The Sixth Year

Happy Anniversary, Michael.  My love.  My best friend.

Six years.

I miss you. 

I wanted to go to the lake today, but I couldn’t.  I could barely do anything except scream and sob.  This is not getting easier.

I remember you saying that we should do something special this year.  Go somewhere.  And I tried to tell you the practicalities of that, that you couldn’t walk and that you couldn’t stand to sit in a wheelchair for long and that you could not sit in a chair in a hotel room.  And now I think I should have said, yes, sure, let’s do that.  You never wanted to see reality, and I always thought that it was wrong, that if you could see reality, you would want to do something about it.  I don’t think that I was wrong.   

But I don’t know that I was right, either .

I don’t know that there were any right answers.

But I wish that next week, you and I were going to Maryland together.  That we’d stop at the bed and breakfast, and be together in the whirlpool tub, and have a wondrous day.  And then you’d come with me to the festival, and my friends would laugh and tease you, and it would be great.  It would be joyful.  And nothing would get in the way.  For once, nothing would get in the way.