. It has since then been passed down to his son Aaron before going to his granddaughter Eleanor. Today it was the home of her family, the mighty Ewing family. They had modified the place and built a bigger more modern ranch house with a swimming pool, basket ball court, stables and a bunch of paddocks where their horses could graze. Yet it was still a beautiful place, where the land has been left pretty much untouched, despite the massive riches of oil resting underneath section 40. That oil would never be pumped, as it would destroy the land. Yet ironically oil was the very thing that had saved the ranch from going bankrupt in the 1930s, as it was the money Jock Ewing had made from the oil business that helped preserve the land the way it was and keep the ranch in the family. But that was of course something that the youngest generation of Ewings rarely ever thought of, as to them it was unthinkable to live anywhere else but at Southfork. Thirteen years old Christopher Ewing was out playing by himself in the swimming pool at Southfork. He was a good looking boy, with brown hair and blue eyes. He was still quite short as boys his age often were and he was athletic. He loved playing football and his dream was to follow in his father’s footsteps and play college football one day. He was a great kid who was nice, friendly, clever and obedient. He was mature for his age too, as he was used to spending most of his spare time with adults. But he was also lonely. Sometimes he missed the days when his cousin John Ross still used to live at the ranch. John Ross had been more than just a cousin to Christopher as they had been close like brothers. They could get into silly fights and be competitive and sometimes he’d sure gone on Christopher’s nerves. But John Ross was also someone who Chris looked up to and who could be protective when other kids picked on him. They would always stick together when it mattered and he was in many ways the older brother that Chris had never had. They still kept in touch through e-mails and phone calls but they didn’t get to see each other more than once a year. So in the past four years they had grown apart. It just wasn’t the same as back when they were kids and used to live together.Sometimes Christopher missed those days. Occasionally he missed his mother too, even though he hated to admit it, as he had now lived more than half his life without her. As far as his father was concerned she was definitely a closed book. So as the years passed by Chris had thought of her less and less and he didn’t miss her as much as he had when he was a kid. Since his dad and he did ok without her. They were father and son team and Christopher surely worshipped his father. In his eyes there was no better man. He loved spending time with his father, just the two of them, whether they were hunting, fishing, working the ranch or just out riding it always made him happy. So all things considered Christopher knew that he could consider himself lucky to have Bobby as his father and to be a part of the Ewing family. Yet it was a privilege that Christopher never took for granted, since he was well aware of that he was adopted. Sometimes that made him feel like he had to prove himself to be worthy of the Ewing name. Christopher dove into the swimming pool again when a white pickup truck suddenly pulled up on the driveway and stopped.Out of the pickup truck came a good ol’ fashioned cowboy, with grayish hair, blue eyes, big boots, blue jeans, big belt buckle, patterned shirt and a white cowboy hat on his head. It was Raymond Krebbs who had returned home to the ranch after living abroad for seven years. Just like his nephew Christopher, Ray was someone who felt like he had to work hard to prove himself worthy of being a Ewing. Being Jock’s bastard son, born to a nurse, who Jock had an affair with during the Second World War, Ray always felt a bit like an outsider in the Ewing family. Unlike his brothers his last name wasn’t even Ewing, as Ray had grown up thinking that Amos Krebbs was his father. Amos had been a mean drunk who his mother had married to avoid the scandal of being an unwed mother. It wasn’t the best decision his mother had ever made. Margaret Krebbs had been a strong woman who had dotted on her only son. She had been selfless, patient, compassionate and kind. But unfortunately she had gotten ill and died when Ray was 15. Right before she had died she’d made arrangements for Ray to be sent to Southfork after her death. So he had first come to the ranch at the age of 15, but not to be accepted into his father’s family, but to work as a ranch hand. So Ray had to work hard to earn the Ewing’s respect. It wasn’t until many years later when he was well into his 30s that