Kissed by love

For Christmas Mom and Dad gave me a small pewter wind chime to hang in a window come spring so I can hear you talk to me.  As it is winter I have it hanging on a nail in the door to the living room so I have yet to hear it ring on it's own.

It is of an Angel inside a heart suspended from a flowing ribbon, it is all in pewter and it is engraved.  It says

A GIFT FROM HEAVEN

I am more than a memory

you will feel our love grow

I am forever your angel

Some things you just know.

For today I can share

that in heaven above

God's taken my hand,

I am complete,

I am love.

DAVID

1964-2013

Yesterday I walked by it and said out loud "pretty soon I will move you to a window where you belong, then I will hear you sing."    Yes, I know, it is weird that I talk to inanimate objects...but if I didn't I would have no reason to use my voice most days, and yes, I am that much alone here.

Just now, after vacuuming, I came in here to move the coffee table back where it belongs and as I sat down the wind chime chimed!  I turned to look at it and the little chimes were swaying and singing.  What?!?  I walk past it 50 times a day and never once, in the month it has been hanging there, has it chimed.  NOT ONCE!

Some things you just know...and I know that you just kissed me with love.

I miss you so big baby.  

Thank you

Then there was you

I'm in another low.  Ever since the new calendar was hung on it's nail I seem to have crashed. Will I ever get used to this ride?  I should be used to it after a year and a half, but I'm really not. 

I was driving home from the grocery store on the 1st and suddenly started crying.  I feel so removed from you and the reality of it all slammed into my head, as it does from time to time.  I cried that I haven't had a sign from you in so long and I kept saying 'I need to see you, I need to see you, I just need to see you'.  It's been four or five months since anything really struck me as a message from you.

I pulled into the yard and parked, sat for a minute gathering the strength to carry my purchases up the long flight of stairs, then got out of the car.  The very first thing I noticed was the very distinct call of Mr. C, your bird.  The bird that for me represents a visit from you.  I frantically looked around until I spotted him and I smiled and laughed through my tears.  You came.  You finally came to see me and just mere minutes after I was begging to see you.  

You have no idea how dumbstruck I was.  How do you do that?  I look out the window almost every day looking for Mr. C but he's never here anymore.  He's always been here and suddenly he was just gone.  

And then you came.  Thank you babe, I am so very blessed to have you.

Mr. C

The alarm went off at 6:30 and when I opened my eyes I was humming the song 'Just When I Needed You Most'.  I have no idea where that came from, don't think I have heard it in 30 years. I know it was from my dream which left me the minute my eyes opened but I was still singing it.

I climbed out of bed and for some reason pulled back the curtains and opened the blinds in our bedroom...something I have not really done since you left.  And there looking directly into the window at me was one lone beautiful bright red Cardinal, your bird, you called him Mr. C.  

Hi Baby.

The Lock Post is Out!

Inside the last week of July I asked my David to send me a very specific 'sign', one that I had yet to see within this old house of ours.  One he had seen, and our daughter had seen when I am away from here for an extended period, but I had never in our 2 years of living here.  I wanted him to show me the old fashioned lock posts in the 'out' position like he had always claimed happened.  

I never got that answered...what I got instead...or so I thought was a week of hearing his name in just about every single show that I saw on t.v. that week.  As though letting me know he heard me, he's listening, he made his name be the predominant one in every random show I watched. I'm always so amazed by the messages he sends me, I'm always so proud of him for them.

Okay...so, it is 2 weeks later, it is August 12th...a Monday...it is another day in a month of days that I find that I am just not coping well.  I find that the pain is worsening, not getting better.  The visions have returned full force and they are more difficult to shake.  My heart is heavier and my breathing is getting so bad that I find myself sitting forward and gasping for air as if suddenly it dawned on me..."I'm not breathing".  UGH!  I have to do something, this can't go on, I don't want to do this anymore, I want my husband so desperately, I want my life, I want what we had...it was not perfect, but it was ours.  We built it and I loved it, all of it...the good the bad and the ugly.  I want my husband, and I want my friend.  I want to wake up from this freaking damn nightmare. PLEASE.  So,  I sign up and make a commitment to a 7 week bereavement boot camp.  It's a small step, but at least it is a step forward rather than backward.  I have my marching orders for this first week.  Reading, affirmations and a challenge.  I'm on my way!  This is a significant day.

It's 11pm and I head to the bathroom to brush my teeth, when I shut the door behind me I hear a solid thud.  I turn to look to see what just happened and am rendered motionless, speechless...the post inside the door is in the 'out' position!  I'm just staring at it, I can't move, all I can do is look and look and look.  I do not believe it.  I'm suspicious.  Someone is really messing with me and I'm not believing what I am seeing.  I run to my daughter's room and ask her if she left the 'lock post out'...what post, where? she asks.  I say "Gillian, the lock for the bathroom door, it's out...did you do that."  "Oh...No, remember when we started eating I went in there and came out and started to say something to you but then said I'll tell you later...that was it.  I saw that when I went in but didn't fix it because I wanted you to finally see it for yourself because we always told you about it and you kept saying 'well I never see it'...so humph."   She has no idea the significance of this for me, so I tell her.  With a tear in her eye she says to me "he's here mom, he heard you."  I just back out of her room and go into mine and lie down and mull this whole thing over, she swears she didn't do it, she saw it too.  I said if I saw it I would NEVER doubt his signs, his messages...but even this one might just be too much for me.  

