July 16, 2011

June 16, 2011

            Grief isn’t stagnant; like a pond, it’s always changing like an ocean.  It ebbs and flows.  The phone rang this morning and I was woken out of a sound sleep and I had been dreaming of you.  I can’t remember the dream now, but I was awoken to the realization that you were gone again and it hit me anew. And I had to try to catch my breath again because I had forgotten for a moment there.

            Odd things hit me and they probably always will.  When we went out to dinner at Olive Garden with Mark and Jenn after the viewing on Tuesday night, they gave us mints afterwards and I remembered how I always got one or two for you since I don’t like mint.  I’m sure things like that will affect me for a long time because SO much of my life was intertwined with you.  

            Later that evening…

            I’m wondering if I should start calling this The Bryan Saga because it will probably get quite long.  I went to Katie’s reception tonight.  I had talked to Jaki earlier this week and she told me she felt bad that she had ripped your old Elf doll off your green truck as she’s driving around in your old truck.  My Mom had bought an Elf at a garage sale so she told me I could give it to her.  Jaki almost cried and she said she would put him in her windshield and let him drive around with her.

            Shirley and Bruce and Jenn and everyone miss you a lot.  Shirley had talked about your rotten gym shoes and how you wore shoes forever during the funeral so I brought the shoes along with me tonight.  Shirley almost cried and she said she was going to hang them in the break room so it would be like you were still there.  I told her if she was ever going to get rid of them to please let me know and I’d take them back and she said she would never get rid of them.  It’s probably the strangest gift anyone ever gave her, but they meant a lot to her. 

Shirley also said she was really glad that I put you in jeans and gym shoes.  It’s what you liked to wear the most.  I loved how you wore your tight jeans.  You always blushed when I told you what a good looking butt you had, but you did have an awesome looking butt.  I still remember how you told me about getting hit on by a big lady that looked like Mimi when you were delivering to the Meijer’s store in Greenville.  I asked you if I had anything to worry about and you said I had NOTHING to worry about it at all.  LOL  You said you made sure to tell the lady that you were married.  J

I sat with Jenn and Jaki tonight.  They miss you so much.  Isaiah went over to Jenn’s house today to swim and Jenn said he kept saying and doing things that reminder her of you.  She told me he was like a Little Bryan.  It makes me SOOO sad that you aren’t there for him anymore because he always had so much fun with his Daddy.  I guess today he asked Jenn about the “water pressure” on the hose at her house and she said that was SOOO something you would have said.

Jenn and Jaki and I talked about you all night long.  Jenn said you were always so excited about whatever new project you were working on and you would come in and talk to her about it and she usually only understood half of what you were saying.  I told her I totally understood what she was saying!  And I’m so terribly glad now that your gas pump never sold.  It’s going to stay right where it is now. 

Jenn also talked to me about Robyn.  She’s looking after your daughter.  Maybe it’s a good thing that Robyn is living with her right now.  I know I wouldn’t be able to help her right now because I can barely help myself.  Oh, and the ‘Evil Ex’ is going to be going nuts now because she won’t have anyone to bug about her check!  I’m wondering how quickly she will blow through the money.  I’m sure it won’t last her more than a year or two.  I hope Jenn will continue to get counseling for Robyn.  She knows about her Mom’s alcohol problems so that’s a good thing.

Matt is struggling, too.  I’m glad that you had a few good years with him.  He really loved you.  I hope he gets his act together in regards to his marriage, but I don’t give it tons of hope.  Matt picked the kids up on Saturday, July 9, since you died on Friday.  I found out later from the kids that he and Pattie had an awful argument in the van and that Matt threatened to kill himself so he could be with you.  I don’t like the fact that they found in front of Christian and Mikeala as we rarely did that.  I haven’t told them that I know about the fight yet.  We had just talked on that Tuesday about her and Matt and their arguments.  I told you it was sad that they couldn’t get along and that I was glad that we didn’t have that type of relationship.  We didn’t always get along, but we never brought our arguments down to a personal level; we had way too much respect for each other than that. 

I have a feeling that ‘S’ will turn your kids against me.  I guess I’ll cross that road when it comes and I’ll just carry on the best that I can.  I was always worried that if you died I would be the Evil Stepwitch so I guess I will just have to see what happens.  I told Jenn that it wouldn’t surprise me one bit if The Evil Ex called her up to harass her about her check.  There is nothing anything can do about things until after the will is read so basically she is SOL.  I actually feel slightly smug and happy about her being left in the lurch after how badly she treated you.  You were the nicest guy and she treated you horribly.  

The irony of your death isn’t lost on me.  I looked for a good man, a man who had the same values that I did, a man I could grow old with, and a man who would be an awesome father and you were all of those things and yet, here I am, alone again.  I hate the word ‘fair’ and yet it SOOOO isn’t fair.  I guess I like the word ‘soooo’ tonight because I keep using it.  And when we adopted Christian the social workers were specifically looking for a two-parent household due to his anger issues and his strong-willed nature.  I’m not sure how I’m going to parent him all by myself now.

I’ve been carrying your wedding ring around with me.  It makes me feel closer to you since you always wore it.  It’s like a little piece of you is still with me.  I wish I had you with me, though, and I know that nothing will ever bring you back.  Oh, I wish I had a magic wand that I could wave right now!  Well, I don’t really believe in magic wands, but I wish I had something that could bring you back to me and your children.  I keep wondering how you would want me to carry on and what you would want me to do now with the children.   

I’m worried that Christian’s anger issues will come back.  I’ve seen it a little bit already.  Am I strong enough to deal with it by myself?  However, thinking that way puts me back in the, “Why did this happen category?” and there just isn’t an answer to that one.  I think I’m going to be in the “Why camp” for the rest of my life.

