Sitting expressionless on the edge of the sinkhole that just swallowed my life, staring into the abyss, without clear emotion, just static, deaf brain fuzz. I’m thinking… I’ve been here once before. this moment of confusion and disbelief, a moment when shit becomes real, yet it feels like it’s happening in an alternate universe and to someone else…. a moment of amputation and final separation, a moment when life, the way you knew it just few seconds ago, permanently seizes to exist.
Usually, when you hear someone fall or have an accident, it is often immediately followed by a yell, a scream, a moan, or call for help.
But, when you hear a dreadful fall, behind a porch wall, and a locked door, and while you run for the keys to rip that door open, to reach the love of your life, when there is no sound, no commotion, no sign of struggle coming from the other side of the wall, only cold, eery, blood freezing silence… that is the moment when your mind’s worst case scenario pushes it’s way through everything. And while you fight with every conscious nerve ending in your brain to suppress it, your heart cramps up and prepares for what is to become the most ominous day, and the most life altering moment. It was the moment when my love, my sweet honey exited our lives.
That day was the last time I have seen my husband’s incredible whole-face smile and his giant blue eyes. It was the last time I kissed his shaved head, hugged him tight and the last time I tasted his delicious chocolate raspberry pancakes. He went to his last jazz guitar class. He delivered water-shoes to our daughter at the pool, he kissed and hugged her sweetly, he never missed an opportunity to show her how much he adored her, he sent me air kisses and smiled at me from the parking lot, one last time, and then inexplicably and dramatically exited our lives in 3 seconds real time, but in what for me keeps playing over and over endlessly, in 33 1⁄3 rpm, vinyl, inscribed with agonizing “moments in hell” by Art of Stillness.
I wish I could say that there was something useful going through my head in those horrific moments, I wish I could say that I was hoping, wishing, even praying for a happy ending to the unbelievably painful sight of my husband, my best friend, the love of my life, laying lifeless on the ground beneath the stairs, gripping tightly onto a peace of porch railing in his hand. My throat, instantly dried out by the tangerine size noodle, making me feel intensely nauseous, I could not breathe well, what ever passed by the tangerine, were all the breaths that I took. And sadly, the only thing that ran through my brain screaming and hollering, and only thing that rolled of my lips rapidly squealing, was WTF! WTF! WTF! WTF! WTF!
If I put my head down to the edge of the opening of the abyss, that selfishly ripped 15 full years of life from me, and I close my eyes, I can still recognize glimpses of characters, the full spectrum of human nature, good, bad and very, very ugly, and bring them into bright, crisp mind’s display. I see glimpses of paramedics, who scanned my comatose husband’s debit card, and made purchases in Florida, nurses who, despite their best effort failed to conceal their lack of hope, I see over the top, phoney Organ Donation coordinator, with an eager pen, patronizing, indifferent resident doctors who looking at my blank, confused stare, after 12 days of watching my love struggle to survive, practically yelled at me “It’s over, do you understand? Mrs. K, do you understand?! I remember neighbors, people who turned from friends, into evil villains and bullies, overnight, just because I consulted an attorney, I see insurance companies, sleazy personal injury attorneys, experts, I see damned faulty construction that took a life, our whole life.
As I finger draw my love’s smiley face in the dirt, next to the sink hole that took him away, I gather my strength to stand up and brush specks of dust out of my hair, I count on my fingers how many more days I have left before the second anniversary of the accident, before the statute of limitations expires, before I am ready to stop hanging around this hole, pacing tensely, biting my bottom lip, and before I walk away from it, officially and for good.
The hole offered no answers, of course. No sound, no motion, only hollow darkness. The answers aren’t there, they never were. Trust me, I know… I looked long and hard. They are here on the surface, with me, in the bright light, in real time. He is with me…. Our life together is with me. All the love and laughs we shared, all the meals we cooked, all the amazing conversations we had, our precious daughter, the human product of our love, pulling on my skirt impatiently, and all of the positive, loving, caring, generous people who watched over me, who sustained and preserved my sanity, and gave me no option but to stay awake, the ones who bring endless love, laughter, joy and inspiration, are all here, with me. And the future, in the distance looks technicolor!
Categories: Love and Lore
Tags: accident, death, family, friendship, grief, loss, love, sink hole
spacegoons blog 
Reblogged this on spacegoons blog and commented:
Today I am missing my sweet love.
I gave him one last squeeze and said goodbye on this day, two years ago.
I will forever love you, Rob Keenan, you were the best man, husband and father, I have ever met.
❤ U 4Eva cushy!