After So Much Time

Yesterday as I was driving in my car, I thought, "I miss my husband." And I do. I miss you. Dang it. Darn it. Rats! You were horrible to me in the end. Your meds weren't working and you thought I was interested in another man, which wasn't true, but you had that in your mind, and you were going to show me. You were going to hurt me as much as you could. You thought I was waiting for you to die so I could go off with someone else. But I wasn't. You were being robbed of your life but I wasn't being robbed of mine. Carmi and I were the only ones you honestly told that the divorce was your idea. To everyone else, even your best friend, you said I was divorcing you because you had cancer. To Carmi and me you said you were asking for a divorce because I wouldn't let you gamble without some kind of assurance I would be protected. But after all the awful things that happened, I have these days when I just wish we could be together again. It isn't only the lovemaking I miss, it's the companionship, the talking, your sense of humor, your wit and your zest for life. I miss you, and I wish I didn't. And, oh, how I wish it had ended differently. Wherever your soul has gone, I feel I won't see or feel your spirit again. I miss the essence that is you and must mourn you now along with lots of both ugly and beautiful memories. Now my father has died. You and he, the two men in my life, are gone. I am strong for having been loved by the two of you, but I am weak with loss. It is double now. You died on September 2, and Dad on November 17. It's bitter, it's freeing, it's exhausting, it's sad. My life has been turned upside down in the last twelve weeks, and twenty-seven months before that it was turned upside down, and eight months before that it was turned upside down. And now you are both gone. My life lies before me and I have relatively no plan for myself. You are both gone and I am very much here.