I Keep Looking

Dear Larry:

Last night I looked for you all night long.  Remember those dreams that I used to tell you about where it was final exams and I realized that not only had I not gone to class all semester or dropped the course but had also forgotten where the class was held?  I ran around all night trying to figure out a way to drop the class at the last moment or just find the classroom and give the exam by best shot in spite of having no knowledge of the coursework.  Of course, I never succeeded in finding the classroom nor taking the exam.  I would wake up agitated and exhausted from a restless and upsetting night.

We were supposed to meet at a sporting event, an LSU game.  Prior to the game, I had a business meeting planned, so we agreed to meet in a sports bar for dinner and then go on to the event.  When I arrived at the restaurant, you were not there which was highly unusual.  You always beat me to our arranged meetings because you said, “If you are on time, you are already late”.  I began to search the restaurant for you.  When that was unsuccessful, I reached for my cell phone.  When I began to dial, I continued to input improper numbers.  I would get errors and busy signals and realized that I had forgotten your phone number.   I spent the rest of the night repeating all of the telephone numbers that I could remember but knowing that none of those were yours.    I was frustrated and upset because I had promised to meet you and could not even remember your telephone number to find you.  Finally, I remembered that your number is only 2 digits different from mine and I began to dial.  Then I woke up.

Reality hits me every morning when I have had a dream about you or, on those very precious nights, when you actually come to me.  The sadness overwhelms me as a turn over to the place where you used to be…..to the place where you still should be.  That side is empty, and it reflects the empty feeling inside of me when my days and nights were filled with you and us.  Now there is just me and after 35 years with you, it just does not seem like enough and the empty pit will never be filled.   

Significant days for us are approaching quickly.  Soon it will be what should have been our 38th anniversary.  I think we would have traveled together somewhere neither of us have ever been.  Maybe someplace in Germany or the British Isles.  You would have planned the trip and simply told me to be packed for the day we were leaving.  You did it all and I just showed up and it would have been perfect.  The most perfect part was that we would have been together to celebrate another milestone.  A celebration of US.  Now I face those days without you and my heart breaks for what you had to endure your last days and the courageous way you lived your life until your last breath.  Every moment of every day, it was my honor to be your wife and now every moment of every day my heart breaks because you are gone from me. 

I must admit that I search every day for you.  As I am driving, I look at the clouds to discern a heart or an image that I believe you sent especially for me.  I wait for the cardinal who visits me every morning.  He flies onto the patio as I drink coffee, perches on a chair and turns to me.   It is as if he nods in acknowledgement knowing that usually you would have been sitting next to me having morning coffee too.  He flies away and arrives again the next morning to repeat the greeting.  This morning you sent a rainbow for me in the spray of the rain shower. 

I am certain that some people would find this a little bit crazy. Trust me.  I am not crazy.  It does seem that finding anything that I can interpret as a connection to you provides me comfort in an atmosphere of emotional chaos.  If it fills my heart for one moment of one day, what harm can that be?

I miss you.

Love,

P