I know what it means when someone says, "I miss them all the time."
It felt dispiriting, at first, to know that our lives had shifted, schedules would
catapult them, and me, in many directions...moving less synchronously. It's no secret that I'm fortunate though; they invariably bring me joy, even at
just the thought of them. But we lived in balance...where express and particular questions are resolved and each one is asleep by nine; it was comforting to know they were home for the night. Mornings arrived and
evenings fell with minor deviation.
Then, one by one, they left to join the rhythm of life's urging, until I was the only one waving farewell.
There are chairs in this house where I sit...the reclining love seat in the living room; the wing back across from the fireplace in the den; others in the keeping room around a lengthy table where we eat and gather with
company; and one by the window in our bedroom. It is then, while sitting in any of these places, that I imagine them nestled in their own dwellings, in houses separate from my own.
That's when I twinge and ache as I begin to recall all those years of memories that remind me I miss them all the time.
Elwood