And just in case you were wondering, I’ve discovered what happens when one spends part of each day crying for a week.  My ears have been plugged for the last 8 days and I’ve been walking around feeling surreal.  It seems like I’m not really here because how can there BE a ‘here’ without you in it?  We had so many plans and I still keep thinking that it just doesn’t seem right to NOT have you here with me.  We had talked about the trips we wanted to take together.  You wanted to drive your convertible across the country with a few of the kids.  I think they would have liked that a lot.  You could have visited every single junk yard on the way, too.

It was mostly fun visiting with Mark and Jenn.  I’m glad they got a chance to know you better.  They took the whole week off from work to come out and support me.  I was so touched by that.  Mark and Jenn said they will forever treasure the days we spent with them.  I joked with Jenn about the meal we had at the Macaroni Grill.  You and I would have had lots of fun joking about it.  “Hey, Bry, do you want some soggy pizza; we can go to the Macaroni Grill?”  And I would have had SO much fun teasing you about the Hoover Dam being in Boulder, Colorado.  And OF COURSE, the History Channel was wrong about that; it couldn’t have been you.  J 

And how can Tiffany and I joke about you doing what we call “The Hand Thing” since you’re not going to be around to do it anymore?  I kind of think that maybe you’re chuckling over that one.  I love the jokes we used to have between ourselves.  I used to know that there was another person who had my sense of humor and who understood me.  I used to tell you that probably the only reason you married me was because I laughed at your lame jokes.  Some of your comments made me laugh and laugh and some got old, but they were so ‘you’ that I didn’t care.  I always thought it was funny how you called it my Sewing Group instead of my knitting group.  I almost took a picture of Paolina when she was sewing her bag one week at the knitting group.  LOL        

I’m wondering how I can even be alive with this big hole in my heart.  I feel like the sorrow and blood from the hole in my heart is oozing out everywhere.  Can everyone else see it?  Can they look through me and see my pain?  I feel like I’m not really here because it seems as if a big part of me is missing.  How can one be whole without their other half?  My sister-in-law, Jenn, always calls my brother her soul mate; do you think we were soul mates?  I hope so because I thought we fit together quite well.  I mean, I know we weren’t perfect and we argued at times and sometimes you made me crazy, but I loved you to pieces. 

I’m glad that I always called you my ‘sexy man’ when you came home even though it made you blush.  I just cannot imagine never going out to dinner with you again or hearing your voice again or just laying down next to you and telling you about my day.  You always acted like you were interested even when I knew you weren’t very interested in what I was telling you. 

And once again I’m back to the, “Why did God send you my way and then take you away?”  Why would God let me love you so much and then take you from your family?  You little boy needs you so much.  I’m at the, “Why, why, why” fork in the road.  And where does the road go from here?  Is the path all rocky or will you be looking down and guiding me along the road?  I can’t say you were my ‘everything’ because we were both pretty independent people, but we were a really good team.  I often thought that I was a very lucky person because I had you in my life.  It was rather uncanny how much we thought alike on topics that we had never discussed; even little things.  And there were some things that I didn’t even need to discuss with you because I knew you felt the same way I did.  I would bring up the subjects anyway and your answer would be what I thought it would be.

I’m trying to stay grounded even though I don’t want to.  I have to just live in this moment now because I just cannot imagine living without you.  I looked around at my family eating normally the other day and I just couldn’t imagine or fathom a time when my heart doesn’t ache.  Right now, I think of you every moment of every day.  Food doesn’t look good and my stomach feels like it’s tied up in knots.  I’ve never felt so sick to my stomach before and I wonder how long this part of the ‘grief process’ lasts. 

Honestly, I would give anything if I could turn the clock back and I could have one more day with you again.  I’d like to tell you one more time how much you meant to me.  I’m so glad now that I always told you how sexy I found you and that we always greeted each other kindly.  You once told me that you always said, “I love you” on the phone before you hung up because we never knew what moment would be our last one.  I understood what you were saying, but I never thought that last moment would be NOW!   I will miss the normal conversations we had with each other.  We talked about everything with each other.  I will miss the little jokes we would play on each other and how you smiled at me.  I was happy that I was with you and we had a good life together.

I’m glad that I put myself through college after we got married.  My reason for getting my college degree was to be able to support myself and the family if you became disabled and couldn’t work, but I NEVER thought I might have to support the family because you DIED!  You weren’t supposed to die; you were only 51.  I’m wayyyy too young to be a widow; we were supposed to grow old together and this was not part of the plan.

I keep talking about plans and we did have a lot of them.  Plans are supposed to be followed.  We had so many things that we wanted to do together; we can’t do them now!  It’s hard to make plans with someone who is buried in the ground.  I’m kind of glad that you didn’t look like you when you were laying in the casket because it would have made leaving you in there so much harder.  You looked rather ‘waxy’ to me and not like you at all.  It might have been since you didn’t have your hat on.  I had them put your Kaknes hat on when we left the viewing on Tuesday night.  You looked a lot more natural with your hat on.  I would really like to know where your glasses are at, though, and to know what the autopsy results are.  HOW could it have been a heart attack when you just had a complete physical this spring?  That doesn’t make sense to me, either.  Those thoughts put me back in the ‘surreal’ category.  This just all seems like a horrible, horrible nightmare that I should wake up from, but it’s not.  And if this is a nightmare, it’s the worst one I’ve ever had.

Well, Bry, this ‘Keeper of your Memories’ is tired so I’m going to try to sleep now.  I hope you’re watching over your family because we certainly need it.  Hug Moriah tight and tell her that her Momma loved her SOOOO much!  I’ll ‘talk’ to you again tomorrow.

Your wife that has always loved you so much, Karyn