A Lack of Color

Sorry for the stream of consciousness, all the thoughts swirling around my head need an exit. They are uncooperative and coming out in no particular order.

This is how I feel today. D and I lost a friend yesterday completely unexpected and hard to fathom. An avid astronomer, fabulous drummer and fellow Jet fan. Also a wonderful husband and father. When you hear news like this the world stops for a moment, but maybe it's longer than that. It then starts again but everything is in slow motion. It stays that way for a while then you sleep. The dreams don't help, they are confusing. Did something happen? No everyone is fine. Waking up in a state of confusion praying that was a dream. It wasn't.

Knowing a friend is hurting and unable to make it better leaves you feeling helpless and afraid. These are good people. No, these are great people. Bad things shouldn't happen to great people, not like this.

I was going to post on his wall about Peyton Manning possibly going to the Jets. I didn't. Why didn't I? I want to go back in time. I want to tell them what's about to happen. I want to stop time to stop death. To make everyone happy again.

Then I think of D. He's been working late every night and most weekends trying to meet yet another impossible deadline. I am supportive, this is a wonderful project but I miss him. Now I think of him driving home late and tired. What if something happens to him?

My friend B is now a widow. Strong, confident, conqueror of all things, B has lost her someone. Her support team is strong though. Her family and friends have rallied and are setting up meal deliveries, funds for her young son and around the clock company. This happens when you are great.

When someone you know dies you question mortality. I'm not so concerned about my own, just those around me. If something happened to D I would fall apart. I am not great, I am not a conqueror, I am average at best. I put on a good front but I am not complete without D and K.

Thoughts of bad things pop into my head often (another wonderful side effect of OCD) but I have learned to quell them with logic. The sirens I hear are not headed to K's school, logically I know this. Actually I know this because there would be a phone call.

When confronted by death quelling is not possible. Death is not logical or actual. It is final. There are no shades of gray. There is nothing.

That's not true.

There is something. There is me. Average, upset and desperate to help. I offer myself and become part of the team. Phone calls are made, emails are sent, friends reconnect. Photos and stories are shared on Steve's Facebook page. We are all in shock by this but are now together being strong for B and her young son. Average me, making plans to deliver food and information to other friends.

This isn't about me.

This is also where I lost most of this post. I will go on but not duplicate what I wrote because it came from the heart and my heart is working independently from my brain today.

All around Los Angeles people are wondering what they can do to help, to make the next few weeks a little easier for a friend. She has no idea this is happening. She is home with her son waiting to wake up from this terrible dream. She is now in slow motion and we are all around her conjuring up funny memories of her Steve, filling the universe with happy memories that find their way to her head when it has time to clear.

I need to look for pictures, I have a great one of him giving the finger to my camera after our beloved Jets lost to D's Patriots. I see a color.

Green

I remember their wedding and the way she looked at him. I see another color.

Red


I think of the first time I met their son and his beautiful head of blond hair. I see a color.

Yellow

I think of the stories she told me after they went camping in the hopes of seeing something astronomy related. I see a color.

Purple

I think of many things and see years of happy memories, in every shade and color possible. We are here, keeping these colors for her. Keeping them safe for when she needs them. For their son who will grow up seeing his father in the vivid colors we will paint for him.

There is no lack of color here. There is life, there is love and there is us. Only there is one less of us now. I cannot go back and send that email. I cannot go back and stop time. I cannot change anything. I can merely hold on to these memories and keep our friend alive in my heart and soul.

“In our life there is a single color, as on an artist's palette, which provides the meaning of life and art. It is the color of love.”

We have that in abundance.