Loss

What coffee I am drinking just doesn’t matter today.

My friend Trish died this week.  Trish and I met in college in 1987.  We were instant friends.  We spent a huge amount of time together and we got ourselves into trouble more than once.

One of my favorite memories is the time we house sat for someone.  We made a HUGE batch of spaghetti and drank way too much wine.  We sang and danced well into the night. We both woke up the next morning lying in the living room floor.  What happened next?  We laid there for another hour laughing.

Trish was the Maid of Honor at my first wedding.  Trish was also the witness for Luis and I when we married in New York City.

Funny story about that…Trish had lost her site.  So, she was our blind witness.  None of us thought anything of that until the clerk at City Hall took exception to the fact that our witness was blind.  I had quite the time explaining to the clerk what “witness” meant.  Eventually the head clerk of the city ruled that Trish could, in fact, witness our ceremony.  What happened next?  Like so many years before, we spent an hour laughing.

Trish was laughter. You couldn’t be in her presence and not have a good laugh.

We sent each other wildly inappropriate text messages.  And we talked on the phone every year on our wedding anniversary.  We had most recently talked about what we would do when Luis and I got back to New York City.

And now she is gone.  She died alone, from COVID-19 complications.

The loss I feel is huge.  The world is just less interesting without her.  My life is less fun without her.  My story changes because she is gone.

I know that I will heal…I know that I will transition to a focus on memories…but right now, it is just loss.  And I am feeling it all through way through my body and soul.

The Coffee Break today was a downer…but it just where I am today.

Just sayin’