Dear Scott

Dear Scott,

It has been quite some time since I last wrote. With the recent anniversary of your passing, you’ve been on my mind and I thought it would be a good time to catch up. April 26 marked 12 years since you passed. This year the anniversary was especially significant because it was a tipping point for Alex. He turned 24 in March, which means now he has been without you as long as you had been with him. This occurred to me about a week before the anniversary and I wondered if he had also thought of it and if so, how he was handling it.  He came home for the week around the 26th, saying that he wanted time to visit me, his friends, and to rest.  The evening he arrived he shared with me that this particular anniversary sat different than the others for him. It was hard for him to wrap his mind around the fact that going forward it will be longer that he lived without you.  He spent the anniversary day hiking a marathon distance of 26.1 miles in your favorite place, the American River Canyon. He had come home to seek solace and to spend  the day with you.

Sam and Jess came home a few days later, but for another reason. Sam had an early Mother’s Day surprise for me. He presented me with a beautiful necklace with a diamond pendant surrounded by a circle of rubies (my birthstone) and another circle of diamonds. He explained that there wasn’t enough time to do what he had wanted in time for Mother’s Day, which was to take the diamond from my wedding ring and put it into this necklace so that I could wear it as a keepsake and to commemorate this twelve year anniversary. He also felt like he should get my permission before taking the ring. He said we can have it done later, but either way that was the sentiment behind the necklace.  I was glad that he hadn’t actually taken my wedding ring to make the necklace. While the gift was very touching, something didn’t feel quite right. It took me a few days to figure out exactly what it was that bothered me about it.

This past year has been spent slowly removing the walls that I constructed around my heart. The walls created a safe place to reside when I no longer had your strength to rely on.  I remember vividly the day I first went inside. I felt overwhelmed with taking on the things that you could no longer handle due to your illness. That day we had an argument. You needed me to make a phone call so that you could buy something on Ebay. You could’t make the call yourself because you could’t speak clearly enough to be understood over the phone anymore. While I understood the dilemma, I didn’t think it needed to be a priority. I didn’t have time to deal with that on top of everything else I had on my plate. Irritated, I left the house and drove around town with my frustration, feeling I had nowhere to go with it. I felt like I had enough to deal with, with my own life and the boys, without also having to adjust to this new reality of making your phone calls and handling your life. I didn’t like it, but it felt selfish to tell you what I was feeling. How could I vent this frustration to you when you had enough to deal with just getting through each day as your body began to fail you? I had always been able to talk to you about everything, but now everything was different.  When I came home you were upset with me for leaving. I told you how I was feeling, that I didn’t feel like I could talk to you anymore. I didn’t feel it was fair to burden you with my feelings with everything you were going through. You told me that you still wanted me come to you when I needed to talk and that you still wanted to be there for me. You said that I could still lean on you. As much as I knew that you wanted to be there for me, I needed to get used to a new normal and accept that I could no longer rely on you. In reality, I was losing my best friend. From that moment on, when I found myself in need of that friend,  I went into this cozy little place that I constructed and I worked things out for myself. It was there where I found my own strength. 

I have remained in that cozy safe little place throughout the past twelve plus years, through all of  the relationships I have had since you passed. I made sure that I would never need to lean on anyone again. The thought of  relying on someone and having the rug pulled out from under me was something I never wanted to go through again. This has quite successfully resulted in pushing people away or at the very least making them feel unneeded or inadequate. Until Daniel, who despite all of my crazy reactions to his efforts to take care of me, continues to show up, over and over again. Every. Single. Day.  It has been really scary and a lot harder than I thought it would be to allow myself to rely on someone new. He has patiently helped me slowly remove the walls, brick by brick, releasing my grip on the world I have desperately clung to. He has shown me that it is safe receive love, and even lean in and rely on it. It feels good to allow his light to shine into my cozy little space and even to step outside to begin building a new life with him. I am the happiest I have been in longer than I can remember.  

I know that in order to fully move forward and to step into this new life, I need to let go of my past life, but I don’t know what that looks like. The truth is, you will always be present in my life as you live on through our children.  In one of our last conversations I promised you that I would always keep you alive in our home for our boys and that you would never, ever be forgotten.  Luckily, Daniel is not threatened by my keeping your memories alive and even seems to embrace all that comes with that. Somehow he was able to hold space for everything that came with the anniversary this week. The kids coming home, my need to have time with just them, the gift from Sam that was meant to give me a way to always carry you with me, and all of my feelings around that as I tried to sort it all out. 

I went into my jewelry box today and pulled out my wedding ring. I held it in my hand and slid it onto my finger. It still fits the same as it always did. Remember how I wanted to have a diamond engagement ring, but we couldn’t afford it with Alex on the way? We decided to take the diamond from the necklace you gave me for Valentine’s Day that first year and put it into the engagement ring. It was the perfect solution since I rarely wore the necklace. Over the years I have thought of making something new out of the ring to carry it forward.  I went so far as drawing up a design for a pinky ring and taking it to a jeweler to get a quote. The reality of no longer having the ring stopped me then and is what is bothering me now. I also felt like Sam was making a decision about the ring, that I wasn’t ready to make just then. Just when I’ve been working on moving forward and letting you go, it felt like he was making me hold on. Looking at the ring, I could see that by holding onto it, I was holding onto the memories of everything that was and everything that could never be. I didn’t want to lose the ability to still put it on, something I have done here and there over the past twelve years in private moments when I needed to feel connected to you. Taking the diamond from the ring means the ring is no more. That is when it hit me.

I recalled a memory of a couple of weeks before you passed when you asked me to remove your wedding ring. You said you were ready to die but felt like you couldn’t let go because of your attachment to me. You thought it would help to take off your ring so that you could let go. The ring wouldn’t budge. No matter what I tried, oil, soap, I couldn’t get the ring off your finger. After you passed, I went into the garden to sit while the coroner prepared your body to take you away. Your sister stayed behind to help. Later she came to the garden to find me and handed me your ring. She said it had slipped right off your finger. It had finally released once you were gone. After all, you couldn’t take it with you. 

While there is always room for memories, there really isn’t a place for this ring in my new life. This new necklace is actually the perfect way to carry the memories without having to hold onto the ring itself. I feel like you would approve, and maybe that you even had a hand in helping Sam make the necklace for me. It seems fitting that the diamond continue to evolve and be transformed into yet another use. Like a phoenix, reborn again. This time with different meaning and beautifully encased with love and a blessing from Sam to move forward into my new life. 

Alex, Sam and I have all come to terms with our loss in our own way. The boys are both finding ways to move through their life in a way that continues honor you and to make you proud.  I know you are proud and watching over them, guiding them each day with love. I am finding my way of carrying our memories while letting go of the past so that I can move forward into a new life with Daniel.  As we move through another year without you, our shared memories keep your spirit alive and well with us always, as I promised. 

~Never Forgotten~