Remembering it all again

I remember this week two years ago, and it has been weighing on me again. Her shallow breaths, her little hopeful moments and the long periods of pain in between for us both, the visits from harried Hospice workers, all of it.

I do not know why my mind and heart return to that place so strongly and vividly as they do now, but I certainly feel the sadness and sense of being forlorn, punctuated by the little happy seconds of victory.

They were such small ones. Making a little mush of her pills with honey to ward off the bitterness, getting a drop or two of water or soup down her parched throat and seeing her look at me with recognition and love, not fear and confusion.

I remember watching her as the pain would fade after waiting for the morphine to kick in, trying to stay ahead of the agony for her. I remember feeling my own pain subside as her breath evened out.

Every four hours, the alarm would go off and I would administer her medication. Looking wearily at 11pm, 3am, 7am, work time.

I remember Barbara would come in and me reluctantly leaving to try and keep my work in order and rushing back every break to help and check on her, change her linens and diaper, and get back to work. The heaviness of it all that ground me down and made me short with people, all very vivid.

Two years ago today, I wrote "The vigil begins." The gurgling in her chest would turn out to be pneumonia. But we fought on, and if she could not make chitchat, she would at least love me with her eyes.

I miss her eyes now most. Fiery and kind, strong and vulnerable, and in the end pained but hopeful, a study in contrasts. More than a window to her soul, they were a window to my heart for her.

If You Ever Never Love Again

So you said you would never forgive me if I ever never loved again. I have, but not as wholly as I did you. There just wasn't time. But there was time for some joy and laughs and even travel, and some of it was so very satisfying.

I need you to trust me, baby. I am going to get there again someday. But for now, some of the blessings you gave me, I realize (in these times), will just sit like pearls before swine.

I don't know how to do this dance nowadays, because I have never failed to love. I still believe in it, still cultivate it, still love everyone I can. I just don't know if I should leave it all so very plainly on the table.

I appreciated your visit the other night, and you seem to know my unbreakable heart, unflinching loyalty and ever-questing spirit are all intact. But my sense of ethics in regards to them seems to want me to be more free. I hope that's okay with you.

Good night, baby. Come see me while I travel :)

And for you more physically present folks, a new post tomorrow.

Night!

So hard to let us go

Marcie was strong. She cried, and then she sometimes held it all in, too. But she always broke down when she talked about the people she would leave behind.

"Oh, my mom," she said. "My mom is going to be devastated. I don't know what she's going to do."

I held her hand and she squeezed it as the tears oozed from her eyes and she gulped. I ached to my core.

I hated to see her cry. In all my time with Marcie, I had never gotten used to the idea of seeing her unhappy or in pain, or sad in any way. I always thought that she should feel nothing but happiness, unrealistic as that was.

Of course, if she cried in any case because of me, and that was not unheard of, it usually ended in immediate efforts to reconcile and a sense of great guilt. It didn't matter if I was right.

It was never right for me to see her upset.

But when Marcie cried the most with me was when she reviewed her life, very discreetly, in the form of her friends and family, and her thoughts of how her departure would impact them.

When her thoughts turned to all of those lives her own was entangled with, she spoke clearly and thoughtfully, viewing each person through their own unique lens, colored and shaped by the moments they shared together.

She would call me and sit with me on the couch, or lay in the bed with me, and nearer the end, call me to her side.

I was left in these beautiful and heartrending moments in a state most who know me would say was unfathomable. Speechless and overwhelmed is not my native mien.

She feared for everyone she knew. She hoped for them, too. She lamented the loss of their future experiences together and her support of them. She smiled and then cried at the goals people had set, which she was sure she would not see achieved.

She would often think of people before they visited her, and talk to me about them. She practiced her strolls down memory lane to help her organize her thoughts before she met them.

"I want to make sure that she... I hope he doesn't midn if I bring up... I wonder if she would mind if..." she was always planning and listing and preparing.

I am always grateful that we were so enmeshed in each other that we could finish each others' thoughts and read each others' minds. Marcie was not as at ease with it, even if it was second nature.

Though I might annoy Marcie when I finished hers in better times, she let that go in her last few months and would smile and grip my hand. It was not me wearing her down, she just needed the help.

Her thoughts started out where she wanted to be, but the disease would take them afar or stall her. She would look at me and ask without words. It was relief when i got it right.

"Yes, exactly," she said. "ExACTly. Thank you, sweetie."

"No, thank you," I would say.

She usually smiled at that. I did not tell her that every thought I helped her finish was another precious thing to know her by and another taste of her to savor for me as she drifted away.

