I’m different when she’s gone. When she’s here, there’s more hustle in me, knowing she’s in the other room, studying for a test she needs to take for work. When she’s here, I’m smiling under the covers, anticipating the first words from her mouth, “C’mon, let’s go for a walk.” When I come back, I journal. When she’s here, I giggle when one of her five alarms goes off for her morning snack of pumpkin.
There are three weeks of her absence, then she returns from visiting her family in Korea, while dropping our youngest off at a foreign college for a summer semester.
When she’s not here, I stick to my rules and patterns. Journal three pages, bible study, 3 mile ruck, a quick daily workout, ice, shower, go.
At night, after work, another walk , dinner, reading, writing, finish something, have a drink, go to bed.
The only difference is the resistance– my life moves at a slower pace when she’s not in the home. As to what causes the resistance, it could be anything. It could be the loneliness that sets in, that I feel right in the middle of my torso when I think the word “loneliness” into consciousness. It could be my fear of going out to talk with others and be forced into connection, only because connection is necessary. Last, it could be the rehearsal for the worst thing I can imagine , which is life without her, holding hands with the wind, calling it by her name whenever I feel heaven’s breath blow into my blood.