February 2, 2013

So, I’m missing you so bad I ache. I used to have this life, it wasn't perfect but now it really seems like it was. One phone call changed that life and I don’t think it will ever be the same. It will never be the same. I get up each day because I have to, because what I have left of you is our three beautiful children that I love so much. I get up and do what I have to for them. Only what has to be done to get by that day. Pretty much that’s it, no planning ahead that reminds me to much of the plans we had together, the ones that included us growing old together. Remember? The ones where we are together and sailing anywhere there is warm sandy beaches, you and I sitting on the dock staring at the Indian River patiently waiting for the porpoise to make an appearance. We had a lot of plans.

I look at pictures and my heart breaks. I don’t look at pictures and my heart breaks. Old cards. Your handwriting. The boys use your soap in the shower, I smell it and sometimes I pretend it is you and everything is back to the way it used to be. The smell of your t-shirt, that same smell I would smell when you would hug me tight. No one else can hug me like you. There aren't many people that are 6 feet five inches and lean over to hug my five foot nine. On a really bad day I smell your favorite black volcom hat that still smells like your sweat. It smells like you after you would work in the yard all day. It is so comforting and also so unbelievably lonely. I can’t get enough of you. Your clothes. Your truck key that you put in my wallet because you kept locking yourself out and I kept lecturing you about how much the lock smith was costing us, I told you that we were going to have to start putting the lock smith in our monthly budget.  You made the key and put it in my wallet, it belongs to the truck that you died in. I keep the key that doesn't have a truck; I keep it because you put it there. That damn truck.  Sometimes I see a truck that looks just like yours. I look for the sticker of the surf boards on the back window. A few days ago there was one just like it driving towards our house and I pretended it was you heading home. You know, like you used to after work with groceries for some amazing meal that you would cook. I picture you in the kitchen with your head phones on listening to a book on your IPod. The kids are eating my cooking, they don’t complain for the most part. If we could have bought a new truck that had side air bags would you be alive? Were you trying to call us when the accident happened? They never found your phone. You always had your phone. The accident happened about the same time you were going to call us, before the kids went to bed. I listen to your last voice mail message, listening to the last “I love you” you left me. I miss you. I love you, just like you would say to baby girl- “to the moon and back”.

 When I sit in the group room at work I get this horrible panic in the pit of my stomach. When I hear the phone in the office ring while I sit in that room I feel pure fear. Did you know I was day dreaming about you coming home, what we would do for your birthday, how handsome you were, when the door opened and I was told there was an emergency phone call for me.  I hate that phone call, the one that changed my whole world. How did we get here? How did this happen? How is this possible? Can you just come back now? Please? Why couldn't this just be a nightmare, a really realistic one.  I've had enough of this nightmare. This isn't the way it was supposed to happen… it isn't the way it was supposed to be… Did I tell you my husband died? I probably did, sometimes I feel like I have to say it to remind myself it is true. I don’t understand how everyone’s lives keep moving forward. Why does the old couple in the grocery store get to grow old together? Why is that couple in Wal-Mart so happy? Their happy is too happy for me now.  My heart is heavy. I used to have a husband, I used to be happy, not all the time but looking back it was really pretty damn happy.