Some days are just hard.

This post is only remotely adoption related.  It's on my adoption blog, but it's also on MY blog, and I think I figure pretty prominently into the adoption equation (for me), so, I vote still relevant.

I miss my best friend.

I miss her so much.

I miss this day:

Trying on silly hats while we shopped for angel tree with girls group.  Not caring or thinking about the tough stuff, just being friends.

And I miss this day:

You were so tired.  You tried to stay awake for us, but you drifted off, and tired as we were, we rested with you... but you noticed later that we both had hints of smiles on our faces... we weren't really asleep.  The bracelet I'm making there in this picture from over a year ago is still tied around my right wrist.  I picked out your favorite colors on purpose and made you one too.  I don't know what I'm going to do when mine breaks.  I'll have to fix it somehow.  I wore it when you were here.  I wore it the day you went.  I wore it all the days after.  It's like a part of me now.

Everything I've done lately has reminded me of you.  I read the Hunger Games series, then saw the movie, and I thought so many different times how much you would have loved it.  Especially some of the minutiae in books, those little things we both loved about reading.  I campaigned hard for a fundraiser for adoptive families, watched people who had nothing themselves give their very last, and I thought of you and how you listened to me when I talked about issues and causes that mattered to me, not just to humor me but to hear me.  You cared.  I never felt like you were just tolerating my incessant blather, you wanted to know.

You would have been so excited for my future adoption.  You wanted to see the world.  Maybe you would have even traveled with me when it was time.  You would have read every blog post.  You would have told me how good they were when I doubted myself, and we would've talked about how important it felt to write just the right thing, even though ultimately you're blogging for yourself, not others.  We talked about that before.  I didn't quite understand until now.

Friday is my birthday.  Last year, you couldn't go out, but you invited me over for my birthday, ordered our favorite pizza, and then served up my favorite (fudge swirl) ice cream.  Half that carton is still in my freezer.  I can't bear to throw it away, but eating it probably isn't a good idea either.  You'd have a good laugh at me for that one.  This year I asked for donations to the Pleven Orphans Medical Care Fund for my birthday.  I have no doubt you would have jumped at the chance.

Should've, could've, would've.  There's no point in further enumerating all the things we would do if you were here, but they keep playing over in my mind... a tantalizing view of what I can't have.  I know I should focus on our good memories, and I do, most of the time, but tonight I'm just sad that you're not here to make more. I'm sad that I have to wait so long to see you again.  I know you know all these things I want to tell you, but I want to tell you in person, see your face, hear your goofy but insightful responses.  If Heaven had a phone, I'd call you up and talk all night.  Tonight I miss you.  Tonight I think of what should have been, and I cry.  Tomorrow, I will think of you and smile... like I do every single day.

But for now I just miss you.  Some days are just hard.






God called my best friend Angie home on July 15, 2011, after a five and a half year battle with cancer, more surgeries than I have fingers to count them on, and even more times exceeding all the doctors' expectations.  She changed my life, she made me who I am, and I'll always be sad that we won't do all the things we'd planned together... but I'll do them, because I know she would want me to.  If you've grieved a loved one, you know that sometimes you feel like you have a fresh perspective, you can finally look back and smile, and other times it just hits you like a Mack truck.  This is one of those times for me.  Last year at this time we were celebrating, spending as much time as we could together, and this year I'm missing you.

Some days are just hard.

Love you, best friend.  You'd better set aside a while to talk for when I get there where you are, because I have so much to tell you!  And I can't wait, but in the meantime, I'm going to make you proud.