he’d finally found out that Jock was indeed his father. Jock had been great about the whole thing and welcomed him into the family. But Ray hadn’t had much time to establish a father-son relationship with him, as his father had been taken from him about a year later, when Jock was killed in a helicopter crash in South America. Ray had reacted to the news with anger. Feeling cheated out of all the years he could have spent with his father he’d set out on a self-destructive path. It was only his brother Bobby’s influence and his wife Donna’s blind faith in him that had stopped him from losing everything that mattered to him.Donna had been one of the best things that had ever happened to Ray. Yet people never understood what she’d been doing with him as on the surface she was someone who was his complete opposite. If Ray was proud, stubborn, hot-tempered, down to earth, self-destructive, insecure, hard working and not afraid of getting his hands dirty or work out his aggressions in a good old fashioned fist fight. Donna was a real lady who was intelligent, supportive, patient, strong, driven, confident and an eloquent speaker. She was also a bestselling author and a born leader. But Ray knew that despite all these differences underneath the surface they were more alike than one could imagine. Since Donna too was someone who had lost her parents at an early age. Underneath her calm surface she too could have outburst of anger and be just as proud and stubborn as he was. Yes the Donna he’d fallen in love with, was fiercely loyal and she wasn’t above using her fists, if it meant telling some blond bimbo to stay away from her man. She’d had more faith in him than anybody he had ever known and they’d loved each other passionately. Yet it couldn’t last, after five years of a rocky marriage they had grown apart and not even expecting a baby together had been enough to keep the marriage together. After six years they had divorced formally and Donna had moved to Washington D.C. before their daughter Margaret had even been born. It had left him lonely and hurt.Not that he had to be lonely for very long though, as he’d soon found himself a new family, as he’d fallen in love with his brother Bobby’s first love Jenna Wade. Jenna and he had been friends for four years before they had fallen in love. It wasn’t something they had ever planned or thought would happen but the relationship had progressed naturally. Within a year after he’d divorced Donna, he had gotten married to Jenna, which meant that he’d become a step-dad to her teenage daughter Charlie and a father to his nephew Lucas. Since Lucas didn’t know that Bobby was in fact his real father, Lucas was the only son Ray had ever had. When he’d married Jenna 7 and a half years ago all he wanted was a family that he could live happily ever after with. But the marriage had been rocky from the start, as Charlie hadn’t accepted him as a father and had opposed to his attempts at parenting her. Then there was Bobby who Jenna secretly pined over when she thought he didn’t notice. Feeling like their marriage didn’t stand a chance living so close to the Ewing’s they had moved across the world to start over in Europe.For a while things had been great, they had set up home in Italy and had built a vacation home in Switzerland. Charlie had moved out to go to college and he, Jenna and little Lucas had been a family. They had been so happy together that Ray didn’t even mind not being able to work the ranch at first. But then things had started to fall apart. Maybe a part of the problem was that they were so different. Ray was a man who had had to work hard for everything he had in life, whereas Jenna had grown up rich and was a former jet-setter who was well-travelled, cosmopolitan, fashionable, sophisticated, intelligent, sensitive, gracious, soft-spoken, loyal and kind. So unlike his wife, who had loved setting up a little fashion boutique in Italy, Ray didn’t feel like he belonged in Europe. As the years had passed by he’d started to miss the USA more and more so eventually he just couldn’t stand it anymore. Knowing that he just had to get back to his roots he’d hopped on a plane and travelled back to Dallas. He hadn’t even called ahead and warned them that he was coming, as he didn’t want them to talk him out of his decision of coming back home.“RAY?” Christopher was surprised to see his uncle Ray, as his dad hadn’t mention anything about him coming. Yet he was happy to see him. “Hi Uncle Ray!” Christopher smiled happily and rushed out of the pool to give the man a big hug.“Oh hi there Christopher,” Ray laughed and hugged him back even though the boy was dripping wet. “Gosh you’ve certainly grown!” Ray smiled, as it occurred to him that he hadn’t been much older than Christopher, when he’d first come to the ranch.