I Dreamed a Dream

“To love or have loved, that is enough. Ask nothing further.

There is no other pearl to be found in the dark folds of life.” ― Victor Hugo, Les Misérables

 

 

 

March 10th, 2007 - The Broadhurst Theatre in NYC was when Gaye took me to see Les Miserables for the first time. We had just been given the wonderful news that her Cancer was in remission. Too celebrate, we traveled to Broadway to see our good friend, Norm Lewis, perform as Javert. To be perfectly honest, I had a hard time keeping my eyes open that night during the third act. For me at that time, a 3 hour musical play was not at the top of my list of events to scratch off the bucket list. For Gaye, it was a magical and emotional event. Gaye must have wiped away her tears no less than a half a dozen times during the course of the play. For those not familiar with the story, Les Mis examines the raw nature Grief, Love, Loss and Redemption. Although I did not fully appreciate the emotional impact of the play at that time, I was blessed to hold the hand of a love that certainly did.

Gaye backstage wearing Javert's Hat

Yesterday, I skipped out of work to catch a matinee of the new Les Mis movie. Ever since I seen the trailers, I have been anxious to see the movie. It has been five and half years since that magical night in NYC and almost 4 and a half years without Gaye at my side.  It's kind of funny what Death, Grief and Loss will do to your emotional psyche and being. I knew it was going to be an emotional river of feelings for me. I made the conscious decision to go alone. (I have discovered I hide my feelings much too much with others around me.) Once the movie began, I could not prepare for the emotional impact it had on my soul.  Yes, I cried. I cried profusely.  An Ocean of Loss, what could have been... what should have been... Taking in both Fantine's and Eponine's fate, all I could think about was the loss of Gaye and just how cruel this life can be.. "Life has killed the dream I dream....."

Perhaps, similar feelings that Gaye was going through, back at the Broadhurst Theatre in 2007. 

I owe Gaye everything That I have become over the last 11 years when I was kissed by God when we met. It has been a struggle but I am proud of the man I have become... All because of Gaye. (Gaye still teaching me today)

As Sean Valjean articulates, "Those who do not weep, do not see"

I am blessed with the best memories any soul can have....

...and I thank God everyday!!!

A Lucky Man, Indeed

Because of her, he had learned to look for the birds -

the darting flight of the wild canaries

(yellow sun on yellow wings),

the chesty preening of the redbirds and bluebirds, 

the blackbird with the red-tipped wings like startling epaulets.

-Terry Kay-

 

How much we have learned from them....

the Loves we have lost.

And how their Gifts stay with us...

 

The sharp vignettes surface from our faded memory again and again.

Scenes we scarcely gave a second thought to when our

loved one one was alive

emerge as scenes from a family album...

 

Warmth and Gratitude....

 

What Blessed memories I have.....

 

Happy Earthly Birthday Darling.

(True Love Stories never have endings....)



My Angel with Paws

Deacon's Favorite viewing spot at the Lake House.
I recently realized it is the same spot where I spread Gaye's ashes.
(Deacon's Divine 6th sense or just a Hopeful Coincidence?)

Today is Deacon's 7th Birthday.

It is so hard to define the impact that Deacon has had on my life.

(Fellow Dog Owners would understand)

 

Six years ago, I gave Gaye a Coffee Table book with Pics

of our one year old canine child.

On the last page of the book,  I included a quote from Gene Hill's

book called Tears and Laughter.

 

 I could not think of a better way to share what Deacon has meant to me

articulated in Gene Hill's Words

 He is my other eyes that can see above the clouds;

my other ears that hear above the winds.

He has told me a thousand times over

that I am the reason for being;

by the way he rests against my stomach;

by the way he wags his tail at my smallest smile;

by the way he shows his hurt when I leave without taking him.

(I think it makes him sick with worry when he is not

along to care for me.)

 

When I am wrong, he is delighted to forgive.

When I am angry, he clowns to make me smile.

When I am happy, he is joy unbounded.

When I am a fool, he ignores it.

When I succeed, he brags.

 

Without him, I am only another person.

With him, I am all-powerful.

 

He is loyalty itself.

He has taught me the meaning of devotion.

With him, I know a secret comfort and a private peace.