She did this for weeks at a time, and I was devastated. I did not know what to say to all of her touching memories and thoughts on our friends. I felt the loss all of her friends would experience as she relayed it in her wise and sweet way.

She was getting depressed one day when speaking of a friend who was distant, one we had not been able to contact. I was at a loss, feeling despair as she wondered what had happened in her life.

I looked down and she said, "I promised to get in touch, I should have a long time ago," she said.

I sighed and finally something worthwhile came out of me. But to say them to her, to give her an inkling that I knew the road was to end for her, after resisting the thought for so long, broke me completely.

"I think that she, like everyone else you are thinking about, will miss you very badly, baby," I said. "But I think that they are all going to be very grateful to have someone like you to make their lives as rich as you do, just like I do."

She started crying but my thought was not complete, and I was falling apart, too.

"I think," I said, squeezing my eyes shut against the flood, "That you have done more for all the people in your life in the time they have had with you than anyone else ever will, and with such joy and spirit and fire..."

She covered her mouth wand closed her eyes as I rubbed her other hand in mine. I kissed her on the cheek.

"I just think you don't have to worry about people, because even if you aren't here to do things for them, they will be here to do things for other people like you have," I said. "It's something you do by just being yourself, you inspire people."

I gulped and smiled at her and I said, "I am sure you'll find a way to keep doing what you do best."

I hugged her and she wept with me. There were more conversations like this. Her loved ones came and went. Her memories and worries of them were and are are theirs to share, not mine and not here.

But for me, I am hoping that one little legacy, Marcie's inspiring ways, her cheerleading and wisdom-sharing and life well-lived, will remain as strong their lives as it is in mine, and in these pages.

Letter to Marcie-Music

Dear Marcie,

You gave me music. Of course, in the figurative sense, we made beautiful music together. But you gave me music from people I had not before appreciated.

Who knew I would learn to like some of these things. Sure, we had our common ground, U2,The Who, English Beat, The Cure. So many others... but you gave me the idea that current did not necessarily mean "sucks." I am so very grateful.

You always stretched the edges a bit. You went from ABBA and Beegees to ZZ Top and the Cars, to Tori Amos and Sara Maclauchlan and back to Led Zeppelin, over to Soft Cell, The Violent Femmes and Concrete Blonde, even some Sex Pistols and threw in a little En Vogue and Mya.

I remember flipping between 101.5 and 91X, 102.1 and occasioanlly 94.9 You indulged my need to listen to classical, and you even had your own favorites in that genre. We had a million songs just for us, all of them based on something or some sweet moment we were living together in.

I Have saved your last MP3 set. I hear so much in them and I had to stop listening for a bit. I will get back to them. You communicated so much in that music, in those songs. I will finish and think about each of them, no matter how much it aches, I promise.

I am most grateful to you for introducing me to the songbirds of our age. There is nothing that lulls me to sleep and calm or just relaxation like a songbird's voice. I have been accused by a friend of being "pretty damn Lilith Fair for how aggro your are."

Yeah, it was Dean. Of course you knew that, right?

Well, there was only one voice i truly could not stay angry in the presence of, and it was yours. It still is, actually. I so love when I can recall it and you are so clear in my heart and my ears. When you visit in dreams, it echoes for weeks.

It is and was a small but potent part of you that I still cherish. Thank you for both the music I listen to now, the broadening of my tastes, and the sweetness of your own music in my soul.

I know you did not like her, my sweet, but one person I never won you over on was Natalie Merchant. However, she does ring a note in me, and sometimes as much with her words as her voice.

This last discovery crushed me at first, but I realize now that much of it would never be. I could never disappoint you by not finishing my work here, but the song is beautiful, and I wish I had the years with you it is written around.

Someone did justice to the song in pictures. I wish I had seen us at that age, but that will never be. We deserved to see those days, I know that.

For now, my love, good night.

Me




Someday I will sing this song myself, and change just one word. When I do, I will share it with all of you in a more illustrative video of Marcie and I.

One year ago

I walked into the room and asked her if she needed help getting up. She did. I helped her and her legs buckled under her. The day before, she had been walking fine. I was upset, of course, and called hospice for help.

By the time they arrived, Jane had come by. It was agonizing to fight with the hospice people. Marcie needed help, and they were insisting it was the progression of her disease.

I was suspicious. She had been fine the night before. She had also had a medication change.

Her diuretic, used to control her swelling in the arms from post-surgical edema, had been replaced by the hospice doctor with a powerful statin. I did not piece it together right away, but a few months after her death, I did.

