Moving Forward

I am moving forward, but I'm going at about the same pace as summer tourists in downtown Saugatuck looking for a place to park.  I'm not quite on the Autobahn and don't think I'll ever get there.  I get sad at times.  Especially those times when I can sit and think.  Then all those things run through my mind. 

As I've said many times...."I have been blessed."  This last weekend Marguerite's daughter and boyfriend, Shannon and Matt, were here.  They helped out so much!  Setting the tables, doing dishes (dishes and more dishes), watering, hammering in boards that were loose or off in the kitchen, on and on.  It gave me a chance to actually spend some quality time at the pool.  As I laid there thinking, I could just picture Ray coming down to the pool after watering the plants or cooking and sitting next to me...with a dozen crossword puzzles from the newspaper and a cocktail.  He would be working on at least a dozen at a time and ask me to answer clues if he couldn't get it.  Of course I am horrible at crosswords and I would tell him that if he couldn't get it surely I wouldn't be able to.  However, once in a while he would say "Oh, here's a Bible one...you should get this" and usually I would.  I have saved a pile of those puzzles.  Some are finished, some are just started and some about halfway done.  I will never toss those puzzles.

We both loved our afternoon cocktails at the pool.  It was a time when we could sit next to each other and enjoy what we accomplished in life.  We would talk about business, future vacations, dinner plans, breakfast menus, and our dreams.  He still said he wanted to own a home on Lake Michigan one day.  I always told him we could never afford it, especially after "retirement."  His answer was always "you've gotta dream."  He was right.  I should have lived his dream with him.  I feel so bad that I didn't just live that dream.  Even if I thought it would never happen....what harm could it have done to talk about it like it would be a reality some day.  We dreamed of owning the Kirby House for a year and a half and NEVER thought of that as being a reality. 

The humidity has finally dropped.  Today is a perfect day.  Perfect.  The sky is perfectly blue.  The temperature is perfect.  The breeze is perfect.  How could it be any better? 

Those are my thoughts for today.  - Jimmy