I turn out the light and go to sleep thinking to myself that this HUGE sign has to be David's way of telling me he knows of the boot camp, he knows of my struggles and he wants me to know he is here with me through it all.

I choose to believe.

I love you my boyfriend, my husband, my David.  Oh how I do.

See you in my dreams...

I had a dream and you were there.  

I was sitting on a bar stool in a house...bad vibes everywhere.  

You walked through the door, came to me, looked me directly in the face and into my eyes and very strongly and determinedly said "I love you baby."  My first thought was that you stood out clearly and vividly  while the rest of the picture looked as though seeing it through a filter. My response to you was..."then why the rest of this scenario?  This is all wrong, this is not you, what is happening here, why is this all playing out like this?"  The rest was not good for me, it was not real, and I believe it was more a riddle or a skit playing out some of my feelings from when I'm awake.

Since you've been gone I have gone through every imaginable emotion, none sits with me long...an hour tops.  But they have come,  and there are a few that come by a lot...defensiveness, betrayal and manipulation.  Sounds weird, I know, especially under the circumstances but they come on with a vengeance at times and eat at my psyche.  I know our truth though, only we do.  Anyone else that believes they have you, me or us figured out is wrong...they were not here, they are not us, they were not involved in our GREAT MANY conversations...they do not know.  We do and that is all that matters here.

The underlying feeling of the dream was none of this is real it is some kind of riddle and the rest of my time inside this altered state was spent connecting the dots and cracking the code.  I believe it all was your way of showing me you can hear me, you know what is on my mind and you are letting me know that we are together in my thinking.  That is why you approached me 'clearly' at the onset with such determination, to say 'I love you'.  To give me the power to get through the rest knowing full well it was not real, obviously, but a message.

Well I figured out the context and confirmed my thoughts with dream interpretations...long story short...the meaning in a nutshell: 

• To dream of love or being in love suggests intense feelings carried over from a waking relationship. It refers to your contentment with what you already have and where you are in life. 
• To dream of your lost love represents an idealistic relationship. 
• To dream that you are abandoned suggests that it is time to leave behind past feelings and characteristics that are hindering your growth. Let go of your old attitudes. A more direct and literal interpretation of this dream indicates you have a fear of being deserted, abandoned, or even betrayed. It may stem from a  recent loss or a fear of losing a loved one. The fear of abandonment may manifest itself into your dream as part of the healing process and dealing with losing a loved one. It may also stem from unresolved feelings or problems from childhood. Alternatively, the dream indicates that you are feeling neglected or that your feelings are being overlooked.
• To dream that you have been betrayed represents your suspicions about a particular person, relationship or situation.  This dream often occurs when you are having feelings of insecurity and are faced with major commitments in your life at the same time.
• To dream that someone has betrayed you indicates self-pity. You are feeling sorry for yourself

So, there it is I guess.  Even though the betrayal and abandonment was more on your behalf, meaning you've been betrayed, abandoned, it has had a HUGE affect on me and it is something I have been struggling with since your funeral service.  The effects of which I still feel to this day, every day.  

I suppose all of this was your way of telling me it is time for me to put on my big girl panties, put past feelings behind me, let old attitudes go and stop feeling sorry for myself and get on with the healing.  Well shit David a simple 'I love you...now get over yourself' would have sufficed!  

Anyways, thank you for such a clear pronouncement.  Message received.

And babe...I love you too.

The name...David

This last week of July/first week of August was a difficult one for me.  For some reason I just felt very down and defeated.  Maybe, with the distance of time, I know I am being carried further and further away from my love.  Maybe I am fighting my way out of denial and un-acceptance, emotionally kicking and screaming into the dawn of reality and I HATE IT, who knows.

I'm not a big television person.  I do not turn it on throughout the day until evening, and then it's to sit back and relax and watch the same shows I did with my husband.  Some funny, some repeates, whatever...it's just comfortable and familiar to me.

This week I saw  many shows...Paranormal Witness, Chopped, House Hunters International, Undercover Boss, Big Bang Theory, Rules of Engagement, Hoarders, Long Island Medium, Restraunt Stakeout, Bar Rescue etc etc etc.  Fascinating, right?!?  It's a grande life, but someone has to live it...

Anyway, this past week, this difficult past week, on each show I watched the featured person of each and every show had the name David.  There was not one show I saw that the main person of the episode was not named David...not Dave, but David.  I heard it every time, but it wasn't until part way through the week that I realized it was a sign meant just for me, from the love of my life.  