They changed the drug that night while she slept at a nursing home. She never recovered.

There was no progression of her disease, her tumors had been retreating. I found this out a week later. She had, until that night, been recovering and gettign just a little stronger.

This will not stand. I think the statin did the damage, and her three-week downward spiral and death, losing function on one side of her body as she did, lies at the feet of the doctor whose care she was under.

On her birthday, last year, a mistake or something more sinister sent Marcie on a hellish journey to death.

I remembered her very good, sweet nature today as I went through my routine as best I could. I lit her candles and talked to her. Now that her special day has drawn to a close, I reflect on the injustice of it all.

Four decades of her grace, sweetness and beauty was not enough. She, and all of us deserved and had coming far more.

This will not stand.

Big Job, Big Memories, Big Pain

I have been slowly storing all of Marcie's I-tunes and MP3s on my laptop. Previously, I had somewhat avoided this because the music is so full of her personality. It's like she's in the next room, playing some music.

Which reminds me of something that happened the other day. Marcie loved Concrete Blonde and had a few of their CDs. I had just gotten home and fed Seamus. As I began to stretch before my run, I heard "Lullabye" strain out from the room.

I cautiously asked, croaking, "Marcie?" as I looked around the corner.

No. Seamus sat with his back against the boom box, cleaning himself in his post-dinner frenzy.

That aside, much music is now way too loaded for me. Even the music which came before us is tainted with it, because so much of why we connected was in our love of music and similarity of tastes.

I suppose I will reach back to the music when she has been gone and my memory fades. But for now, I find eery song from our time together just pounding me with memories and then joy, then, a slow sadness as the songs end.

For now, I am just trying to back everything up and make sure her library, so illustrative of her moods as the songs were ordered, map her progression and feelings very clearly.

Even if some of it is painful to comprehend her feelings with, it is at least a window into her that was not lost. It's kind of a journal in music I can read when I am strong enough.

The best part? Looking at her beautiful handwriting on the covers of her backup CDs. I can see so much of her in her loops and lines.

Not being good at waiting

I was never the kind to sit and wait,
I was never one to bide time.
But you were always patient,
and with a touch or a word I was calm.

The worst waiting ever for me
was the same as the worst for you.
I charged and demanded action
and you let me, and it was ours.

It did not matter in the end
no rush was in time, no haste.
When I finally knew the time approached
I watched and learned to wait again.

And I may have been patient,
I may have let you bide your time.
A single touch calmed you,
and a word comforted.

I learned to hate waiting anew
not for the time it took,
but for the time it didn't,
and for the time it should have,
because nothing ever hurt more
than when the waiting was over.

What a bummer, but also an opportunity

So, today Marcie received her renewal for a driver's license in the mail. I have come to expect the endless entreaties for aid from the animal charities, the cancer materials from Kaiser, the Komen information and the book clubs, magazine renewal appeals and requests from NetFlix.

How is it that the state cannot figure out she is gone?

It hit me very hard today to read their little reminder for her to send them money and renew her license. But then it struck me. I could have a nice, new copy of her license, renewed past her death, with a clear picture of her from a healthier time.

I just may do it and then write a report about it. It would help the state deficit, too, I imagine.

An Unshared Road

I remember the paths we chose.
We did not always agree.
Sometimes we wandered.
We were never lost.
I joined your soul in long journeys.
We strolled in citadels of the mind,
and hiked the forest of the heart.
We were never lost.
I faced great obstacles with you.
We climbed mountains of tribulation,
took treacherous trails along chasms.
We were never lost.
I never knew where we were going.
We chose anew at each crossroad
and were each others' only guides.
We were never lost.
I don't recognize this place I am in now.
We never wandered in such ruins
and there is no path in the rubble.
I am so very lost.

The blouse

I remember what you said that night
in a dim-lit coffee house.
Your cigarette cherry glowed red light
and smoke rolled up your blouse

"I hope you'll take it slow with me,
I've been in quite a state.
I'll give it time and then we'll see,
If we still want to date."

You puffed again and I drank a bit
and nodded, acted cool.
The cherry glowed, your face was lit
I stared, a happy fool.

"That's fine with me, I'll take my time,
and learn what makes you tick.
And after all, we're in our prime.
We need not be so quick."

You rolled your eyes and took a drink
as night slipped over day.
You looked at me and paused to think,
I wondered what you'd say.

"But don't dare drag your feet with me,
I have my pick of men.
I've many places I must see,
And some to see again."

I smiled and took your cigarette.
I puffed and blew a ring.
I smiled and said, "On that I'd bet,
the men and everything."