“Why do you grownups always say that?” Christopher made a face, as he just like any other child really didn’t like to hear how grown up’s constantly commented on how much he’d grown since the last time they’d seen him.“Because it’s true,” Ray insisted, before he went on, “So is your daddy at home?”“No I’m sorry, he’s away on a business trip in Los Angeles so it’s just me and uncle JR at home.”Ray frowned displeased, “Uncle JR, huh?”Noticing the uneasiness in Ray’s face Christopher hurried to go on, “But please stay anyway, grandma and Clayton will be back any day now and they’ll never forgive me if I’ll let you get away before then!”“Sure I’ll stay,” Ray smiled, “even though it sure won’t be easy to put up with JR.”“Why not?” Christopher asked puzzled. “I mean uncle JR has always been real nice to me and now he’s promised that John Ross will be back here soon”“Oh he has, has he?” Ray commented. “And what do you think about that?”“I think it’s great, John Ross and I have always gotten along real good and we still keep in touch by e-mail and phone calls,” Christopher beamed.“That’s good.”“Yeah it is, so what brings you back to Southfork?”“Well...it’s a long story,” Ray sighed.“Must be, since you do look a bit down,” Christopher commented. “Come to think of it, something is bothering you, isn’t it?”Ray nodded, “Nothing passes you by, huh?” He wondered, as he battled with himself whether Christopher was old enough to hear the truth or not. Finally he decided that honesty was probably the best approach, so he confided in him, “But okay you’re right. It’s Jenna, we’ve separated.”“You’ve separated?” Christopher asked in bewilderment. “But why?” Christopher looked at Ray questioningly. “I thought you and Jenna were happy…”“So did I,” Ray sighed. “But well what can I say, Charlie and Lucas have always come before our marriage to her and on top of that I think Charlie hates me.”“Oh no I’m sure she doesn’t!” Christopher shook his head. “I mean Charlie’s always been real nice to me.”Ray sighed. Yeah to you maybe, just like JR’s real nice to you, still that doesn’t mean that they’re real nice to good ol’ Ray Krebbs, he reflected to himself, even though he didn’t say that to Christopher, as it was just too hard to explain. “Well maybe so, still let’s just say that we got off on the wrong foot concerning her ex-boyfriend Randy and from there on things never really been that good between us,” Ray offered as an explanation.Christopher clearly bought it, as he didn’t ask anymore. Instead he just said, “I’m sorry Uncle Ray.”“Yeah me too,” Ray sighed. “But don’t worry about it. I’m sure we’ll be fine after some time apart. It gives you a chance to think things through.”“Ah so that’s why you’re here in the states rather than at home in Italy?”“Yeah it’s easier to be away from each other here, gives us both some time to think. Then in the meantime I figured that I am gonna try to get hold of Donna and Margaret. I haven’t seen that little girl of mine in far too long so it would be nice if they could come down here for a visit or something,” Ray said and Christopher nodded in agreement, since he thought it was a good idea. Ray however still had some doubts whether it really was so wise to see Donna again. Since a part of him wasn’t really over Donna, just like a part of Jenna had never gotten over Bobby. Of course she’d deny it if he’d ask her and yet all he needed to do was to look at the way she looked at Lucas and it was plain to see it. Because even though they had raised the boy as their son, it still wasn’t his face that reflected in the boys looks but that of his brother, a fact that he was painfully aware of and he was sure that Jenna saw it too. But then again what could they expect really, as the main reason they had gotten married was because they were both lonely and deserted. Jenna by Bobby and him by Donna and since Jenna had the one thing he’d wanted all his life, a family; it had seemed like a match made in heaven 8 years ago. Unfortunately time had proved that the match was much harder to keep together than they’d first thought. Because no matter how much he tried to think of them as his family a part of him could never seem to shake his brother’s shadow, just like Jenna never entirely could fill the void Donna had left in his life. So yeah taking that into consideration he knew that seeing Donna and Margaret was probably the worst thing he could do for his and Jenna’s marriage now and yet he couldn’t let that stop him, as he just missed his little girl too much to give her up. So he just had to see little Margaret, even if that might cost him his marriage...</blockquote>

Verification: What month follows July?