Our Anniversary

 

36 years ago today Sandi and I made everything proper and legal like in the same church in Somerville, Massachusetts, that her parents had wed decades earlier. She was a New England girl, through and through, and I was a Texas boy that most of her friends and family had no idea what to make of at all. I did it all, but wear cowboy boots, and most of them were sure I was not good enough for her. I was not, but not in the way they thought.

What she ever saw in me, I do not know. I can not help but wonder, if she had married another and thus had an easier life as we struggled financially and in so many other ways, if the cancer would have ever reared its head or been terminal. I will never know what might have been. I did everything I could to help her in the battle, but it just was not good enough. The guilt I feel, and, yes, I know it is irrational, over that fact is massive and crushing. 

Today is the fourth anniversary without her here telling me what needs to be done and that things will work out because they are meant to be. I remain convinced that going on without her was not what was meant to be. We were supposed to grow very old together, hanging out in our respective chairs, and occasionally visited by friends and family. Acceptance of the reality I live with every damn day remains very hard and elusive.

She was and always will be my everything. Not an hour goes by where I do not think of her. Often more than once. It is hard every single day, but some days are really, really downright brutal.

This is one of those days.