I have seen birth, I have seen death 
lived to see a lovers final breath 
do you see my guilt, should I feel fine
is the fire of hesitation burning bright
and if you want to, talk about it once again
on you I depend
I'll cry, on your shoulder, your a friend
James Blunt "Cry"

I haven’t written in quite a while.  I think the biggest reason is that I did not want to write about sadness.  Sadness sucks, no one wants to hear about it.  We all have enough of that, you don’t need to hear mine.  So for a couple of months I have been consuming it.  I like the word consuming.  I am not dealing with it. I am not ignoring it.  I am consuming it.  Which for me means, feeling it, touching it, holding it, seeing it, and tasting it.  I am not letting my grief consume me.  I am consuming it.  If I am sad, I cry.  If I am sad, I let it go to my core and I feel it.  I take it all in.  I find that there is gratitude there.  If I can feel this much sadness then I know it was all worth it.  Twenty two years of my life was not a waste because I lost her.  Those twenty-two years were a blessing in my life.  They are who I am.  It hurts.  It hurts a lot.  In the quiet of the darkness, when no one is around, I wonder if I can take it, but I do, I find my gratitude and I hold onto it.

You touched my heart you touched my soul.
You changed my life and all my goals.
And love is blind and that I knew when,
My heart was blinded by you.

I've kissed your lips and held your head.
Shared your dreams and shared your bed.
I know you well, I know your smell.
I've been addicted to you.

Goodbye my lover.
Goodbye my friend.
You have been the one.
You have been the one for me.
James Blunt "Goodbye my lover"

In the last couple of months I have had the opportunity to attend two wedding.  To be totally honest they were probably the second and third hardest days of my life.  Not the worst, but the hardest.  Wedding are all about hope, happiness and love.  If you pay attention, you will also feel them even if your not the ones getting married.  These special couples that let me attend will never know how special those days will be to me.  I felt it.  I felt it all.  I could feel the hope as they touched hands,  I could see the happiness in their eyes, and I let their love radiate around me, and hold me for a minute.  The hard part for me was the vows.  It was the closing of the circle.  When we got married I don’t think I fully understood.  We say them never expecting to execute them until we are old.   In sickness and health means that we bring each other chicken noodle soup when we are sick, and well,  we just don’t understand, “until death to us part.”  My hope is that no one would ever have to understand what that means, but for me it hit me like a tone of bricks.  In that moment I understood.  I had completed my circle.  It crushed me with sadness, but in the same instant I had some sense of accomplishment.  Which might seem weird to some, but in that moment It made every sacrifice, tear, and every moment of our married life even better.  A vow is simply just a bunch of words together.  Fulfilling a vow is so much more.  So much more that I cant even find the words to explain what “Till death do us part” really means.

When everything you know
Starts to let you down
And your world starts spinning round
I'll be the place where you can sleep
Cause in my heart you'll always be
More than a friend
More than time well spent
You show me who I'm supposed to be
And that makes you deserving

As long as I breathe
As long as I need
As long as I'm me
Oh, I belong to you
As long as I'm free
And as far as I see
If my heart still beats
Oh, then it beats for you

Just because you're gone
Doesn't mean that I've moved on
I still love you just the same
I still crumble at your name
Because the love you make me feel
Is the only thing that's real
And I need you to be alright
Brett Young "Your to Hold"

So what now?  I don’t know.  I haven’t seen the playbook for when your spouse passes away.  I’m not sure I would read it even if I did find it.  I suppose I rationalize my actions just like everyone else does.  We try and find reasons why we should do something or not do something.  We try and find answers that just aren’t there.  I try and help my kids understand even though I don’t understand myself.  We seem to be wondering down a path not really knowing what direction to go.  Trying to figure out what we are supposed to be doing.  Where we are supposed to be going.  How we are supposed to be feeling, sometimes caught between what our own expectations are compounded with what we feel are the expectations of others.  Lost is the best word I can come up with.

I keep telling myself that I didn’t ask for this, but here we are, and there is nothing that we can do to change it.  We are not different.  We are just like everyone else.  We are just trying to live our lives to the best of our abilities.  Just like everyone else we are trying to figure out how to make the best, or at least cope with what life has thrown at us.  I have to believe that on April 11, my love and my ability to love did not die too.  I have to believe that I still have a lot of love to give.  I have to believe that I have a lot of love to give not in spite of Tammy, but because of her.  It is my choice whether I keep that love for myself or decide to make it bigger.  I choose to love my kids more because I know that I also have Tammy’s love inside of me.  If I choose to love other people though out my life I will do it better because I have Tammy’s love inside of me too.  Love is not a zero sum game.  I don’t have anyone to be mad at or hate because of how they treated me.  I just have love.  Love for what I know is possible in love.  Love for the people in my life.  Love for all of you out that have helped us, been there for us and continue to be there for us.  I also have a need to give it away.  I want others to know what it feels like to be loved.  There are people out there that don’t know what it feels like to love with out condition.  I want to teach them.

A couple of weeks ago I had a conversation with a friend that has went through some very tough and life altering times the last several months and after talking with them for a while about how life has changed how they think I told them that they just needed to follow their smile and see where it takes them.  I went on about my day and that evening as I was thinking about our conversation, I realized that maybe that advice was not just meant for them.  Right now I am not trying to live in the past, or really look that far in the future.  I am trying to live right in front of me.  For a dreamer like me that is a challenge.  So for now I am going to take my own advice.  I am going to try and follow my smile.  If it is in front of me and I am smiling, then I am going to follow it.  Where that leads I really have no clue, but what ever happens I will lead with our love, mine and  Tammy’s together, and it will be so much bigger because I do.