You took it back and pulled a drag,
then turned and put it down.
You took my hand, picked up your bag,
Smiling behind a frown.

"I'm serious you know," you said.
"You may not have a chance."
"So if you want then go ahead,
and show me some romance."

For seven years we wined and dined,
and loved and laughed and fought.
To wed me you were "not inclined."
"Never," or so you thought.

Then after one more coffee cup
that morning in the fall,
You gave your one-time "never" up,
and said we'd change it all.

For seven more we lived a life
as one made out of two,
For me, you were a loving wife,
and I, a mate for you.

I remember what you said that day,
the glow of dusk's last light.
You took your time, as was your way,
and spoke into the night.

"I'm glad you took it slow with me,
I've been in quite a state.
And soon my soul will have to flee,
I'm sorry, it can't wait."

"So many places I did see
and some I saw again.
You didn't drag your feet with me,
said, 'Now,' when I asked, 'When?"

"I'm meant it back then when I said
you may not have a chance.
But I'm so glad you went ahead.
It was such sweet romance."

The night you left I saw your face
inside the coffee house.
Your smile behind a knowing frown,
above your pretty blouse.

A Mistrust of Praise (Conclusion)

"You are so beautiful," I said, holding her hand and kissing her forehead.

She looked at me dubiously and croaked, "You don't have to say that."

Her voice was a hoarse, breathless whisper. I heard it as much with my heart as with my ears. I had waited two days to hear it again, and I was in tears that I had my chance.

"You are so beautiful," I said. "You inspire me, you make me a better man and a better person. I am in love and have been for 14 years. You teach me, you love me, you take care of me and you have grown up with me."

She looked, her eyes uneven, one pupil larger than the other. She could not see me well, I knew. But her hearing would be the last thing, and she needed to hear it all. Spasm or not, she squeezed my hand. Her eyes closed. I squeezed back.

"You are and have always been the most loyal, sweet, smart, kind, thoughtful, generous, adventurous, glamorous, sexy and loving woman I have ever met," I said.

She gulped and I kissed her cheek.

"You are the greatest honor I have ever been given, and I say given because do not know that I have ever earned or deserved you or even had a hope of really being worthy," I said.

Tears slid out of her eyes and she mouthed "You have," then eked out, "You are, honey."

I felt the hot trail of my tears burn down my cheeks as I continued to recall my list of things to say. "I didn't always praise you at the beginning. I was afraid that you would take me for granted or maybe you would take advantage, I was insecure," I said "I'm sorry."

She nodded at it all and I kissed her nose, letting a tear mix with hers before I gently wiped her cheeks and rasped "I am glad I got over it, and I always meant what I told you about how good you are."

She opened her eyes and the strength of her voice startled me. "I am glad too, honey," she said, then, her voice fading again, she added "You always said what you felt."

I knew she was tired and I leaned down. "I love you, beautiful," I said.

She looked up at me with her eyes slit and mouthed, "I know." A rueful half-smile almost formed and she was out again. It was a gentle joke to lighten the moment. I kissed her again and her breathing was the slow, familiar rhythm it had become.

I knew she accepted at least my own praise, and that I had offered her as much as she could handle in a moment of wakefulness. She accepted not my praise of her baking or cooking, which she could dismiss as a recipe and secretly enjoy, but of her.

To get that acceptance and see her lightly revel in my attention was an honor in its own right.

The Weight of Years

It is difficult to live here,
In this house on this street.
Where every little thing is a reminder,
and every little reminder is so precious,
but heavy on my heart.
I want to flee from this,
so I cling to it all.

The Down Side to Nostalgia

As much as I love the music I have collected, much of it carries the memory of Marcie and events in my life with her so strongly that I cannot bear to listen to it at times. In other moments, I am simply comforted. I am currently on a ten-minute break from work, wondering if there is "More Than This" than to be "Back on the Chain Gang" and remembering Marcie as one "Few and Far Between."

I miss our "Glory Days."

Times Apart That Were Just In Time-Paris in Winter (2)

When Marcie told me she was going to Paris, I smiled and stood up. She hugged me but she was a bit stiff. I pushed her gently so I could look in her eyes.

"What's the matter?" I asked.

"You're going to be mad, Frank," she said. "I know you. You're going to be pissed off that you're not going to be with me."

I shrugged and decided to hold my tongue, then surprised myself with my own words. "I'll get over it," I said. "I want you to be happy."

She gave me a very smug look and shook her head, then shrugged and looked in my eyes matter-of-factly. "I wouldn't be too sure of that," she said.

