Did he know?

Dan always had this way about him. I don't really know how describe it. He just knew stuff. I know that sounds weird and vague.  He was the kind of person people always came to for big problems, because he always had an answer, even if the answer was "I don't know" he made you feel at peace about that answer.

Sometimes I wonder if he knew he was going to die. I don't for one second think he knew he was going to die the day he did. But he would say things that now make me wonder.

He always said he was running out of time. When he turned 30 he said, "I'm already 30, I was supposed to have a book published by now, I'm running out of time." I told him that writing books was something you did when you retired, that right now was the time for babies. He didn't argue that he just said he was running out of time.

Dan was always saying things that frankly I always blew off. I guess thats why they say hindsight is 20/20. He would tell me he was going to die young. I didn't believe him, why would I? I would I have any reason at all to believe that he wouldn't live to be 100. That was our goal, to make it to our 80th wedding anniversary, that would make him 100 and me 99. He came up with that goal, thats what he wanted for us, yet he said he was going to die young. I get they don't coincide, thats why I always blew the one I didn't like off and believed in the one I did. He didn't bring it up very often, he knew it bothered me.

The most memorable time was the summer before he died. We were in the middle of adopting a baby. (you can read the story of that tragedy here if you want other-peoples-babies. )  He went for a long walk in the Idaho dessert and came back and told me that God had talked to him about the adoption. I was excited thinking our baby was on it's way to us. "Your not gonna like it" he said "God told me that Baby Girl has to be enough for us"  I totally and completely blew him off. "Whatever, He did not, we're adopting a baby" He didn't say anything about it after that, he knew it bothered me. Instead we thought up baby names because that made me happy.

He was always worried about dying of a siezure. I blew him off, "your being ridiculous, people don't die of seizures, especially people who hardly ever have them." I was right. Not even a month before he died we had an appointment with a neurologist to check on his new medication. He asked her what the chances were of him dying from this. she said practically none. The neurologist said practically none. She said it in such a way like 'I can't legally say never because it happens, but it's so rare that I want to say never.' You know like medications that say "may cause blindness, because it did in .0001 percent of people. Yet Dan died of  a siezure, he was the .001 percent and he some where in his head knew that.

Many times now I wish I would have listened to him. I wish I wouldn't have taken our life for granted. I wish I wouldn't have taken our future for granted. I though we had all the time in the world, we were supposed to.  I wish I would have encouraged him to write his books, instead of telling him he would have time later. That adoption was so stressful, if I would have believed him we could have done something more with our last months together.

If we had known, truly known (meaning my husband could have convinced my stubborn head). if we had known we didn't have all the time in the world. If we had known it was coming. I like to think we would have done something super romantic like run away to Europe and see all the castles, that was on our someday list. I like to think we would have treasured every single second the three of us were together. I like to think he would have imparted all his wisdom on Baby Girl and I and he would have told us how to be brave and strong. He could have told us he loved us at least a million more times. We could have said goodbye.

But we didn't know.

I wrote a book about my grief, you can read it here: Carry on Castle