Dearest Trick~
I fear I have spent much of the time since you transitioned to a new world living in the past of my world here. It is so easy to spend endless hours, who are we kidding, endless days reminiscing and holding on to the beauty that is YOU!! I could spend a lifetime talking about your kindness ~ like the time you drove around Los Angeles on Thanksgiving trying to find the homeless man you KNEW needed the meal we packed up. I could spend a decade playing the times we danced in the kitchen over and over in my head. I could spend an eternity smiling over the way you laughed and laughed and laughed sometimes at the silliest of things. I could spend a century telling anyone and everyone who would listen about what it is liked to be truly loved, to be seen from the inside out by a man as beautiful as you. I could spend a millennium learning from all the lessons you being just YOU has taught me. I could spend an era sharing the childlike love and wonder you showed daily.
But, (and this is a big but) now is the time for today. Now has come the time for the healing to take hold, for the new road in front of me to be walked on. For today I take a step, not run or leap, but a step in the direction that is my new life, my new world that lacks to physically have you in it. For today I carry you in my heart. For today I enjoy the people around me. For today I am grateful for the food that fills my belly and the memories that fill my mind. For today I dance solo and embrace the joy that comes from the movement of my feet to the music of life. For today I allow myself to move on with knowledge of where I have been, but not having the past hold me there. For today I slip your picture into my pocket, tie the shoes of life on my feet and walk oh so carefully into the unknown. For today I taste the wind and clasp the delight it brings to my lungs. For today I see the support that surrounds me even from a distance, it empowers me to move. For today I feel the smallest but still an ember of HOPE! For today I have learned what you have always wanted for me… to keep living. Tomorrow might be different. I am not sure what it holds. I am unclear of how I will feel, of who will be there, but for today I dance into the sun that you shine down on me.
Around the world and back again~
Ali - I think of you and Patrick often. In fact a very cool thing happened a couple of weeks ago. I was sitting in the lobby of the Music Box (Mary, Maria and I went to see the "Last Waltz") and just looked up and over and there was a guy - not just any guy - but a Pat lookalike! For a nano second, I forgot; it conjered up an instant warm, feel-good sensation in my heart; you know the one I always got when I saw him meandering down the street with Norm knowing we'd chat a bit and I'd feel better for the exchange; and then I remembered. But for that fleeting instant; he was back in physical form; and it felt soooooooooooooo wonderful to see him again!
ReplyDeleteWarm wishes,
Diane
PS. Give Normie a big hug for me