Today is my first day "back in the office" as it were. I am not ready. I thought I was, but I'm not. Last night, as I lay in our empty bed reaching toward her pillow and imagining I could still smell her there, I wept in desperation. I *know* this must pass. I *know* that this must become bearable. The daylight at the end of the tunnel is simply too far away to see at this point. This morning, I struggled with my "morning routine" that I used to execute so quietly and gingerly as my wife lay asleep. I feel, perhaps for the first time in my life, the grasp of anxiety. At times it is almost dizzying. I cried all the way to work and prayed for some sort of help. I wanted so badly to hear her voice comforting me. I arrived at work before anyone else. It was dark, quiet, and cold. The air was still the ambiance stepping into my office only accentuated the depth of my sinking feeling of aloneness. The blinds were lowered and my desk clutter was exactly as I'd left it two weeks-ish ago except for perhaps some additional dust. The two photographs of my sweet Erin were still on the credenza where I'd left them... smiling at me. It was just at that moment... the moment I was looking at the photos through recovering eyes as my lids grew taught from the drying of tears... that moment I saw the note.
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I could have collapsed. I'd read it many times before, but had completely forgotten it. She used to bake goodies like banana nut bread and cookies to bring to my office to surprise my co-workers. One day she had written it on my whiteboard and I never erased it because it made me smile every time I happened to see it. My lachrymose morning intensified as I tried to get my head around it. It is impossible. I tried to make myself busy. I filled out an outstanding expense report from my business trip to California back before it happened. I had trouble focusing my thoughts. I filled out my bereavement paperwork for the time I took off from work and a PTO request to visit my in-laws. I entered contact information into my database from scraps in my pocket that have been accumulating over the last two weeks. Nothing helped... it felt wrong. It felt overwhelming. I opened my desk drawer and saw a small card I'd saved from a gift Erin left me at work as a surprise. I shuddered as I read it a few times. I wondered what else might be in the desk, so I started digging. I found several small notes. All of them were just little sweet nothings she had left packed in my clothes on a business trip so I would find them when I got to my hotel. I must have put them in my laptop bag to save them and put them in my desk when I got back to work. I don't remember now. I do remember that she did these things all the time for me as I have a box full of similar memories from the course of our relationship. These things are my dearest possessions on Earth. I took some quick snaps with my camera phone so I could share them in this post. As I synced the phone to my laptop and checked the local directory for the images, I found more old photos of Erin and Henry that I'd taken candidly at some point. My God!
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How does one recover from a wound so deep? We can go on living, but how do we become alive? I know Erin would never want me to suffer. I am trying so hard. My boss tried to chat with me and I lost it within 2 minutes. My boss's boss tried to chat with me and I lost it immediately. There's nothing like an (almost) 35 year old man unable to speak in chin-quivering blubbering agony. I am trying so hard. I don't want to consider a leave of absence from work because I don't think it will help... only prolong. It is something I want so badly though... to just disappear for a while. Unhealthy. Anyway, I am faced with going to pick up Erin's urn today sometime. It seems like a simple enough task, but I know I'm trivializing it in my mind to ease the pain. Taking advantage of the time required to regenerate tears so they can be spilled again, I called and left voicemail for the detective regarding her belongings this morning. I haven't heard back yet. It is lunchtime and I know I need to eat something, but I'm not hungry. I'm physically and emotionally exhausted and I've only been awake 4 hours.
I’ve not the arrogance to say ‘time heals’ but you are on the right path. Keep working at it. You have my heartfelt sympathy, for the little it is worth.
Wow Clayton. What does one say? All you can do is take it one day at a time. Your tears are just a reflection of your pain. Who wouldn’t have pain that deep? You need to cry as much as it takes to release the pain. If you need more time off work, then take it. Travel, visit friends, take pictures. A job will keep you busy, it will pay the bills and it’ll keep you from sitting around the house alone, but it’s not what’s most important right now. Well, it’s never what’s important, really. In the grand scheme of things.
EL left you a lifetime of memories through pictures, notes and little things around the house. Thank you for sharing your memories with us. As Tom said, I can’t say that time heals all wounds, but it might help make those wounds more bearable. There are always going to be triggers—anniversaries, birthdays, special dates, movies, pictures, etc.—and if you fall to the ground in a big heap of emotion every time, so be it. I’m sure EL will be right there comforting you as best she can.
Clayton, as you writeand we read perhaps it will help disperse some of the pain. We are all here for you. Come home for a visit.
Death is nothing at all.
I have only slipped away into the next room.
I am I and you are you,
Whatever we were to each other, that we still are.
Call me by my old familiar name,
Speak to me in the easy way which you always used.
Put no difference in your tone,
wear no forced air of solemnity or sorrow,
laugh as we always laughed
at the little jokes we enjoyed together.
Pray smile, think of me, pray for me.
Let my name be ever the household word
that it always was.
Let it be spoken without effort,
without the trace of a shadow in it.
Life means all that it ever meant,
it is the same as it ever was.
There is unbroken continuity,
why should I be out of mind
because I am out of sight?
I am waiting for you
somewhere very near
just around the corner.
All is well
Henry Scott Holland 1847-1918
The weekend that EL passed away Ernie and I had somehow managed to have some time without the kids and so we went to San Antonio and stayed on the River Walk. Sunday morning I showered first and after I got out wrote “I love you” on the mirror. I knew that by the time I finished up that the words would disappear, only to reappear when the steam from his shower filled the bathroom. In the grand scheme of things it was just a small gesture from a wife to her husband. Then we got home and found out the tragic news. Ernie and I talked for a long time about you and EL and how happy you had been and how lucky you were to have shared your lives together. It was then that Ernie mentioned the “I love you” I’d left on the mirror for him. He said that when he got out of the shower and saw it, he’d thought about you and Erin Lynn and how at your wedding her maid of honor talked about how you would both leave messages for the other so that they would be found at a later time. I had totally forgotten that. I know that right now they are painful to find all over again - but what absolute treasures you have to remind you of the beautiful love you shared.
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