I Am Not Alone

My Dear Michael,

Today I have been widowed for one day longer than we were married.  I knew that this day was coming and I am not sure what it means?  It feels surreal, empty, sad.

When we got married, our vows said "until death us do part".  To  you, I said "I will love you for the rest of my life".  I didn't say "until you die".

Our life together was huge.  It was deep and big and it filled me up.  My dreams were fulfilled in  you.  And I remember saying "this is enough..for the rest of my life..this is enough".

As I look back on this time, both with and without you, I can't help but compare.  Those years and months with you were full of laughter and love.  Our love seemed to grow in ways that I never imagined.  There was a special sweetness, a sense of two old souls that had searched a lifetime for their missing hearts and were finally at home, complete.

We belonged together.  Our love seemed to fulfill a promise.  A promise that was older than time.

The time without you has been one of searching.  You both grounded me and gave me wings.  Since you've been gone, my heart has been like a bird trapped inside a glass house..trying desperately to take flight, but instead, banging against the glass over and over, in a futile attempt to reach the sky.  I have looked for you everywhere...in your letters, in the faces I see out in the world, in my dreams.  I have never stopped looking for you, Michael.  Because without you, there has been no freedom, I no longer feel complete.

I really thought that by now, I would be ready to try again.  To be open to finding love once again, building a life.  I really believed that.  I have watched as others have opened their hearts again and I rejoice with each story of  new love.  I've tried to date a couple of times, but no one else can live up to the legacy of love that you gave me.  No one else can be you, no one else is able to fill the space that you left.

One thing I never counted on, was that I could love you more deeply as time passed.  I thought that with time, our connection would be broken or faded.  Instead, I have found that it's become stronger.  I dreamed of  you one night.  You held me in  your arms and you whispered in my ear, over and over,  "Never let go, just never let go".

My grief has changed in this 2 years and 9 months.  The rawness has gone.  I laugh and I do things with our little guy.  I work and I also work hard at becoming "whole" again..finding happiness.  I pray often and hard for God to heal my brokenness.  To be healed from the loss of you.

My mom told me recently that she had watched her grandmother and her mother grieve their lives away and she didn't want to watch her daughter do that too.  That surprised me.  I thought I was doing such a good job at putting my life back in order.  The truth is, Michael, more than anything, I  understand how that can happen-how you can love someone so much that you can never, ever let go.

The love that I had with you was a once in a lifetime, bigger than Heaven and Earth love.  It was a love that can never be replaced or duplicated.  I don't know if God has something or someone in store for me.  I pray that if He does, He will open my heart to it.

But, Baby, if not, I know that what I had with you is enough.  We were enough to last me a lifetime.  And if the payment for that love is this grief, than it is grief well spent.

Today, as I was getting out of the car, this song was playing on the radio.  I listened to it until the radio shut off.  It made me realize that I'm really not alone.  You went before me, but you've never left me.  Three hours later, when I got back into the car and turned the radio on..this song was playing again, and it picked up at the exact point where it had left off earlier.  I am not alone.