in the details

"She said she usually cried at least once each day, not because she was sad, but because the world was so beautiful and life was so short."  Brian Andreas

 Despite my previous post about the 4 month 'anniversary' of Chris' death, I have more to say.  I know, brevity is not my strong suite.

 On March 17th I let myself do something I had not done in a long time; I let myself go through the details of the day Chris died from the moment he got out of bed through the hours our friends and family sat with us, bewildered, anguished, angry by the events of that morning til the 4 a.m. walk I took through the neighborhood with my mom when I couldn't sit still any more.  

While driving to my parents house to drop the kids off for a sleepover, I sat at a stoplight and saw an Aid Car coming from the other direction.  Usually I push the events of the day out of my mind.  I have replayed, relived, regretted them over and over again to the point that I could not continue to let myself live in that altered time continuum.  If I was going to continue moving forward through this life and this world trying to find hope, I needed to live in this moment and not the one that forever altered my existence.

I talk often of Chris in passing comments as well as in detailed conversations however, his presence in my house...I really cannot feel it anymore.  The day he died and in the weeks that followed, I could feel his presence as if his energy still existed in this world.  Now, though the memory of him in this home and in our life is strong, I cannot feel it in the way I did those first weeks and it is hard to imagine him here.  I don't doubt he is close by, following our lives, cheering us on, reaching out to brush away our tears.  But, his energy on the other side is not something I can feel in my current existence.