"Why?" I asked, suddenly a little worried. "What's going on?"

She watched me closely and I knew i was about to be tested. I steeled myself. She spoke and I waited for her words to sink in.

"I am using my credit cards," she said.

I gulped down some bile and nodded somewhat insincerely, but took a deep breath and looked into her eyes. "Maybe you won't have to charge too much. I'm sure we'll be okay."

She looked at me stubbornly and leaned to the other side. "I am going to have a good time. I am not going on a tight budget. I am going shopping and I am going to stay in a nice hotel."

I nodded and breathed. "Well, whatever you want. Maybe i can give you some cash to help out, too."

"I don't want you money," she said. "This is something I will pay for myself. We live together, we sleep together, we love each other, but this is for me, it's not for you at all, so you won't be paying for it."

I looked up a little hurt at her words and nodded, losing my patience. "Why? What's wrong with wanting you to be happy?"

She shrugged. "Maybe I wouldn't pay for you to go traipsing around in another country, either. Did you ever think of that?"

"So you're going traipsing around?" I asked, now pretty much ready to fight. "What are you trying to say?"

She shrugged and crossed her arms, stepping back. "Do you trust me?"

I nodded. "Yes, I do. But why are you trying to test that trust?"

"You just need to trust me," she said. "I am not going to say anything more about it."

The weeks passed and her departure date came. I saw the bill for the ticket. it was small, a few hundred dollars. The hotel took another $300 for reservations and first night's stay. she had two weeks planned.

"Honey, how much will your hotel cost?" I asked. It was a serious error.

"It will cost enough for me to enjoy it," she said. "Why? I thought you said whatever I want? It's my money, right? RIght?"

She marched over and stood in front of me, looking down with her smug look, arms crossed under her breasts.

"Yes, but I saw a bill for $300 dollars for one night... " it was the last thing I remember before the argument began and continued until almost midnight. I simply wanted to know how much it cost. But Marcie, at the peak of her pique, finally called the hotel and canceled in tears.

I was flabbergasted.

"I am canceling the whole fucking thing, Frank," she said. "You are such a bastard! All I wanted to do was go to Paris and have some time to myself and you just shit all over the whole thing. You didn't have to pay for anything."

I could not speak, she had simply refused to let me interfere with her call and now I was being blasted. She ran into the room and moaned over her shoulder as she closed the door. "It was my money! Oh my god, why are you so crazy and stingy?"

I slept on the couch, guilty and bewildered. I just wanted to know how much. It turned out I didn't need to feel guilty, but I didn't know that until a day before she packed. In the mean time, I felt like I should make other plans and get ready to break up. I was heartbroken and thought I had damaged us permanently.

Don Juan Seamus De Marco, or Mr. Personality (Pt.5) An Unkind Cut (Conclusion)

The howling and caterwauling began daily at sunset. Female cats wandered up to our door, as did older males spoiling for a fight.

If I tried to pull Seamus away and close the door or even the back window where he sometimes called, I found myself holding an angry ball of spitting, gyrating, clawed fur.

A few days of angry silence and howling cat psychosis after the whole mess began, I found myself nursing a seriously slashed forearm as Seamus walked around the house hissing.

I had corralled him and brought him in just as he tried to make an escape, and gotten my arm both clung onto and bunny-kicked for my efforts.

"Fucking shit, that burns," I said, watching four ragged red lines explode into foam as I poured hydrogen peroxide over them.

"Uh huh," Marcie said, startling me a bit.

She stood with her purse slung over her shoulders, looking smug and smiling, biting her lower lip. "What are we going to do about this, Frank? Do you understand now? He's a beast and he'll just get meaner and crazier until he gets neutered or he runs off."

I shook my head and wiped my arm with a towel, cleaning the wound carefully. "Marcie, that's not my point."

"What's your point, that you want him to live a shitty, short life and die of disease or by getting hit by a car as he wanders around?"

"I would just like to see him have a litter of kittens, which I know Cammy is going to have Kazi have before she fixes her."

"Oh, really?" she asked, glaring. "So you and Cammy are breeding kittens now? Is that it? Well, why don't you just go sleep with Cammy, then, since you two are living out your lust for each other through the cats, Frank. Asshole!"

I watched her leave, bewildered. I shook my head and heard something at my feet. Seamus was crouched there, licking up blood dripping through the towel. When I tried to clean it up, he hissed.

I decided it had gone far enough and when she came back from the store, I brought it up to arrange terms of surrender.

