Dear John

 

14 years have gone by.  Although chunks of this day have slightly faded from my memory (I don't know whether that's good or bad), I will never forget that it was a Saturday.  And that the following day I was supposed to sponsor Rayna at her confirmation at church.  (I thought that it was Pentecost, but I Googled it and no... but then Pentecost would have been Memorial Day weekend, so maybe they figured we'd have a better crowd the following week...Maybe they did.  I didn't go.)

I wish it hadn't been a month and a half since I'd last seen you.  I wish we'd seen you more.

I still can't understand why our having James pulled you and Emma away from family gatherings.  How it bothered her. But she had a son, who we never met.  Who wasn't at your wedding.  But her mother was and that was the first time we met her. File those under things that I will never understand.

I wish you were still here.  You SHOULD still be here.  Why, Why, WHY didn't you take better care of yourself?  (Because it's cheaper and easier not to?)  Mom swore you said you wouldn't live past 40.  Did you really say that?  How did you know?  Did you know?

I want to have more memories of you.  Everything is so in the past.  

Instead, my memories are colored by the day you died.  Everything that happened that afternoon.  That first night.  The next day at the funeral home; plans being made.  Finding photos of you to display at the funeral home.  Making sure Mom and dad were okay.  (They weren't okay.)  Arranging food.  Making calls.  Writing a eulogy.  (You were well loved since three people spoke that day; Peter and Carl in addition to me...they did you well.  The things that you need to hear while you are alive are too often said after you are dead.)

There was such a crowd at the funeral parlor that Wednesday morning.  Your friends.  Your family.  Friends of mom & dad.  A tree was bought by mom & dad's "gang".  It stood proudly in the front of the house at the shore.  It weathered Superstorm Sandy.  (Not much else did.)  I hope it's still there.  (Although when I packed everything up, I took the rock that said, "Love Blooms Here.") 

Mom's friend Linda would bring her a plant/flower every year on that day.  It meant so much to her.  I wish someone would bring me a plant today.  It might make things a little more tolerable.  Because even all these years later it's still intolerable.  It's still unfathomable.  But there it is.

Your best man and your "second mom", who I still keep in touch with, visit your grave every year on this day.  (Or about...I know that this year due to health issues they won't be coming by till the weekend.)   That means a lot to me.

As you know, I'm not much of a cemetery person.  Although I do go every year for you.  (Which I don't do for mom & dad...that would be too much cemetery for me.  I think I had more than my fill in 2022-2023.)  James, who you never got to see grow up and blossom (I know in my heart that if you were still alive, you would be pals.  How I wish that could have happened) does go frequently.  

The two of us went last night.  I know, a day early.  But it was what would work with my work schedule and his (the kid is working 9+ hours a day 5 days a week and is on his feet for 95% of the time.)  It is a pretty place, but...it's just stones and plants/grass.  It's not you.

Where I think your spirit resides (as if I could know such things), is in that piece of driftwood that dad used to measure crabs.  He wrote, "Foster's Famous Crab Stick" on it.  That I keep on display in the house in the Poconos.  (It would have been a great place for you to come and visit...it's not the shore, but I KNOW you would have liked it.)  I pass by it and I think of you.  I think of dad.  I think of mom.  I think of silliness of that day and I miss it. I miss it so much.

I miss you.  And like your closest friends and remaining family (because we're getting smaller), even though the years keep flying by, I'll keep missing you.