Why not me?
Three years later, still asking the hard questions about love, loss, and what comes next.
I have a complicated relationship with quiet. I love the stillness of early morning before the world wakes up, when I sit on my porch and soak it all in. No television, just silence. But my brain loves and hates it. There are too many thoughts tearing about, seeking release — or anything to help quiet them
My brain has been on a tear. And as such, I have been much more discombobulated than normal. This discombobulation isn't just seasonal. It's deeper than that. It's the weight of a life that has shifted beneath my feet. Is it the change in seasons? The change I feel in myself? The unknown path that I find myself on?
When you lose a partner, your entire world changes. It is not just about the everyday things that you miss. It’s the future you had planned. The future with your person.
A future that no longer exists.
In Tony’s last year of life, what the kid and I call “Dad’s hippie year,” he told us over and over, “You have to check your vibe and keep moving forward.” Now, he had been listening to an extraordinary amount of Kendrick, and he was in psycho-social oncology therapy. I suspect he was at peace. This is the man who, upon receiving a stage IV cancer diagnosis, never said, “Why me?” Instead, his response was, “Why not me?”
Why not me?
I think about that frequently. The temptation to say, “Why me?” has been so strong these last three years. Instead, I say, “Why not me?” What are the lessons I have learned that I am meant to share with the world?
Why not me?
I am struggling with it quite a bit lately, as the loneliness starts to creep in, and sometimes I wonder if I will ever get a second chance to share the love in my heart with someone else.
I love big. I give every bit of myself. But it would also be nice to have someone else to carry the weight with. To dance in the kitchen. To see me as I am, flawed and capable and imperfect.
I had that. It was so beautiful in its imperfection. It’s funny how you can look back at a lifetime of memories and see everything that you desperately wanted to change at the time, but time and distance show you how great it truly was.
Being this vulnerable on the page is never easy. Looking back at your life with such a critical lens is also never easy. Daring to say that you want a future filled with love is also never easy. I have a lot of love in my life from so many people. So I am not in a deficit that way, yet the big gaping hole he left is palpable - overwhelming and visceral.
They say that with deep grief, there was great love. And it was indeed a great love. Nature abhors a vacuum, and I don’t want to fill the hole in my soul unless it is truly meaningful. There will always be a place that can never be filled. For now, I have to find the things that fulfill me. And maybe, in time, I'll find the courage to love again. But not until it's real.
I found the poem "Stages" by Herman Hesse helpful.
So real, so raw. You're asking the hard questions, and that is never easy - but I think in the end, it is the right thing to do. Tony sounds like he was such a lovely, wonderful man (and handsome!).