"Okay, honey," I said, walking in and sitting on the bed. "You can get him fixed. I think I can find a place that will do it for a low cost or even free..."

"Frank! You are NOT going to have me be the one he associates this with! You have to go with me!" she demanded, yelling and fuming.

I put my hand on her lap. "I don't really need to," I said. "Why does this have to be about me going with you now?"

Really, I felt I had been jumped on enough over my admittedly foolish response. But where I had not associated my personal masculinity with the situation before, it was now firmly in play and I was determined to get my way.

"I am the disciplinarian, I am the responsible one, and I am the one taking away his food all the time," she said. "I am tired of being the one he has to watch out for. You need to be the bad one with me once in a while."

I considered it and then I considered the operation. Though called minor and referred to casually, cats and dogs do not get vasectomies when they are neutered, castrated. But she was right. I agreed.

On the day she took him in, though, I had school and exams. She let me off the hook. When they got home, he ran into a corner, then under the bed, then eventually ventured out, avoiding us both.

When Marcie and I made love that night, I had to admit a little sense of guilt and a creepiness to it as he watched, I imagined accusingly, from atop a pile of warm clothes.

Seamus was sedentary and already overeating by the end of the first week. It took him days not to avoid us or hiss. The other cats stop coming around. I was worried his personality would change drastically.

But one night, as the sun set, he began caterwauling out of our back window. It was music to my ears.

"Seamus! Shut up! Jesus!" Marcie screamed, cutting him off for all of three seconds.

All was well. And there was a bonus. Cammy moved out, confiding in me before she did that Kazi's first litter was coming. She also seemed to think that she had only had that one tryst.

I neglected to say anything to Marcie, of course.

Five days

Five days from now will mean one half year from losing her. My weight is down over 50 pounds, but I feel the heaviness of my heart increasing.

I feel it as I run into the night, hoping to outpace my sorrows with steps and heartbeats.

I feel it as I ponder my work and the meaningless struggle to procure money for children who are sneered at by selfish gray people who would see them imprisoned before they were educated.

I feel it as I consider the future with women ahead of me, in all their sadness or greed or heartless demand for comforting falsity.

I feel it as I gaze into a picture of beautiful blue eyes and know that a great and perfect love is gone from me, perhaps forever.

I feel it as I try to gather the courage and the motivation to pour out her life in verse and chapter as I know it, and her memorial as I realize it.

I feel it as I listen to my body for the little signs that say I will not live to honor her, to immortalize her, and to be known to have been hers at all, except as a rumor that dies with the last that have heard it from some reverent voice.

And I cannot feel so much so often and so deeply anymore without someone, and I feel my greatest grief when I admit I know she was right, and I must love to live, and I must live to love again.

And I wish she could live, so all of that, all of these weights, could feel so much less of a burden and a stone in me, and so much more a matter of my grateful love for her, as it always had been.

But at least my shoulders are broad and my back is unbowed, and much of that is her, alive in me and insistent that I carry her, and it, on.

F.

That last week comes back

Every once in a while, sitting here so close to where she left us and the great pain of those last hours behind, I am overwhelmed in my memories by her prsence. This is one of those overwhelming nights.

We are in the half-year anniversary of the last week I had with Marcie, and though i have had some joy in my life and made plans to honor her, I have been stricken this evening and am having a hard time with it all. No posts about cats and arguments tonight, folks.

Though I see that there is a possibility of happiness without her alive and near me, it is at times like these that the loss of her feels like a gaping wound that will never quite heal, but simply close up and open once in a while. I'll be back when it closes again.

F.

The morning

As I was listening to the radio on the way to work, a song came on which struck a chord (thought not much more after I read its lyrics). Still, it reflected on a small part of my and Marcie's love affair that occurs to me almost every day.

She used to wake me gently if she woke first. "Honey," she would say. "Sugar Bear, it's time to get up."

But I was no Sugar Bear in the morning. In fact, sometimes I would simply startle awake, no matter how gentle the waking. Worse, if she moved the bed around, I apparently cussed (which I tried not to do around my sweetie much).

Still, after a splash to my face and some time to adjust to morning, I would wander in and hug her around the waist from behind as she put on her makeup.

"Hi, baby," she would say. "Are you in a better mood now?"

