KT Man,
I find myself looking for you in each day and reflecting on you after each day. Yesterday. And the days just roll on, one after the other. Each day suspended: The day as it should be with you among us and as it is, with you as a memory. Fifty days ago. No going back. Images are difficult and conversations impossible, both suspended.
Our refrigerator is like all refrigerators: pictures on magnets. Images. Family in various formations. Events. Graduations. Gatherings. The images stare out with such love and movement. But they aren’t. They’re frozen. Captured and momentary. Your smile so beautiful. Your gist so present. Life on your sleeve. We can’t move them and yet can’t look at them.
Your celebration of life suspended between Day 26 and now today. The pictures assembled to remember you are now in boxes for storage. Brought out for solace but so painful knowing now what we didn’t know then. When the picture was taken. So haphazardly placed with no idea in mind. So the pictures and images are suspended between knowing. Differently interpreted now.
Conversations hover just above the planning field. Gracefully suspended by next steps. Quietly discussed with you slightly present but on the side. Estates. Work. Plugging back in. Keeping the machine going. Financing. Planning. My replacement so vital but begging the question what then? Not so much for me, but others.
The day seems suspended between these two realities carried by images and conversations. What once was a gift for writing now troubled with words. Carrying them around to reflect the images and convey the conversation. Using the rules of language and convention to bridge the suspension of knowing. Your beautiful smile always present: “Smile: It’s the best part of the day.” Your gift for bringing others into conversations: “Listening and respect are two sides of the same coin.”
So today’s like every other day. Suspended and looking. Quietly seeing you somewhere. Among us. An image. In a word. A conversation. Suspended between dreams and the day as it rolls out. Hoping one day the disbelief will turn to belief. In something. Anything. But for today, not yet.
We love you bud. But it hurts not to have you in our life. We will keep you in our dreams.
JT Man