One Year

This morning my Love and I are going to a memorial service. My friend Amy passed away one year ago and was laid to rest this weekend in 2007.

The end of 2006 was personally a very difficult time, and the terminal illness of my friend finally living up to its "terminal" tag made the holidays almost unbearable.

I was in Las Vegas for the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) when things were finalized. My plans had been to leave Las Vegas Friday for Phoenix, as I was to run my first marathon there. Instead, I got the last seat on the first plane out to Chicago for the wake that Friday afternoon.

Thursday evening, two other employees of my company had taken our customer out to dinner and the Celine Dion show. Four engineers fourth row center sipping strawberry daiquiris out of fancy plastic cups. Quite a sight.

The customer wanted to party all night & really let loose so we ended up at a club and then finally he and I sitting together at a $50 minimum blackjack table at the Wynn. This was the smallest bet table we could find during that evening at our hotel.

I won't detail my travails during that evening, but suffice it to say my Italian colleague had to go to his room to bring me $600 cash to keep me afloat. My customer finally left at 3AM, a few hundred dollars up. I hit a lucky streak and even though it appeared to the newly assembled crowd that I was raking it in (like winning over $500 in one hand), I really had just started to climb my way out of the hole I had dug during the last few hours.

I left Las Vegas a few hundred down as I boarded the cab at 4:30AM. Waiting for my ride and travelling companions as I stood in the lobby of the Wynn, I watched a sea of drunken clubbing young men and women making their way back to their rooms, or perhaps like me to their flights. The women with carrying their shoes, the men carrying their women. The somewhat sexy yet seedy side of the strip at sunrise.

I next found myself at 5AM with an enormous crowd of people at the airport. I hadn't slept a wink and could barely stand the sweaty, slow moving crowd. I put my iPod on high volume and tried to drift away, but found no solace in my thoughts.

My Italian colleague was traveling with me, connecting to Europe from Chicago. He pointed out my 180 degree change in complexion, from daring and exciting the evening prior to dour and miserable this morning. I explained to him my situation.

I sat in the back of the plane, trying to sleep, iPod full blast (mostly Celine Dion, by the way), fighting back tears as they streamed from my eyes.

Entering the room at the funeral hall I was bombarded; mourning friends, mourning family, mourning husband and young daughters, pictures all around commemorating Amy's life. And there, at the head of the room, my beautiful friend lying motionless.

A picture came up on the laptop slideshow, Amy and I together with a group at This Run's for Jack 5K running race two years prior, a fundraiser to combat melanoma.

I burst into tears and inconsolable sobbing, which seemed to last through the weekend.

My Therapist says my grief show have subsided in 9 months. Amy's husband, my dear friend Joel, was told he should start dating again in 1 year. I was told to wait one year before introducing a new woman in my life to my children after the divorce.

And yet, I am still saddened to the point of heart sickness by Joel's loss, by our loss of Amy. Joel is not yet dating and I am bringing my Love to the memorial service.

I guess the heart knows not the rules the brain creates.