Her sweet and loving voice always made me smile. So this song, aside form why its singer is separated from the unknown voice he seeks, was suitably touching to me, despite being from the Barenaked Ladies:

Sound Of Your Voice

The moon is full but there is an incompleteness
The days are beautiful but I feel a bitter sweetness
If I had a wish, or even a choice
I'd wake up to the sound of your voice
How I miss waking up to the sound of your voice

I let you down and fell right off of your good list
I hope each day you'll find peace and forgiveness
The alarm clock rings, What a lonely noise
And I long for the sound of your voice
Oh, how I miss waking up to the sound of your voice

Take it from me: there's not much to see
In this void

The saying goes there will be other dances (don't give up)
This little song is about second chances
Just say the word and I will rejoice
And wake up to the sound of your voice
Oh, how I miss waking up to the sound
To the sound (sound)
To the sound (to the sound)
To the sound
Waking up to the sound of your voice

Take it from me: there's not much to see
In this void

Sometimes I really need to hear the sound of that voice. I luckily can listen to a few recordings I kept. I also sometimes hear her voice in my mind very clearly. I wish I could hear it in my ears, even if she were cross.

F.

A Dream with a Message

All my thoughts and signs of Marcie, as well as a peek at a friend's personal blog, triggered a dream last night. But it seemed like some little bit of Marcie was coming through with a purpose, and not the random synthesis of imagery drawn from our lives.

In the dream, Marcie and I were making out in an airport lounge, sitting in a little round booth with some hors d'œuvre and glasses of wine. A beautiful lilting voice came over the loudspeaker as we kissed.

"Flight Three for Mbingu now boarding at Gate Seven," it crackled, interrupting the music in the lounge, and our kiss.

"Mmmph... mmm," Marcie said, her hand on my jaw as she stopped. "We have to get to the gate or I'll be late."

I nodded and grabbed her bags, admiring her sleek form in her little aqua camisole and long but clingy white skirt. She was wearing white heeled sandals of some kind, and I remember thinking that they showed off her toenails' little flowers very well as we walked.

When we arrived at Gate Three, children were playing and clamoring around a few smiling adults. A young man stood in a white uniform that looked an awful lot like an Army uniform in Navy white, I noted. Everyone was dressed for summer.

"Marcie," a beautiful Indian (or perhaps Pakistani or Bangladeshi woman, I could only guess) said, beaming and taking her hand. "I am so glad you made it. Why don't you take these four and take them with you?"

She gestured to four little girls, one of them a redhead who immediately attached herself to Marcie's leg, the other three African, dressed the same, in little white gowns, one wearing her hair in hanging braids, the other two, smaller girls wearing little cloths wrapped on theirs.

The taller, braided one showed the other girls something in her arms, "It's my baby," she said. "I saw a brilliant glow in her hands and on her forearms, cradled but translucent, the faintest outline of a baby's form visible.

They murmured and the girl slipped her arms under her gown, smiling a moment at me. I smiled at the smallest girl, who looked at me a little confused, and she came over and took my hand, pulling me. I started to go, but the woman took my arm with a warm and gentle but firm grip.

"No, Serena," she said. "Francis is not going on this flight, but you will see him later, okay? Now go with Marcie."

"Sorry, Serena," I said, and before I could ask why I was not going, Marcie spoke.

"I call him Frank, Niyati, " she interjected, smiling at the women. Marcie stepped in close and her face slipped into a little sad smile. "Honey, I have to go now. I'm sorry, but they said you can't get an entry visa yet."

I suddenly realized that Marcie was seriously going without me, and that is why I had no luggage of my own. I began to protest and Marcie kissed me. I felt a strange electric jolt down my back and opened my eyes, my throat hard and pained as understanding dawned and I remembered.

Niyati rubbed my back as I listened to my little bride and the tears flowed.

"We'll have our second honeymoon, honey," she said. "But not right away. I have things to do, and you have things to do, too. I won't leave you alone. I'll call you, okay?"

I could only nod and then kiss back. The four girls hugged around us until Niyati took their hands and put them in Marcie's or on her skirt gently. Marcie pecked my cheek and Niyati took her bag.

"Okay, ladies," she said. "Time to go now. Marcie, I will see him home after everyone is in."

"Bye for now, honey," Marcie said. "Come see me when you can."

"I will," I said, hoarse but determined to sound strong, which I was not nearly.

They walked into the gate and were gone. Niyati rubbed my back and smiled when I turned to her.

"She waited for you in the terminal so you could see her off," Niyati whispered. "She is very stubborn. But it was okay to let you come here for her. You have been very good to her."

"Why can't I go?" I asked.

"It is rare for people even to come here," she said, "You have been here before, and you knew your way back, and you will know your way here when you don't get to go back again."

She sighed and smiled, stroking my cheek and smiling. "You may have been waiting for your gate call once, but this was Marcie's. Your ticket is expired, and your reservation is for a much later flight, so you can't board yet. You also need an entry visa to fly, and yours is not ready yet."

