Within Reach

KJ was one of the most amazing people I've ever met. She was creative, honest, sarcastic, kind, and intelligent. We met in mid-1993 through a mutual friend, and bonded over a shared love of Dean Koontz. We moved in together just a couple of months after met. We were married two years later.

When I first met KJ, she was a writer. She spent hours every day writing romance stories, and while she never published anything, her work was always impressive.

From there she went on to cross-stitch, crochet, pour painting, wood burning, jewelry making, resin crafting, and more. And she had a list of other mediums she wanted to try eventually, such as metal working, carpentry, sewing, and cosplay. She jumped from hobby to hobby like she wanted to sample all life had to offer.

We were obsessed with each other, to the point that we often ignored everyone else in the room. Some couples finished each other's sentences, but we didn't even need sentences. We often spoke to each other in movie quotes, and we almost achieved "Darmok at Tanagra" levels of communication.

In our early years together, she was an inexhaustible dynamo. I had trouble keeping up with her. Once we got our first digital camera, we began going to zoos and parks every weekend, and we loved taking pictures together. Money was always tight, but we found our bliss in whatever nature had to offer, and we searched high and low for photo opportunities.

I couldn't afford to give her the life she deserved, but she always told me she loved the life I gave her.

Then in September 2015, KJ had to go to the emergency room for diverticulitis. This was the beginning of the end. Her health was never the same afterwards. She never got all her energy back, and it was like the start of a cascade failure, health-wise.

In the following years she had several more operations, including partial thyroid removal and eye surgery. By the end she was blind in one eye and deaf in one ear, she'd developed diabetes, nearly half of her teeth were fake, she had high blood pressure, she couldn't walk very far, and she had chronic body pains.

She still tried to stay busy, but her body couldn't keep up with her spirit. There was a lot she couldn't do, and for the past couple of years she mostly watched TV while crocheting. She fell into deep depression and developed a gambling addiction. She no longer wanted to watch anything new, preferring the comfort of shows she'd already seen dozens of times. She spent most of her time watching YouTube videos.

Moving out of Nashville helped her disposition a lot. Our new house brought her a lot of joy. She loved this town, and so do I. We could easily see ourselves growing old together in this house, sitting out on the screened-in front porch and watching the cars go by.

She was making progress, anyway. There's no way to be sure how it would have gone, but I know I saw improvement. We started watching new movies and TV shows again. She was greatly looking forward to the new Fantastic Four movie. And then we got the puppy, and it made her so happy. She'd wanted a dog for years.

If there's actually any rhyme or reason to the universe, an actual cosmic plot guiding our fates, then I'd like to believe her death was inevitable, and the universe was just trying to make her final days more comfortable.

I'd like to believe that. But I don't. They say it's always darkest just before the dawn, but in my experience the reverse is more often true. The universe just loves to give you false hope, putting the promised land within reach before it pulls the rug out from under you.

Screw this universe. I want my money back.

My Right Hand

I've always heard indispensable people referred to as "my right hand." As in, "Oh, my assistant Charlotte? She's my right hand. I couldn't find my keys without her." I always thought I understood that phrase. I mean, yeah, she's important. So important that losing her would be like losing a body part. That's just a degree of importance, but it doesn't make it clear all the ramifications of what it means.

When I say losing KJ was like losing my right hand, I literally mean it was like losing a body part. Your hand isn't just important, not in the way other things are important. Losing a hand is a serious lifestyle change. It affects all aspects of your life. How you get dressed, how you drive, how you eat - it's all going to change.

I've been with KJ for thirty-two years. That's well over half my life. That kind of partnership has a formative effect on you. She is literally part of my personality. I can't watch a video without thinking about how KJ will react. I can't hear a joke without thinking, "Wait until I tell her this one." I can't make a decision without needing to hear her opinion.

It's like those stories you hear about K9 dogs. You know, the ones that become so bonded to their partners, that when the officers die, the dog has to retire.

It's been nearly twenty years since my father died. To this day, sometimes I'll see a movie and wonder what he would have thought of it. It kills me that I can't see his reaction. It kills me that I can't ask him his opinions on things.

