I Thought I Had Time

Dear Aaron,

I've been cleaning out my closet. You know, all those clothes that I wasn't ready to get rid of, in spite of the fact that they're not my size and/or style any more. Plus the stuff I've just tossed in there to deal with later.

Well, it was time. And mostly, it was just fine, except trying to find the time to do it.

But then I came across a bag...

It was the bag I put things in when we came home. Came home without you.

I found the lights that you were given for your hospital room. The lights that I meant to put up that night but ran out of time before going home to see Daddy on our anniversary. The lights I was too tired to put up when I got back. No problem, I'll just put them up in the morning, but morning never came for you. 

I found the socks I bought because we were always losing socks in the bedding.

I found the leg warmers I ordered because when you came all the way off the sedation we would need something to keep you from pulling your PICC line out. Holding those soft little perfectly new articles of clothing broke me all over again.

They are all still here.

Brand new.

Never worn...

Never used.

And you are not.

I thought I had time.

It truly did not cross my mind that you would leave, not my conscious mind anyway.

I thought I had time.

Today I put out fall flowers and leaves at your grave. I decorated your grave instead of thinking of a Halloween costume and hoping it would be warm enough for you to go out trick-or-treating. 

I thought I had time.

I was wrong.

I miss you so much.

Love,
Mama

"Time, the Heraclitean river — so painfully real to the heart, so unseizable for the brain."

~Percival Arland Ussher