I nodded. "So I don't get to board until I die?" I asked.

"You will not die, no one really does who comes here, but you cannot be responsible for anything when you do come to depart," she said. "If there is something not yet done, you cannot board."

I was calmer but sad. I stared at the gate and sighed heavily, wondering how I would visit if I could not fly yet.

"Stay here a moment," Niyati said. She walked over to the confused soldier, who waved as she guided him into the gate. I waved back and nodded. I envied his luck.

Marcie walked backto the edge of the gate and beckoned to me sneakily. She bit her lip and looked at Niyati, who was greeting a young woman and a couple.

My heart surged. I smiled and ran to the gate on my quiet step, sneaking rapidly and leaping at the end, but a huge wall of a man suddenly stood before me. The gate slid back from me behind him.

He put his hand on my shoulder and Marcie came over as he spoke. "I know you can't help it, and I know you think you want to take my wrist, and you want to slip by, and you want to go, Francis."

I nodded and looked up at him. He may have been seven feet tall or so, but I didn't care. I considered the best course for a moment but my thoughts were scrambled as Marcie kissed me.

"Honey, you are very brave and I know you want to be with me, and I am so happy you ran to me for one last caper," she said. "But just run to me when you see me somewhere else, okay? We'll have our time together."

The man let go of my shoulder. "Thank you, Marcie."

I had one last kiss before the dream ended. As we kissed, i felt her mischievous delight with me and her passion. I woke and felt her hands on my cheeks and her lips on my own, phantoms of her again acting as company to me.


Sometime this weekend, I will share Chrissy's dream of her. I have been trying to digitize the wedding video. We will see. I may also get the archive of messages from Tanya, and I have found more little notes. Good night, friends. If any of you have dreams to share. please let me know.

Extra note: The name I heard was "Natty," but this is as close as I found from theplace I think the woman was from or supposed to be...

A very tough day

So, todays was a day that, no matter what I did, was filled with Marcie. I imagine my dreams will be quite hard to put away when I wake up tomorrow.

First was the lady with her redheaded child who crossed the street in front of me at Park and Adams. The little girl, very "Natalie Wood" in her jacket and gloves, save for her fiery red curls, waved as she walked by and smiled.

A block or two later, Lily and Christine crossed the street from Cream, a local coffee shop. Lily is a pug, and Christine is her mom. I'll get pictures next time.

When I got to work, I was clicking through my old emails and came upon a nest of Marcie's. I read them and had to go for a little walk. I am waiting for Tanya to send me one she discovered, too... that will be hard as well.

On my way to the post office for my passport appointment, a song came on by Stevie Nicks. Marcie loved Stevie Nicks and I have always been bewitched by lady songbirds. It was "Changes," loaded with parallels and pain, and an acoustic version from one of my favorite all-decades rock channels, KPRI.

So much of it is so very relevant to our last months together that I had to pull over and sit for a bit:

Landslide

I took my love and I took it down
I climbed a mountain and I turned around
And I saw my reflection in the snow covered hills
'Til the landslide brought me down

Oh, mirror in the sky
What is love?
Can the child within my heart rise above?
Can I sail through the changing ocean tides?
Can I handle the seasons of my life?

Mmm Mmm... I don't know... Mmm Mmm... Mmm Mmm...

Well, I've been afraid of changing
'Cause I've built my life around you
But time makes you bolder
Children get older
I'm getting older too

So...

(Guitar solo)

I've been afraid of changing
'Cause I, I´ve built my life around you
But time makes you bolder
Children get older
I'm getting older too...
I'm getting older too...

So, take this love, take it down
Oh if you climb a mountain and you turn around
If you see my reflection in the snow covered hills
Well the landslide will bring you down, down

And If you see my reflection in the snow covered hills
Well maybe... The landslide will bring you down
Well well... the landslide will bring you down

Every time I hear it, I hear her singing to me, though I am well aware that Stevie Nicks sang it for her father. Marcie and I once had a long cry to it after her first surgery, the removal of her breasts.

It came on as I tended to her 4 separate wound drains. I thought I was hurting her, and I asked, but she just crumbled again and shook her head, hanging it away from me sadly. She said, "No, it's the song, honey."

I really listened to it for the first time and knew she was singing it about herself to me in her heart. I guess my heart sang it back, and now I am the one under the landlside. And man, did it bring me down.

I miss her more than I ever did, but I guess she is calling me more strongly than ever, too. That, or I am just grabbing at every single chance to stay connected and on track.