His head on my shoulders can heal my human hurts.

His presence by my side is protection

against my fears of dark and unknown things.

 

He has promised to wait for me...whenever...wherever...

in case I need him.

 

And I expect I will... As I always have.

 

He is just my dog.

 

Hppy Birthday Deacon!!!

My Angel and Savior with Paws.

Farewell, My Love.....

August 22, 2008

 

4 years.....

1461 days.....

35,064 hours...

21,038,400 minutes...

1,262,304,000 Heart Beats...

 

No matter how I break it down....

Years, Days, Hours, Minutes, Heart Beats,

However Large, however infinitesimal the number,

Aptly describes Gaye's Absence in my world.

 

It seems impossible that 4 years have passed -

Yet here I am.....

 

If I was honest with myself and Gaye was grading my last 4 years,

I think she would give me an "F".

(It would be an A or an F in Gaye's grade scale of life)

 

One of Gaye's intimate fears was that I would not be able to

 Let go, Love again and embrace Life

(I guess Guilty as charged)

 

I just have such a hard time loosening my reign on Gaye.

We had such a magical life planned.

(and then God said "HA")

 

Here is my pledge in honor of Gaye's 4th celestial Birthday.

I am letting Go.....

It is time for me to move on...

Knowing Gaye will always be the best parts of my DNA;

It is time to let go of the pain...

let go of the regret...

let go of the guilt...

 

Time to embrace and love life once again....

 

Perhaps the heavens will allow lightning to strike twice....

(I have a great connection up there)

 

Farewell, My Love....

I know she is happy to hear me say that.

Deacon at Winship Cancer Institute this week. I have been loving, kissing and hugging him so much recently, his red coat is rubbing off.

 



“God has strewn our paths with wonders and we certainly should not go through Life with our eyes shut.”

I took this shot on the second to last day in Ireland



“You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
call to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting –
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.”
― Mary Oliver

The healing elixer of Nature;

All around, one sees

Hope, Love and Faith

Don't be ashamed to weep; 'tis right to grieve. Tears are only water, and flowers, trees, and fruit cannot grow without water. But there must be sunlight also. A wounded heart will heal in time, and when it does, the memory and love of our lost ones is sealed inside to comfort us.”
― Brian Jacques, Taggerung

Amen.....

In the wisdom of ages, may I find solace and hope.

“You can shed tears that she is gone,
or you can smile because she has lived.
You can close your eyes and pray that she’ll come back,
or you can open your eyes and see all she’s left.
Your heart can be empty because you can’t see her,
or you can be full of the love you shared.
You can turn your back on tomorrow and live yesterday,
or you can be happy for tomorrow because of yesterday.
You can remember her only that she is gone,
or you can cherish her memory and let it live on.
You can cry and close your mind,
be empty and turn your back.
Or you can do what she’d want:
smile, open your eyes, love and go on.”

-David Harkins

Although, it is just so darn hard,

I must accomplish what she wanted;

smile, open my eyes, love and go on...

The Dragonfly

The Dragonfly

Once, in a little pond, in the muddy water under the lily pads,
there lived a little water beetle in a community of water
beetles. They lived a simple and comfortable life in the pond
with few disturbances and interruptions.

Once in a while, sadness would come to the community when one of
their fellow beetles would climb the stem of a lily pad and
would never be seen again. They knew when this happened; their
friend was dead, gone forever.

Then, one day, one little water beetle felt an irresistible urge
to climb up that stem. However, he was determined that he would
not leave forever. He would come back and tell his friends what
he had found at the top.

When he reached the top and climbed out of the water onto the
surface of the lily pad, he was so tired, and the sun felt so
warm, that he decided he must take a nap. As he slept, his body
changed and when he woke up, he had turned into a beautiful
blue-tailed dragonfly with broad wings and a slender body
designed for flying.

So, fly he did! And, as he soared he saw the beauty of a whole
new world and a far superior way of life to what he had never
known existed.

Then he remembered his beetle friends and how they were thinking
by now he was dead. He wanted to go back to tell them, and
explain to them that he was now more alive than he had ever been
before. His life had been fulfilled rather than ended.

