Funny ol' thing, life...

Loreene, I miss you.

I found out about your death today, almost a month and a half after. I Google'd your name, and there was the obituary I copied in the previous post. You might ask why I'd copy it, and I'd answer:

Because newspaper obituaries come and go. If I'd waited a few more days, I might not have found it. And I want people to find it. People who knew you. People who loved you. People who might have fallen out of close contact with you. People who went on about their lives, assuming that because you were so young, they had plenty of time to write or call and see what you were up to.

People like me.

People who other people might not know to notify.

We had always done the "you dead?" emails, usually when I got busy at work and didn't have time to check my e-mail. The last time I got mail from you was in May, and ironically, it still had the "you dead?" subject line. I've replied to that email twice since then, checking on you. I can't begin to imagine what kind of sick joke the poor guys at your company thought I was pulling, if they saw that mail. I think you'd think that was hilarious, and if I wasn't missing you so much, I'd probably agree.

I don't know what made me pick today to check. I don't know what thought process said, "hey, she hasn't emailed back in a really long time, maybe you should google her and see if something happened." That's a joke. We both know what I was googling for. Hospital admissions don't show up that way. But obituaries do.

You know, the sack of hammers that hits you when you read a memorial for someone you love doesn't get any softer when you know you're half-expecting it.

You were my only fan here. You kept coming back, day after day, checking to see if I'd updated this piss-poor window on my life. You were my sounding board, my voice of reason, my cheerleader and my confessor. While there may be things I didn't tell you, there wasn't anything I couldn't tell you.

I don't pray alot anymore, but I pray you've gone to the reward you deserve. Life might have knocked you around, but you took it all with a grin, and a belief in better tomorrows that never failed to inspire me.

Damn, I'm going to miss you, darlin'.