Happy Birthday Dan



Tomorrow is Dan's Birthday. I guess in a couple hours, though I don't know what time he was born. I wanna say the middle of the day, but that doesn't really sound like Dan, it's not very exciting. Baby Girl, who if you haven't heard is exactly like her father, was born at exactly 5am.  On a Thursday.  Back then Wednesdays were awful days for Dan. He got up early and went to school, then he went to his internship, then he went to work.  He was gone about 13 hours every Wednesday. He said "Whatever you do Jennifer please don't go into labor on a Wednesday night." Well it wasn't my idea, it was Baby Girls. Anyway I imagine his birth more like that. I will ask his mother when I see her.

 39. He died six weeks after he turned 36.  Three years, almost. not quite. This is his third birthday without him.  We are all going out to dinner, my family, his family, I'm thinking about bringing him along, that will definitely get some crazy widow looks. 

I let baby Girl pick the restaurant, she was very excited to do so. Last year anxiety got the better of her and we wound up eating pizza at home with everyone. The year before that we went to Dan's favorite restaurant.  I'm unsure if Baby Girl even realized it was for his birthday. 20ish of us, celebrating a birthday for someone who wasn't there. Celebrating the life of someone who wasn't there. 

I miss him.  I miss his presence in my life. A common theme in therapy is trying to make my body realize he's not coming back, apparently my body hasn't caught on yet and it's always a little tense, waiting for him, expecting him, or something like that.

I miss his voice. the lowness of it. the calmness of it. My family tends to be kind of loud and boisterous. It um sort of surprised, ya lets go with surprised, Dan that our general loudness level was that of a yell. He said he was going to wien me out of it because our family would not be that loud, it hurt his ears.  He tried, he made great progress. He's not here to keep it in check anymore though, and I'm teaching it to Baby Girl. If he had a grave he would be rolling over in it.  I have videos and recordings of his voice.  Probably more then most people have, it's not enough. It's not the same, It's not his voice having conversations with me. It's not me telling him to stop mumbling. His retort back that he's not mumbling I should just get my ears checked.  He's not telling Baby Girl how proud of her he is.

I'm 37, sssoooo much younger then he is.  I should be teasing him, "this is it, your last year to live it up, next year you will be so old you will probably die." That's not as funny as it once was, But thats what people do. tease about getting old, being 'over the hill'  I think we all do it because we know we can. No one is actually old at 40, no one is actually going to die at 40. Except for everyone in my young widows group and then some. Except for Dan who didn't even make it to 40, only 36.  I should have 4 good years of teasing him about getting close to 40.

Tomorrow the love of my life turns 39 and I'm not with him. He's not with us. I didn't get him a present, we are not going out on a date. We are going out to dinner, for him, to remember him, It's not the same. I miss him so much it hurts. It aches. Every unimaginable feeling you think it is, it is, it's real.  There is no description for the emptiness when your loved one dies. As Lin Manuel Miranda wrote "you can't imagine the unimaginable"

Happy Birthday Dan.....How's the Mt Dew in Heaven?

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



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