But, his new body would not go down into the water. He could
not get back to tell his friends the good news. Then he
understood that their time would come, when they, too, would
know what he now knew. So, he raised his wings and flew off
into his joyous new life!
~Author Unknown~

I mentioned several times before that our greatest hope is

that us beings simply don't understand.

My Intuition and Heart says Believe and have Faith!

I will follow my heart every time!

It has one perfect track record.....

A Loan on Earth

"I'll lend you for a while a child of mine," He said.
"For you to love the while he lives and mourn for when he's dead.
It may be six or seven years, or twenty-two or three,
But will you, till I call him back, take care of him for me?
He'll bring his charms to gladden you, and should his stay be brief,
You'll have his lovely memories as solace for your grief."

"I cannot promise he will stay; since all from earth return,
But there are lessons taught down there I want this child to learn.
I've looked the wide world over in My search for teachers true
And from the throngs that crowd life's lanes I have chosen you.
Now will you give him all your love, not think the labor vain,
Nor hate Me when I come to call to take him back again?"

"I fancied that I heard them say, "Dear Lord, Thy will be done!
For all the joy Thy child shall bring, the risk of grief we run.
We'll shelter him with tenderness, we'll love him while we may,
And for the happiness we've known, forever grateful stay;
But should the angels call for him much sooner than we've planned,
We'll brave the bitter grief that comes and try to understand!"
~Edgar Guest

Considering the fact that there is one constant in life that
will be faced by all that we know and love, Death -
One would think that we would be better prepared to handle this event. 

Deep grief is a profoundly lonely experience. It delivers emotions that
make us feel alone and cut off from society. A sense envelopes that
no one can surely feel what we are going through.

Over the last three and a half years, I have learned that
Love and even more important at times, Grief, yes Grief
is in fact Universal and binds us all.
There is a vast community of us souls that have experienced
the dark journey of crushing loss and finite physical light
extinguished.

Us Souls can be found everywhere...

The above poem from Edgar Guest referring to a loss of a child,
echoes those sentiments that us souls so strongly cling to when it comes to
HOPE, LOVE and FAITH and the belief that all is not lost and God
has a plan.
No, We are not alone in this struggle to understand....
... And that brings a great deal of comfort to us Souls.....

New Season.... New Beginnings....

A New Season, New Beginnings, Another Beautiful spring is upon us. With the help of my neighbor, Valeria, I planted a garden this past weekend.  This will be my third consecutive spring garden. Funny how I had no interest in gardening when Gaye was alive. She was never successful in motivating me to assist her in planting flowers around our beautiful home.  These days, in the LGW, (Less Gaye World), I get excited and hopeful about the possibilities of what I can plant and nurture. I guess, there is something to be said about the therapeutic value of toiling in soil and attempting to create beauty, color and growth out of nothingness and dirt. That in itself provides me with a much needed dose of Hopefulness.

I laugh at myself and find myself amazed at how excited I get when it comes to creating a garden. Never in a million worlds, would I have bet I would have become a passionate, albeit extremely clueless lover of soil, plants and landscaping and the beauty it can create.

Love and Beauty are things that ooh so many people take for granted.

It can be found in the simplest of Places, People, Things and Pleasures.  

Before Gaye, I never did see the amount of Love and Beauty

we have in this world.

With this wonderful and beautiful spring season upon me,

I am so thankful for what Gaye has taught me.

She has taught me to how to love...

She has taught me how to dream...

She has taught me how to trust in the lord and have faith.

In absentia, Gaye has also taught to me how to embrace the
fragile beauty of life. 

An Education that came at infinite cost.

 

 

 

(I just wish she would have taught me how to live without her)

Deacon Protecting the yard from an interested Deer.

The Weight of Grief

A very close friend has been visiting me recently. I call Grief a friend, for as much as I Yell -Fight -Scream, Grief is always willing to be at my side through good times and bad. (Lucky Me)  Being the glutton for Punishment, I decided to watch the movie "Rabbit Hole" last night. For those not aware, it is the story of a young couple who loses their child.  Rabbit Hole was an extremely successful Broadway play and with me and my close friend finding nothing to do, wallowing with others in their sadness seemed like a rational albeit morose act with my buddy.

A particular scene describing Grief leaped off the screen and totally hit home on the Grief process....

