With This Ring

My love. I look at your wedding ring on my hand dozens of times every day, remembering how it looked when you wore it. The turquoise stones, set by a jeweler who made that ring just for you, are still beautiful. I look for it in every photo I have of you, memorizing that ring on your finger. Sometimes it aches to look at it on my hand. Such a part of you. All I have left of you. Most of the time it fits a little too loosely and I worry that I’ll lose it. As easily as I lost you.

Was there anything I could have done differently to keep you? I’ve asked myself that a million times plus one and never come up with anything. Can I stop the wind from blowing? The moon from shining? The stars from twinkling? Was I the reason you lived as long as you did, because there was some kind of magic in my hands that I somehow lost last February?

It’s a mirage, the idea that we have control like that. Control over anything. How many times did I kiss you goodbye in the morning, never letting myself worry that I wouldn’t hug you again that evening? How many fires did you walk into and walk out of again? How often did you avoid a collision on the freeway, a fall from a ladder, a hunting accident? We don’t know, do we? Did I have any control of your safety all those times? None.

I just thought this separation was way down the road for us. I joked that we’d need another forty years together to figure each other out. Fully adjust to co-existing in retirement. Learn to adapt to growing older. Frailer. Grumpier. Sleepier. And all the rest of the dwarfs—ier.

I took it for granted. I took you for granted. I thought you’d always be here, with me, with the grandbabies, with our kids, and our friends. I thought we’d both dodged enough bullets we’d earned the right to be bulletproof. Maybe I let my guard down? Maybe that’s ridiculous. I know the truth is that your death was a senseless thing that I keep trying to make sense of, even if it means I blame myself.

There was so much stacked against us. So many fails. Neither of us saw this coming. That nurse who saw us on Tuesday and sent us home. The firefighters who responded to our house the next morning and said the hospital would probably send us home, too. But they didn’t. The way everyone thought I was sicker than you were, but here I am, and you’re not . . . here. The way the doctor shook his head, trying to figure out why the virus took your life. Even he came up with nothing.

We don’t know. That’s about all we do know. And not knowing is hard to live with. Was there something we could have done differently? And, as many have pointed out to me, what difference would it make now if I figured that out? I know it wouldn’t bring you back. From what I hear about where you are right now, you wouldn’t even want to. It’s better for you in every way except one—I can’t be with you. That’s part of the pain of grief, too. Life has asked me to live this new existence without you, this life I didn’t ask for. And every day there are reminders, all day long, of what I once had with you by my side.

I bought a new Tahoe last week and now I’m its sole driver. I stop at a grocery store and remember the way you always parked me in the shade when we were together. Stopping for gas, I'm the only one here to fill my tank in the Arizona summer heat. I watch couples holding hands and long for the way you always opened my door first when we got in the car, your hand at my back, quietly guiding me with your love. “Always kiss me goodnight,” you said, reminding me of the plaque on your nightstand. The one I gave away when I cleared out the house because I can’t look at it anymore. Your corny jokes. Your stoic look when I made corny jokes. The tender way you looked at me and the times others saw it, but I missed it. I miss it now. I miss it so much.

I always knew this day would come. That chances were I’d outlive you. Women often do. I just really gambled on it happening a long way down this road we journeyed together. You know I never was any good at gambling.

Tomorrow Marc is bringing the state flag to me that flew over headquarters the day you died. They took it down in honor of you and your service to Chandler Fire Department. Tomorrow they’ll give it to me. I didn’t know that was a tradition there. There’s a lot I didn’t know until now. There’s a lot I wish I still didn’t know.

Life just keeps asking me to do hard things. And I keep doing them because I have so little choice. So little control. And because I love you. And because I don’t know any other way to get through each day except to do what I have to do. I’m just trying to survive here, Baby. Wearing your ring. Accepting your flag. Remembering your love. Your smile. The incredible man I was lucky to stand next to for most of my life.

Wishing with all my heart that I never wasted one minute taking you for granted. We just never know what a risk life is until it’s too late. I’m sure regret is a waste of time. I can’t think of much in life that you regretted, though. You always had the courage to face life as it came. I can think of plenty of risks you took, willing to give it a chance even if there were no guarantees.

There aren’t any guarantees, though, are there? Life is full of uncertainty. Questions without answers. Pain without comfort. Sorrow without you. I just know marrying you was the smartest decision I ever made, even though the promise I made, the contract we kept, included that little reminder, "til death do us part."

I’d do it all again in a heartbeat. You were the best thing that ever happened to me.