A Letter to My Husband in Heaven...

Hi baby,

Wow.  You've been gone 2 years.  I literally woke up crying this morning.  I took two Xanax to sleep last night, hoping it would help with my mood upon waking, but it didn't.

How have you been gone two year babe?  How?  I mean, you were literally just here it feels like.  I can see your face.  I can hear your smile.  I just pressed play on the last voice recording I have of you on my cell phone.  It is of your outgoing message on your cell.  My gosh, I miss your voice.

Baby, I can't believe you're not here.  I can't believe this is my life and Conner's life and you are missing it.

Oh this child of ours....he's gonna give me so many grey hairs.  I NEED you here to help me with him.  I NEED you to help me get through the days.  I NEED your hand to hold and your lips to kiss. I NEED your voice to tell me it's going to be ok and that you love me.  I am so scared he's going to end up like you: dead before he should be.  I am so scared of all the accidents he has, and let me tell you about those.  I am definitely paying for your raising, baby.  Aye aye aye....  He thinks he knows it all!!!  Just like you! lol...  Seriously though, I can't tell him anything because he thinks he already knows it all and is not careful at all.  It reminds me of all the stupid accidents you had over the years, whether it was dropping a gate or a trailer on you somehow, stabbing yourself with a dirty terribly huge cattle needle while working cows, wrecking before we began because your sadness and guilt pushed you to drinking too much, and so much more.

I think about the last accident you had before you died, the one that ended you up in the ER at Mountain View with two broken fingers.  Conner and I were in the ER last week with his knife injury...stabbed himself with your knife while whittling a piece of wood...and we were in the exact same room as you were.  We of course cried as soon as we realized it.  I noticed it first and tried to just ignore it, but it took him a few minutes to realize it was your room and when he did, the poor nurse didn't know what to think.

I was so mad about that freaking concrete plant and that accident just confirmed my hate for it. I remember when you decided you wanted to buy it and you knew I was beyond mad.  You even asked me as we stood in the kitchen together with our cups of coffee, "if I buy this will you still be here?"  I told you maybe this one more time but you had to stop somewhere. You either had to give up the MRWA job and do concrete and dirt work plus manage a few wastewater plants, or you had to quit all of that and just go back to MRWA.  I told you that day something had to change or you were going to kill yourself.  It was too much.  I knew it. Everyone around us knew it.  But you didn't.  And so you died at that freaking plant two years ago today.

I almost surprised you with lunch that day.  Conner and I almost brought you food and thought about just spending the day at the plant watching you, helping you, playing in the gravel piles he loved to climb on.  I feel so guilty about not going.  I wish we had because maybe I would have seen you slip and could have helped you.  I'm so angry that you were alone. I should have been there.  Someone should have been there.

Or you shouldn't have gone.  I knew you didn't feel well that day, so why did you go??? Why didn't you stay home and rest?  I would have cooked for you and it would have been a great day to lay on the couch with our son and watch movies with him. Or to lay in the floor and play with his gazillion Matchbox cars that you two loved to crash into each other.  You should have stayed home that day.  I should have begged you.

My gosh I miss your arms wrapped around me.  I miss so much the way you used to come up behind me while I was standing at the mirror getting ready for work.  I miss the way you would rest your head on my left shoulder and we would look into each other's eyes via the mirror ahead.  You would say, "my gosh, you are beautiful baby, you make me wanna kck-kck."  That was your noise you'd make...lol...to mean you wanted me... totally inappropriate for my blog probably but I'm writing a letter to you so who cares.

I miss how proud you were to be seen with me and how proud you were of me.  You always told me that.  You told me that about taking pictures.  You told me that about teaching.  You told me that about singing...well only like twice because you usually got mad and said, "I don't know why you have to get on stage with those boys and shake your a** for everyone else."  Well ding-dong, in case you didn't know, I was doing that for YOU.  I wanted you to be proud of me.  I never wanted to disappoint you, in all our 13 years together, I never once wanted to disappoint you.

I miss the way you complimented every meal I cooked.  Your boy has taken after you on that.  It's so sweet.  He'll tell me, "oh this is good momma...dad sure would have liked this."  You used to tell me how good everything I cooked was.  Even the first time I actually cooked a full meal at my rental house when we were just freshly dating.  My stupid oven, do you remember it?  That ridiculous thing!  It didn't work right with the temperature setting on bake, so while I had it set at 350 degrees to bake the chicken parmesan, it actually was at like 500 degrees!  My alarm started going off and you walked in with me standing below the alarm, waving a towel to try to get it to shut up, crying like an idiot, and already apologizing profusely for disappointing you.  But remember what you did?  You smiled, opened a window and said, "babe...it'll be ok!  We can just scrape off the black stuff!"  I mean, that was love right there! lol...

I miss so much about you, babe.  And I miss so much about being happy.  And our home...it is beautiful and perfect and I've made the little adjustments to it you always wanted done but didn't want to spend the money to do.  But, even in all it's perfectness, it is so lonely.  It gets so silent.  I miss the thud of your steps that used to make me so mad.  You never could just walk somewhere.  It was like you were on "go" every step of every day... a man on a million missions.  It used to make me mad because you literally stomped through the house and would wake me up.  But, boy what I would give to hear your stomps again.

Michael, you gave me the best years of my life.  You gave me 13 years of fighting, loving, growing, learning, and creating a family.  I wouldn't trade one second of any of it, except the second you took your last breath.  I want to thank you baby for all that you gave me while you were here.  Our son is the most important thing.  So, I am trying to live.  I've been having better days lately. I've been feeling a positive change ahead.  I just know things are going to turn around for us.  Please don't think that means we won't miss you every step of the way because we will.  We always will.

We will celebrate your birthday every February.  I will tell you Happy Anniversary every August. We will visit you every December 29 for the rest of our lives.

But baby, I have to heal.  I have to step forward in life.  I actually feel you right now smiling and nodding yes to me.  I know you want me to, so I'm trying.  Michael, I want to fall in love again.  I want to be wanted and needed like I was with you.  I want to find happiness for our boy.  I want to find a man who loves me and Conner and who will spend time with him, teaching him things a man needs to teach a boy.  I want to find a Godly man, one who will go to church with us.  One who won't work himself to death, but won't just sit on the couch and do nothing either.  One who will love me enough to compliment me every day like you did.  One who will take the boy and me on adventures. One who will help me build a life again for us both.

Know that no matter if and when that happens, I will love you for the rest of my life.  It is going to take one heck of a strong man to deal with this.  To love a woman who loves him, but also loves you. Do you think that's possible?  Do you think it's possible for someone to accept and love me knowing that a piece of me will now, forever, and always times infinity belong to you?  I worry sometimes that it won't happen.  But Michael, I have so much love left inside me to give baby.  I want to love again. And I hope one day I will.

I hope that Heaven has a few dirt roads that you and your dad can drive down today.  I hope it has a field full of green grass and grazing cattle.  I hope that you are sitting in the sunshine today, laughing and smiling at all the memories we made and the love we shared.  You are missed here by so many.

I love you more than words can explain, Michael Richard Hollis.  Thanks for marrying me all those years ago and thanks for making me the happiest I've ever been at least for a while.  Conner, Tristan and I love you and miss you but hope nothing but pure happiness and bliss belong to you now.

Until we meet again my love, and prepare yourself for that day because I plan to come running as hard as I can, keep smiling...keep laughing...and we will keep living as best we can.

NFAxI...
#stillhis
Love,

Your Wife