But that's nothing compared to this. KJ was the guiding force in our relationship, and she's been a deciding influence in every decision I've made in the past three decades. I think about life without her, and the future just looks blank. I wanted to grow old with her. Now? I don't know what I want. I'm traveling unknown waters here, and I don't even know how I want things to turn out.

Please don't worry about me doing anything drastic. That's not what this is about. I promise that I won't do any sort of self-harm. As for what I will do... that's up in the air.

I Tried

Well, I tried to sleep, but I couldn't. I think I'm up for the long haul.

She died in pain. That's what bothers me most. The coroner tried to tell me that it happened suddenly, too quickly for her to be in pain. But KJ was in severe pain - more than I'd ever seen - right up until the minute she passed out. One of the last things she said to me was something along the lines of, "Why me? I never hurt anyone."

I keep hearing her voice. I think it's the puppy downstairs, yowling because it doesn't like being left alone at night. But on the periphery of my hearing, it sounds like KJ calling for me to come downstairs. I'm going to have these auditory hallucinations for a long time. Every gust of wind, every creak of the house, I'll hear her voice in it.

I have never lived alone. I went from living with my parents, to living in a dorm room with a roommate, to living with my parents again, to living in an apartment with KJ and two other roommates, to living exclusively with KJ. It's been years since we've slept in the same bed, but I always felt better knowing she was in the house. Safer, more complete.

I still keep thinking I'm going to wake up tomorrow and find this was all a dream. Of course, waking up would require sleeping. In the 37 years we've been together, we've spent maybe ten nights apart. And every time she was gone, I had trouble sleeping. I might never sleep again.

I always assumed I'd outlive her. Between her health problems, her smoking, and her poor diet, I just figured I'd last a few years longer than her. But I at least thought we'd have another ten, maybe even twenty years together.

I don't want to get rid of her stuff. Even her clothes - I mean, I have absolutely no use for it, but it's like, "What if I give it away and then she comes back?" But another part of me thinks, "Get rid of it all as quickly as possible, because having it around reminds me of her, and that's torture."

It's too early for me to be having those thoughts anyway. Right now I just need to come to terms with her death. I can think about settling her affairs in a few days. But then, that's not how my brain works. I'm going over everything right now. Every little thing.

I don't think I'll ever be in another relationship. I've been saying that for years. We often talked about whether we'd date again if the other died. I just don't see it. Not because KJ was the perfect woman - I mean, she was perfect for me, but nobody's truly perfect - but rather because I'm so broken, and I don't have the energy to mask enough to make someone like me. Relationships are hard work, and I don't believe I'll ever have that kind of drive again.

Things were going so well. Yeah, the job search sucks, and there's the fear that I can't really afford to live in my new house. But we love this new town, we love the house, we love the neighborhood, we've finally paid off a lot of debts, and overall it just felt like a fresh, new start. The second half of our lives could begin.

Fuck.

In Memoriam

My wife passed away a few hours ago. She was the victim of a sudden, massive heart attack. I am beyond inconsolable. My life doesn't make sense anymore. I keep expecting to see her walk back into the room. What even am I without her? We've been married for nearly thirty years. I've never lived alone.

KJ has had chronic pain issues for years. Her right shoulder in particular has given her a lot of trouble. I swear some of our family thought she was faking it, but they weren't there those nights that she was howling in pain, waiting for the medicine to kick in.

She went to the doctor every three months for over a decade, but he never could figure out what was wrong. He did all sorts of tests. We went to various specialists, but no one could ever find the source. Part of it had to be the way she slept - ever since her hernia operation about six years ago, she couldn't sleep on a bed anymore. It just wasn't comfortable. So she slept in an easy chair, but she often stayed up until she literally passed out, and would fall asleep with her head leaning forward.

It was usually just the one shoulder that hurt. Tonight the pain traveled to her left side as well. We tried the usual tricks. Pain pills, Pepto Bismol, 7-Up (sometimes the pain was so intense it caused nausea). I used the massager on her shoulders.

