Goodbye to you...

I still can't believe that you left this world.  Only 57 years old.  I still remember that 22-year-old boy that I fell in love with.  We were such different people back then.  We were so full of hope for the future.

Who knew?

I think to myself that if I hadn't divorced you when I did, I'd be a widow now instead of the ex-wife.

Scary.

Glad I'm not your widow, still sorry you are dead.  That may sound harsh, but it's true.  You were often a pain in the ass and I'm annoyed that you couldn't show your sons that you loved them, because I know you did, but you showed it in the most bizarre ways. 

You were often loud, sometimes mean, very hurtful.

But I know that was only one side of you.

I knew the person who would do anything to help sometimes.  I knew a guy who loved his baby boys.  I knew the man who was heartbroken when he had to move to another home and didn't see them every night.

But I also knew that guy who could be mean, selfish, hurtful.

Still, the last thing I wished for was your death.

I wished you would have come to your senses, to tell your boys how much you loved them, to set a good example for them, to watch your grandson grow up and to be a good person.

I wish you could have had a desire to live.  I wish I didn't feel somehow to blame for your demise.  I know that's not true, even though you blamed me often, but I still felt sad when I ended our marriage and had to make you move out.  I wasn't sad because I had second thoughts, but because I never meant to hurt you and I hoped someday you'd be happy.

But in retrospect, I don't know if you had it in you to let yourself be happy.  You spent a good portion of your final years with another person who did her best to love you and you disappointed her too, so I can only assume that you were never going to allow anyone to make you happy.

Did you die sad and lonely?  I hope not.  I hope your time with your brother was good.  I hope you knew your kids loved you even if they kept their distance because you were being so mean to everyone.

I hope you found moments of happiness and that when you took your last breath you weren't scared, but hopefully relieved, free from pain and suffering and struggling, free from the fighting, the anger, the sadness, whatever it was you felt for so long.

Be free now, be happy, be peaceful.

And if you come back in another life, be happy, be light, be love...

How do you explain...

How do you explain the sadness you feel over the death of someone that you divorced 15 years ago?

How do you explain that even though he could be very hurtful and cruel, he also had a real human, once loving side, that you loved as a 22-year-old girl?

How do you explain that knowing your sons have lost their father, that he will never get the chance to make amends with them, that knowing he died alone in a hospital with $11 in his possession and a small bag as empty as the life he was leading at the end, fills you with such immense sadness, you can hardly hold it in?

And why should you explain?  Why can't it just be OK that the human in you honored the human in him and now grieves for a life you once knew?

My heart is broken, for the sorrow my son feels, for the pain I can relate to, for the grandson he won't get to watch grow up.

I wish for so many things.  I wish he could have been different.  I wish he could have seen the pain he was causing the ones who once loved him.  I wish he could have made the effort to keep everyone close to him.  I wish he would have had the will to live.  I wish I didn't feel responsible for some of his unhappiness.  I wish he could have believed in himself.

But it's too late for any of that now.  He's gone and all I wish now is that he's resting in peace and that he can be in death, the person he couldn't be in life.