Car rides

 Hey Kerr,

I’ve been thinking about you even more lately.  But it hasn’t been all awesome.  The day you died has been replaying a lot in my head.  Usually it happens when I am driving, and I’ve been in the car more lately than probably in the entire past year.  The girls started preschool (omg they’re so cute & growing so quickly) and so I drive them back and forth and work has been picking up, etc.  I think car rides make my brain replay that day because I was in Mac’s car when I found out you died...

Mac got me.  I asked who was it.  He said you.  I begged him to tell me what happened but he wouldn’t.  Dad told him not to so all he said was ‘call your dad’.  Dad told me, while choking back tears, you died.  I wonder if he remembers that moment or even that he’s the one who told me.  Your brain has a funny way of forgetting things so it can protect itself.  My brain forgot Allan’s funeral.  It only came rushing back to me once when I re-entered the room his service was in.  It happened with your funeral, too.  I forgot where your funeral took place until I was back there for Matt’s Grandma and had a panic attack.  

Being the bearer of bad news sucks.  Because now, you’re a key part of that persons terrible story.  I hate that I’m the one who told Andrew you were gone.  I’ll never forget it.  Never.  What he said.  The room we were in.  The walk down the hall.  The car ride home.  It’s not that I’m mad I’m the one who told him or Issac or being with Steve to tell Simon & Zion.  I just hate that I’m the one in their memory of how they found out.  But maybe it’s that I’m just mad it had to be told... that it happened at all.

Today’s car ride replay was of when Allan died. That day I jumped into action and knew it was the time Andrew had to get picked up from camp.  He went to camp at the JCC.  The girls go to school at the JCC.  Different ones, but still... so as I pulled out of the parking lot today, my brain went to when I was pulling out from the parking lot on July 9, 2004.

When I find my mind spiraling down the events of November 21, 2014, I tell it to think of other things.  I try to do my best to divert my brain away from remembering all of the terrible moments ... calling Natalie and Ilyssa while I waited for a mac to get me... knowing nothing and yet knowing something terrible had happened.  The drive which seemed like it took forever.  The walk down the halls of Glenbrook hospital to find the ER.  The woman saying ‘I’m sorry’ when I told her who I was there for.  Collapsing to the ground.  The list of memories go on.  The tinges of moments.  But instead of thinking of those, I try to make a list and replay the good times.  Where does my mind go when I try to think of you (and not the day you died):

Mrs Doubtfire | the day you came home from Hawaii engaged | the bridal suite we got ready in for your wedding | you singing ‘the piña colada song’ in Italy | you hitting Issac at China chef | you singing in your Escalade | laughing hysterically in Vegas about gelato | sitting on the floor of the great room in Lincolnwood playing with baby Andrew | texting you while I was in the hospital in Spain | holding you hostage while I was in the hospital after my surgery | living with you and the nights we’d make cookies or get red mango | texting about you’ve got mail, my best friends wedding & sleepless in Seattle | getting my wedding dress | the first time you took me for a manicure | the first time you took me for an eyebrow wax | all of the care packages you sent to me at college | the killers - specifically ‘human’ | ‘walk 1000 miles’ | REM ‘stand’ | anything by that 80s singer... you know the one | Sophie b Hawkins ‘as I lay me down to sleep’ | Lance’s 30th birthday and me getting you drunk for the first time | your vanilla scented hugs | laughing so hard at Dad washing his phone again | swearing |

I love you.  I miss you.

XO

Happy Valentine’s Day