I am sitting on Wailaa beach with my old roommate from Maui who has just arrived. One of my oldest friends has been here for a week and is leaving tomorrow. I have been here thirteen days. I have barely been to the beach three times. We hiked the bamboo forest in Hana to two waterfalls with a mutual friend who moved to Maui. We brought one of my husband’s rubber ducks and let it go. Wish I remembered their names. He had three travel ducks, one female and two males, all named. Though they appeared identical at first, they all had a little marking that allowed him to identify them, a color misprint on the bill or a stain from traveling. When we packed for vacation, he would stand in the hallway at his disorganized bathroom shelf, and line up the ducks. He would hold each one and ask himself who would go on the trip. He asked himself aloud and with me nearby. Then he would choose one to pack in his backpack. We were so immature. Nevertheless, those childlike ways made us laugh, and maybe not feel so old among the approaching death, commutes, overtime, mortgage, and ex-wife.
I took one of the ducks and put it in the river by the waterfall. My long time friend took pictures. The duck took off, floating sideways, and we turned to hike back. We passed a break in the bamboo and the friend that lived on Maui said, ‘There he is!” I missed the rubber duck as he floated downstream. We searched for him when we had to cross the river but he was either upstream or had passed us.
I fell into depression for three days after his birthday and the anniversary of his memorial service. My girlfriend headed to the beach alone. I stayed home on the computer. We did go to the beach with our Hawaii friend. She chose some music to play in the car. The one song, one that was on the radio a lot when he died, one about love and loss and wanting to go back. The tears streamed. I was silent. My head turned towards the rolled down window, watching Hawaii roll by. The Hawaii I loved and where I had lived twice. The place we had tickets to go finally with my brother and his family. The tickets we cancelled but did not request a refund in hopes we would go when all the cancer was over, the chemo, the radiation, doctor appointments, the pain, sleeping, the social security forms.
How could I be so foolish? Why was I so hopeful? How could I have been so naïve? In retrospect, I see my husband knew and accepted his death. He protected me by leaving my hope. I thought I was protecting him by not giving up, not losing hope, staying strong, crying alone in the car. All we did is hurt ourselves by grieving and suffering alone. We tried to protect each other and only left each other alone in the worst part of our lives, our marriage.
I am jealous of the widow who cried with her husband, of the ones who could crawl in bed with them and hold them. I am jealous of the wives whose dieing husbands wrote letters to their children or made recordings. Oh, I wish I had his voice, his movements, to view again. I do not even remember his laugh. I know the details of his face will fade from memory as time disintegrates our time together and I slowly replace the framed photos with newer ones. Will I remember his flat jean pockets, his hairless chest, the sight of his bull legs, and the memory of the first time I saw him standing at the foot of the bed? Will I forget his kisses with the mixed smell of Right Guard deodorant, T-gel, sweat, cologne, and Lubriderm?
I know this will happen. I can only remember another love’s face if I think about it and the face shifts and is blurry, finally settling on a face from a photo, a one-dimensional memory.
Why do I have to let him go? Why do I have to move on? Would he have moved forward? I think he would only work and fall asleep in front of the TV. He would work so he was exhausted, could sleep, and had no free time to be alone, time to fill-up with things he would have rather done with his wife. Would he have moved? Would he have dated by now? Would he have purposely died too?
He used to apologize for leaving me, for leaving me alone in grief and not being able to be there when I was old and sick. I told him not to be sorry. He was the one dieing, the one that lost the stick draw. He knew. He knew because he faced the truth I was ignoring.
Couples surround me here in Maui, newlyweds, old couples. All of those happy and in love couples walking by me. The old couples make me the saddest and jealous. Maybe they hate each other back home. Perhaps they cheat, stay late at work to avoid coming home, fight, bicker, sigh of the boredom and routine. The life path that finds them standing in a kitchen, maybe one they can not afford, one that needs remodeling, one in a neighborhood they hate, one that constantly needs cleaning or plumbing repairs. Nevertheless, here for that week or two of their lives they escape, are relatively happy, and have glimpses of the one they used to love. I sit alone with just grief and some old friends.
