7. Only the Good Die Young

"Who would have thought forever would be severed by the sharp knife of a short life...well, I've had just enough time." 

~The Band Perry, If I Die Young

Time.  There never seemed to be enough of it.  Now there is simply too much.  It used to be that when I saw an elderly couple holding hands, still very much in love, I would smile.  I thought that would be Jon and I one day.  Now I turn away to hide the tears.  Now I wonder if I'll be the wacky old lady who teaches yoga classes, drinks bourbon on ice every afternoon but pretends it's just iced tea and lives in a big house with 5 cats.  God, this is not my life.  This is NOT my life!


Recently it has seemed as though almost everyone I know has moved onto that next, logical chapter while I remain stuck in the past, consumed with my memories.  When I took a much-needed break from Facebook from April of 2011 until just a couple of months ago, the first thing I noticed when I reactivated my account was how many of my friends had gotten married or had their first child.  I thought that would be me now too.  "I'm happy for you, " I force myself to say, but the words sound hollow and somewhat strained.  "Happy" isn't really a word I've been too familiar with over the past few years.  I'd say I've really just been playing the game I like to call "staying insanely busy to stay sane."  My own worst enemy is often my own mind - it doesn't let up, it doesn't shut off, and it certainly won't allow me to attain any sense of inner peace.  And therein lies the essence of life since I lost Jon:  one big, giant distraction from myself.


I've often tried to seek out distraction in the form of self-help by reading books about the pain suffered by others.  When I read about the trials and tribulations of anorexics, alcoholics and drug addicts, I think to myself, "well, at least I should be grateful that I don't have that problem," or "well, at least I haven't gotten that low yet."  But haven't I?  How low do you have to go to scrape rock bottom?  How much is too much and at what point do I get to say, "enough - no more.  Please just take me to heaven to be with Jon now?"


Movies are another of my go-to distractions.  Jon and I had a special appreciation for the magic of Hollywood - his movie collection (now technically my collection, I suppose) includes all the classic epics and also some of the not-so-epic but most hilarious movies of all time.  The problem, however, is that movies now resonate with me in a way that makes the entire experience almost too personal, too bittersweet.  For instance, I saw one movie about three years after losing Jon called Brothers.  In it, the wife of a Marine Captain gets the dreaded knock at the door to notify her of her husband's death.  Weeks later, however, she receives a phone call to say that her husband was not killed, but instead was captured and has finally been rescued.  If only this were our story...this the exactly the kind of phone call I continue to dream about, and sometimes, when I concentrate hard enough, I almost start to believe that it's still possible.  In another movie, a boy is troubled by the death of his mother.  The father tells his son that he must stop thinking about her.  The son asks his father, "how do you do that?"  Silence.  "Dad?"  More silence.  And that's because there is no answer.  The only answer is that there is no answer at all.  You just can't stop thinking.  You can't flip a switch and take a break from the emotions.  I'm not a quitter, believe me, and I'm telling you that trying not to miss the person you miss most in the world is like stepping out into a thunderstorm and hoping not to get wet.  The more you try to stay dry, the more drenched you end up.  And so here I find myself, trying not to get wet and often ending up soaked straight through.  I think back on Jon and I's big, beautiful wedding - I thought that big beautiful wedding would translate into big, beautiful life.  Big and beautiful, however, is not quite how I'd describe my current reality.  Maybe Jon is trying to tell me to stop trying so hard.  Or maybe he just wants me to give myself a break....from myself.  


On what would have been Jon and I's first wedding anniversary, it was a beautiful summer's day in June.  The sun was shining and the sky could not have been clearer as I walked into the restaurant Jon had loved when we'd spent our last New Year's Eve there together.  As I was leaving the restaurant at the end of the evening, however, the heavens suddenly opened up and the rain came down so hard that the raindrops literally bounced off the ground.  I hadn't seen rain like that since my wedding day on Cape Cod exactly one year earlier.  When I finally made it to the car, I was drenched, soaked straight through.  I thought of it as Jon's tears reminding me that he was still here with me on a day we would otherwise have celebrated with a glass of Asti and a night full of laughter.  I mourned the loss of the laughter in my life that night and I mourn it still now.  Jon should still be here.  He should be here with me to experience that big, beautiful life we dreamed of sharing together.  I want to be changing diapers and getting up at 3am to walk the halls with our screaming child instead of thinking about what I might do next to distract myself from the fact that he's gone.  I want to pick up the phone and hear the sound of his voice saying those three little magic words:  "I love you."  I want to tell him I love him now and always and I will never stop loving him because I just can't.  I can't.  I love you, Jon.  You are my forever love - my husband, my best friend, and my hero.  "And when we meet again at the journey's end, and we laugh together once more, I will have a thousand things to tell you..."