Becca: Does it ever go away?
Nat: No, I don't think it does. Not for me, it hasn't, and that's goin' on eleven years. It changes, though.
Becca: How?
Nat: I don't know... the weight of it, I guess. At some point, it becomes bearable. It turns into something that you can crawl out from under and... carry around like a brick in your pocket. And you... you even forget it, for a while. But then you reach in for whatever reason and - there it is. Oh right, that. Which could be awful - But not all the time. It's kinda... not that you like it exactly, but it's what you have instead of your son, so you don't wanna let go of it either. So you carry it around. And it doesn't go away, which is...
Becca: What.
Nat: Fine... actually.

Grief is my link to Gaye. I don't want to let go, so I carry it around with me...... and you know what, that actually is fine.

The true value of Friendship reminds us how lucky we are to share the experiences we've encountered.

I thank God everyday for the love of Gaye.

Yep.... I will take Grief as a friend every time...

to remind me....

Our last Vacation together ,
Costa Rica
(Love our matching Haircuts)

I have a Place of Peace within myself. I can find it.

Where?

Where has it Gone, 

that light, that spark,

that love that looked into mine?

What has it to do with that cold clay?

It's here, 

here,

here,

here in my heart.

She is in me,

around me.

Nothing in that clay

-Anzia Yezierska-

The change is astonishing when breath and life depart 

and all there is left are the cremains.

I look at this dust

it is loved, it is revered.

But it is only particles.

No Physical presence that Gaye ever existed.

Where has she gone?

Interpretations differ according to belief and experience.

An epic war I pray endlessly to comprehend.

There is one certainty, I know without a Doubt.

Gaye lives on through the things she has taught me

and in ways that has profound impact in my life.

So, in the weeks, months, years that lie ahead for me

in this Less Gaye Physical World,

I will feel, I will experience, I will love. 

I will encounter Life and think:

"I wonder. Yes maybe that's a part of Gaye living in me."

Perhaps, that is part of the answer....

I will take the Risk of Believing and see where it leads me

"Shall we live in Mystery and yet conduct ourselves

as though everything were known"

- Christopher Fry -

In Grief and Loss, everything has significance.

We look and strive for meaning in what appears to be

random events and wonder what is going on.

In death, nothing makes sense

so we look for meaning anywhere and everywhere

A special song is played at the perfect time.

The Sun breaks through when a loving thought is on Gaye.
A light flickers on Gaye's favorite artwork.

Deacon comes running into my arms at a low point.
Gaye's Chimes ring out with no noticeable wind.

I hear words of faith and encouragement
when I need it most.

Are these events all just coincidences?
Can it be possible that in
the Mysteries of Creation,

the Powers of God,
the Energies that move this Physical World

- Even our Departed Loved One-

are looking out for us?

God I love to think so.

And when I read similar stories about others having the same
Experiences, Senses and Feelings,
My skin tingles - My heart fills with

Hope, Love and Faith.

Yes, it might be so....

There is always room for doubt.

There is also room for Faith and Hope,

That is the Mystery of life.....

Deacon getting Splashed on in Asheville

At the bottom of the well, one can look up and see the sky.

Was she still hovering about the house at home,

the essence of herself,

and were I there would I perceive her presence?

I fought off the mighty yearning to go in search of her,

wherever she was.

For surely she was looking for me, too.

We were ill at ease, always, when apart.

But where are the Pathways?

- Pearl Buck

This quandary presents itself to all who have lost loved ones.

There are times when I look into a starlight night

and wonder:

"Maybe, that is where Gaye is, up there among the stars"

These thoughts are heartbreaking conjectures,

because there are no answers,

no destination this side of death to which

we can travel to find our lost love.

Yet,

sometimes I do feel Gaye's spirit hovering near

Whether it is my own wishful and hopeful  projection

or, in some way,

her spirit actually making a visit.

We have no way of knowing.

I want it to be Gaye

- some contact, some assurance, some validation

of a life beyond our physical shells.

But Oddly enough,

perhaps it doesn't matter a great deal right now to know.

If I am comforted, I need to be grateful for that sense.

And if this presence of the spirit comes

from my own imagination - well,

the creator of life gave me my imagination, too.
-Amen-