Healing Tears

I've been crying the last couple of days.  In a good way.  Yesterday afternoon it was during a conversation with a friend who lost the love of her life in December.  Last night, at bed time, I just plain missed my perfect partner and  I cried.  For a while I haven't been able to cry; it feels good to be able to do it again.

This morning my brother and a family friend picked me up and we attended the Physics Lecture at UM.  This one was about magic, and very interesting and informative.  I met a couple of friends there.  Jeff, from the support group at SJMHS was there, and I got caught up on how things are going with him and his wife, who is battling cancer as hard as she can.  An old neighbor, whom Gwen and I had seen at the lung cancer clinic two years ago when he had been just diagnosed with  Stage IIIA lung cancer, was also there.  I had a nice talk with him, and learned that his cancer had been caught early enough and was completely eradicated.  I couldn't help but feel envious and sad.  Overall I was happy for him.  He was one of those anomalies as far as  cancer was concerned; never smoked a day in his life, swam regularly, bicycled everywhere, yet he had lung cancer.

This afternoon I've been home alone and enjoying it.  Jeanne called from Spain where she is attending an affair hosted by ALCATEL.  All my kids have checked in this weekend.  I like it that as the days since Gwen's death have increased I have felt a stronger and stronger bond with each one of our children.  I love being the best dad I know how to be.  Also this afternoon I decided to watch a movie that came up on HBO, Leap Year.  Amy Adams is in it, and I enjoyed her in the movie about Julia Childs.  This was a romantic comedy, the kind of move Gwen would have loved.  I couldn't help it, I cried at a lot of scenes, predictable as they may have been.  The movie took place in Ireland, and there was a wedding scene where the bride stood and said the following:

I'd like to give thanks to my husband.

May you never steal, lie or cheat.


If you must steal, 
then steal away my sorrows.


If you must lie,
lie with me all the  nights of my life.


If you must cheat,
then please cheat death,
because I couldn't live a day without you.
 
Oh my, I know it sounds kind of corny and dumb in cold print like this, but those words grabbed me in a place that I didn't know existed until after Gwen died.  That last part about not being able to live a day without you has taken on such new meaning.  Yes, I cried and cried and cried.

That's pretty much the way we saw our whole relationship, Dear, and I feel blessed and grateful that we were able to share a love like that.