She told me, "If it doesn't go away in 15 minutes, we're going to the hospital." I even put my jeans and shoes on, ready to walk out the door if we needed to. Then she had to throw up. I gave her the trash can and she sat cross-legged on the floor, spitting up into the trash can. Then she leaned into the trash can and just sat there for a while, trying to catch her breath.

I don't know when she died. She stopped whimpering after a few minutes, and I thought she'd fallen asleep. Sometimes the pain is so bad she passes out. I sat there for about twenty minutes, stupidly browsing social media while I waited for her to recover. I didn't want to wake her up if she was asleep, because what if the pain hadn't faded yet? It would be better to let her sleep through it. 

But at the same time, she was in such an awkward position, sitting on the floor hunched over the trash can.
I didn't want her to wake up with back pain. I waited an uncomfortable amount of time, trying to find that sweet spot between "wake her too early and she's still in pain" and "wake her too late and she throws out her back." I've woken her up too early before, and regretted it. But she was not in a good sleeping position.

I don't know how long I waited. I thought I saw her breathing the whole time, but I must have imagined it. Finally I touched her back, but got no reaction. I talked to her, no reaction. I shook her, no reaction. Then I moved over to her and looked at her face.

I will never forget that face. I'm going to see it in my nightmares, which is why I'm up at 1 AM typing this instead of getting into bed right now. She looked like a drowning victim in the movies. Her face was gray, her eyes were open and yellow. Her nose was running, and drool leaked from her lips.

I called 911 right away. They had me do CPR until they got there, but I knew she was already gone. There were just no signs of life. No warmth, no breath, no spark. There was nothing there to save.

When the EMTs arrived, they had me wait outside, and asked me a few questions. I collapsed on my lawn, wailing while I waited for them to come back and update me. They took an incredible amount of time. I later found that they'd gone through her purse for her identification, and they also went through her medicine cabinet to see what she'd been taking.

Finally one guy came out and informed me that she had passed away. I hate my brain. My thoughts were swirling with all the usual "How am I going to live without her" and "What do I do now." But thanks to all the true crime shows KJ watches, I also had "Does my grief look genuine enough, or will I be a murder suspect?" Ugh.

But no, the coroner told me later that it was definitely a heart attack. She said that there was nothing I could have done. Even if I'd taken her to the hospital right when the pain began, she would have been gone by the time we arrived.

Which should make me feel a little better, but it doesn't. Not even a bit. I'm going to beat myself up forever, wondering what I could have done to prevent it. We've lived in our new state since January, and she hasn't gone to the doctor since the move. We kept meaning to find a new doctor here, but she hates going to the doctor so much, we kept putting it off. Maybe if we'd gone, they would have detected something. Maybe maybe maybe.

Fuck. Fuckity-fuck fuck fuck.

I don't know where to go from here. She's a big part of why we moved where we moved. She just got a new puppy less than a week ago. We're going to give it to some friends. No, I'm going to give it to some friends. I have to start thinking like a single unit again. Everything in my head is we this, we that. And I keep talking about KJ in present tense, like the "she hates going to the doctor" above.

And then there's the intrusive, "maybe it's not so bad" thoughts. You know, like, "At least I won't have to buy her expensive Capri cigarettes anymore." Jesus Christ. I want to slap thoughts like that right out of my head. If KJ were here, maybe I could get her to slap me. I'd gladly let her smoke imported Cuban cigars for the rest of her life if it would bring her back to me.

We had plans! We were going to go to the zoo soon! In July we were going to go to Gatlinburg and get our chair lift photo - we try to do that every five years. This is just so sudden. Tomorrow I have to start thinking about things like closing bank accounts and whether I really need two cars.

I have no friends here. I haven't met anyone since the move. I'm alone in a strange city, with no job or life direction. KJ wasn't perfect. We disagreed on a lot of topics. Sometimes our shouting matches drove the cats into hiding. But she was still my reason for getting up in the morning, and knowing she was in the house helped me sleep at night.

This house is too big for one person. Maybe I'll look for a roommate, I don't know. Maybe I'll move closer to family. I don't know what I'm going to do. I know I'm not going to sleep tonight.

Rest in peace, KJ. I will always love you.