Sep 02, 2012                20:05 hours                                   

LOVE

            How is it possible that this most beautiful and undying truth can be so fascinating, and yet just as devastating at the same time?  As I continue to ponder life without you, my best friend, the love of my life, and my out-and-out soul mate, I cannot seem to wrap my head around solitarily facing this ever changing world, which to me has once again become the great “unknown.”   In my heart of hearts, I am alone in the fact that I faced the unexpected death of my wonderful husband, and I presume that our love was and is greater, stronger, more amazing, and inconceivably incomparable to anyone else’s in this world.

            And yet I know this lopsided thought process to be folly, because I am not the author of love, nor the giver and taker of life.  It comes down to this one fact, and I am becoming more and more convinced of it each day.  My humanity cannot conceive life, love, and death, because it is not the creator of them.  In this temporal body, I may only experience these “I AM” concepts and delight in them or despise them, as I so choose, and the rest of the world is in the same boat as I.

            Bret Wayne Trone, your love made me soar, and although I know you still love me, now more than ever, in fact, because you finally know what perfect love is, the loss of it here on earth has plunged me into the very abyss.  In this regard, our love is truly a two-edged sword, pole opposites, if the truth be told.  And yet, in retrospect, I wouldn’t have it any other way.  Rightly so, if I had ever discerned the outcome of our thirty-year relationship, I would still have chosen you, hands down, no holds barred, til’ death do us part.  Every second with you was worth it all.

            To prove the point from my opening paragraph, I will close with a story about the picture above.  I baked Bret a birthday cake today, for his 52^nd birthday, the same one I made each year, a German Chocolate cake, his all-time favorite.  I also had a beloved picture of us blown up and framed for a keepsake.  With these two items in tow, I headed to one of our favorite places to eat in Tehachapi—La Bella Amore Italian Bistro on Green Street.  We often went there when we wanted an intimate, quiet dinner, especially if we were going to a movie afterwards.   Because of the specialness of this place, I had a memorial plaque placed on the bench outside this restaurant a while back.  This is where I planned to place my sacred items and take my pictures. Now, to revisit my topic sentence and tie this all up into a nice, neat bow!

            LOVE = DEVASTATION—As I pulled up, there were a couple of people outside the restaurant; thus, I waited patiently for them to move out of sight, so I could sneak up to the bench incognito, place the cake and the frame strategically, and quickly take my pictures without being noticed.  This became a near excruciating task, as firstly, I couldn’t get the placement right because of the lighting, and then I started to have trouble breathing and could not see anything through my tears.  I wasn’t even sure if I had gotten a decent shot, when I spotted a chubby hand pushing on the exit door, followed by a little blonde head.  As I hurried to snatch up my things and tried to juggle them to the car, five more people filed out of the restaurant right behind the little boy I was trying to escape.

            LOVE = FASCINATION—With tears pouring from my eyes, I came face to face with my teacher friend and her wonderful family.  Her two older daughters had been students of mine in prior years.  As I awkwardly said, “You caught me,” she enveloped me in a warm hug.  Then, giving her daughters both a hug, I stared to babble and tried to explain what I had been doing.  She told me she already knew it was Bret’s birthday, and that they had been thinking of me and talking about me today.   

 

  
          Call it what you will, fate--karma, qi, the force--I don’t care.  But, I know that I know that I know that I know that I know that I know that I know that my plan being foiled by a good friend, her family, and her daughters who love me, and whom I love dearly, is alone, the design of God Himself, the Author and Creator of love.  Trust me, I cannot understand it, I dare not try to explain it, and there are times I don’t even recognize it, until many minutes or hours or days or even months, sometimes years later.  But I can believe it, because there is nothing greater or sweeter or truer than the love of my Creator God and Savior, and when I miss Bret so much that I think I can no longer go on, His love is there, and I know that it will always, always, always, always, always, always, always be enough!