You see, at the beginning of the week I sat here crying and I picked out a VERY specific thing that, if he made it happen, I would never ever doubt in signs again no matter how small.  If he did this one thing I would forever be a believer.  It has not happened yet.   

We live in the top floor of a VERY old, 1895,  Bell Mansard Victorian, and David used to say he always felt scared to go into our Master closet...the hairs on the back of his neck would stand up every time he went in.  Also, whenever I was away traveling, he and our daughter would say that the old 'post' locks would always be in the 'out' position.  Noone ever really even uses them and to do so you have to physically turn the knob to make the post come out of the door.  For some reason when I am home it doesn't happen, but when I am gone they both swear it ALWAYS happens.  This...this is what I asked of my husband...the sign I wanted to see...make the posts be in the out position like you used to claim.  Do that and I will forever believe.

It has not happened, the posts remain tucked inside the door where they belong...but maybe that is because 'another' has control over that trick...maybe the ghost of the founding owner of this beautiful old home,  who died in his kitchen here on the first floor...knowing this, my husband did the only thing he could think to do and that was to have his name plastered on every single show I watched in a weeks time.  David, David, David, not Dave as he was known by those of his former life, but David as was spoken by me, and those in his new life...his name, David, was spoken every single day inside of this house through the voices of the television.

That's good enough for me...

The Penny

We've been home from Arkansas now for a week.  There is no food in the house so I guess it's time to hit the market.  Once inside the store the sky opens up and the floodgates are let loose. It is raining so hard everyone in the store is looking out the windows at the their car...way out there in the rain.  Crap!

I finish my list and hit the register...as usual I let several 2, 3, 4 item people cut in front of me. My good deed for the day...I'm bagging my own items while the cashier is ringing up a man who was behind me.  I can hear that he has come up short on money for his items, not much, but even if it is a penny it is horrifying when it is you that it happens to.  I immediately reach in my wallet and give the cashier what she needs and the man just looks at me and his eyes and his mouth say 'Thank You'.  I tell him it was my pleasure and go back to what I was doing.  He leaves.

Now it is my turn to brave the rapids which once was a parking lot.   And me being me...I parked as far away as I could.  My only form of exercise these days.  I start to run but one step out from under the overhang and I realize that is pointless, so I shrug my shoulders burst out laughing and walk to my car.  I use the word 'soaked' lightly...I am drenched!  And it is very funny to me.  I notice a little older man running with his one bag to his truck as I turn to place my first bag in the trunk...when I look up he is standing at my cart and handing me one bag at a time for me to put inside.  I thank him so many times it is now silly.  I am so struck that this gentleman is willing to get 'drenched' with me just so he can help me.  I feel very very happy and light inside.   We are done...I thank him and he leaves.  I go put the cart back where it belongs and start running back to my car and it is there right in front of me...a brand new shiny penny...just for me. I will believe this is David letting me know he sent the help just when I needed it most.  

I am a lucky girl and I adore my husband.

The heart

At this point,  late July, it has been some time since I've had a sign from my love.  At least any big ones that is.  I have had several small moments when I catch a little glimmer of something and just automatically say "Hi babe".  They could be real, they could just be me wishing.  The ones I write about here are the grand gestures that there is just no denying due to the timing and the circumstances leading up to them.  They are real and you only have to open your heart and your eyes and see to believe.

Summer is when I return to where I lived most recently, before meeting David again.  I return with my daughter to Arkansas to spend many weeks with family and my son who still lives there. It is a time that my husband looks forward to every year because he uses his vacation time and we drive down together along with one of his sons, as a family.  It's a long ride, the kids usually aren't too thrilled, but they have the end destination to ease the pain of it.  This year was going to be a little different...My David wasn't going to be able to make the trip with us.  As much as he wanted to it just wasn't in the bank account for 2 return flight tickets for he and his son.  So that meant neither would come.  In the end, the way life worked, the children and I did make the trip along with David's cremains.  In the end we all got to go.

This summer the trip was only 2 weeks long and on the ride back to Rhode Island just after getting on the road the two kids fell asleep, leaving me alone with my thoughts and my tears. The loss of David is just so huge and painful that I find I cry at the drop of a pin. So this morning, driving, I cried hard and silent, and when I was done I spoke out loud 'I want a sign David, I want to see a heart.  I need this today baby."  Of course immediately I think, I'm driving 12 hours, where the heck am I going to see a heart...ah, the clouds!  So up I look...is that one? No...there? Maybe, no.  I give it a rest and concentrate on driving. Ultimately I forget all about the hunt for the heart and about an hour later on my right a white Toyota Corola pulls past me and I shift my eyes in time to see a HUGE heart drawn in the dirty rear window.  I look back in my lane then almost drive off the road when what my eyes just saw reaches my brain.  A HEART!!!   I am floored, and I am in awe.  This beautiful husband of mine, who is so new to this 'spirit' life of his never ceases to amaze me with the 'signs' he sends me.  It is the only heart I have seen since that very moment.  I asked for it and he gave it to me.  How truly amazing and how truly lucky am I...