Love Letters to Tennessee

24 August 2022 Hello Tennessee, It’s me.    Today is the fifty-second day since you left this earth.    I miss you every day.    Some more than others. I was listening to a self-help audiobook today and heard an interesting thought.  Marriage does not come with a black box.  You know those black boxes on commercial aircraft that everybody looks for when the plane crashes.  They contain all the flight history in infinite detail.  Crash investigators comb through millions of data points, voice recordings and other measurements to understand what went wrong.  If only we could do this with relationships when one party passes. I have learned I must do something similar with myself.  I have to examine my body, my mind and my soul so I can live with myself.  I also must comb through the facts of our relationship and question them.  Was I fair to you?  Did I take the time to really understand your feelings, or was everyt...

22 August 2022 Hello Tennessee, It’s me.    Today is the fiftieth day since you left this earth.    I miss you every day.    Some more than others. Last Saturday I went to the stage where they have music near the equestrian center.  I was saddened because normally we would go together and dance.  But you were not there to dance with.  I remembered the times we danced together.  I thought of those moments and vividly remember how much you enjoyed dancing.  After all, that's how we met.   They got rid of that old creaky dance floor and replaced it with a strong concrete pad. Nobody was dancing.  If you were there, we would be the first ones down on the floor.  Dancing and loving and living life. I remember how much you loved to dance.  I ask myself if I took you out enough.  Could I have taken you more often or danced longer with you.  I wonder if I listened intently to you or if I treated you well....

19 August 2022 Hello Tennessee, It’s me.   Today is the forty-seventh day since you left this earth.   I miss you every day.   Some more than others. I decided to write you letters.   They say when you lose someone, it’s good to put your thoughts on paper.   Writing you is part of my healing.   It is a way to help fill the void.   Since I cannot reach over and touch you, wake you and tell you my thoughts, I am using this medium to communicate my feelings.   Not as if you can read them. It helps me nonetheless.   It is not uncommon for grieving spouses to write letters to their departed partners.   Nobel prize winning physicist, Richard Feynman wrote famous love letters to his wife after she died of tuberculous at the age of 25.   Now I am no Nobel prize winner, nor a physicist, but I am a pretty good writer.   So here we go. I imagine as if I am travelling on a business trip without you.    But this time you t...