Six years ago

Six years. I can't believe it's been six years. Sometimes I think about you so much that whole days are spent wondering where you are, wondering if I'll see you again one day... I wonder what your life would be like. Would you have a son? Would he have your eyes? Six years. It's a long time.

You really don't know how much your absence has left me stumbling around blind. In six months, we would have been married for six years. At least I like to think we would have been married that long, longer still. I like to imagine that you never left for Iraq. I like to pretend that didn't happen sometimes. It doesn't change it. It doesn't change that six years ago, you left. That six years ago, today, was the last time I saw your face. I try to pretend that didn't happen. And maybe in some reality it didn't. But in this one... I can't forget.

I remember the news. I felt like my heart had been ripped out and you had taken every ounce of happiness with you. I don't remember much after the Chaplain's eyes met mine. I became aware of a vast emptiness in my life. You were gone and this stranger, this man telling me that you were in a better place, stood in front of me. How could that be true when I wasn't with you, I thought. How could you be somewhere better when you'd told me the best place was with me? I couldn't think, I couldn't focus. The loss was all around me, the pain was constant and excruciating. I'd lost the first boy I'd ever loved. The boy I'd planned to marry. The boy who had kissed me first, who had given me my first valentine's day gift, who danced with me at a dance first. I'd lost the first boy who had touched my heart and soul and body. When I lost you, everything changed.

I remember when you were ten years old. Do you? Do you recall the first time we met? I was seven and scrawny and thought I was every match to you. You got mad when I did better at a race and pushed me down into the mud. Over the years things would change. We went from two kids who fought to two teenagers in young love. On your 18th birthday, you told me you were enlisting in the Marine Corps. I remember the fear I felt at that moment. I wasn't old enough to keep a Marine happy, only 15 and not nearly experienced enough. I hadn't even given you my body yet but you promised no pressure and you meant it. You waited nearly two more years. 

Your graduation was such a wonderful day. Your mother was so proud of you. She kept leaning over and whispering "That's my son! Can you believe it?" Her very own Hero son. I remember looking at you in your uniform for the first time and thinking "wow, this works." I remember your confident smile, it was so different than the one you had before the Marines trained you. You were no longer awkward or clumsy.

The following summer we went to your Dad's wedding and sat at the wedding party table. I didn't know anyone, not even your Dad but you said it wasn't important, they didn't know you, so knowing me wasn't a priority. I will never forget the pain in your eyes when you said that. That was our last summer together.

The day you were buried was the hardest day of my life until that point, in fact, it may be one of the hardest days I've ever gone through. I sat next to your mother, on the same side I sat when we first saw you become a Marine. I held her hand and this time there was no excitement. I think we were both so hallowed out and our strength was gone... I remember trying to stand, to put my hand on your casket one more time, I felt so weak. And now six years later, I feel a flash of pain, 100 times less great and it still hurts beyond what I ever expected.

Things are different now. The life that we were meant to live ended with you. The memories you gave me are mine. And you taught me so many important lessons... I learned so much about love and life and pain of loss from you...

I am with a good man. He's a Soldier, an officer, so different from you. I love him very much and he makes me feel like I matter more than anyone else. It took me a long time to get here. But he doesn't know your name. I'm not even sure I've really told him about you. I know I have mentioned you once or twice but you are mine. To me, your name, your face, our love, those are mine... I covet your memory on quiet rainy days and think about you. I miss you and a part of my heart, the only part that didn't break the day you died, the part that holds all the times before, all the whispered first love moments, still loves you with the power that could fly men to the moon. <3 I miss you. And I hope I'm making you proud..

Six years... how did so much time pass? 

I love you. Semper fi.