There are few things I can remember as vividly as a moment like this:
Where I was on September 11…
the laughter turned to cry-ter on January 27, 2004 the moment I found out Buddy was killed…
the first time I fell in love…
the first time I completed a 1/2 marathon…
but really– five minutes ago, when I realized that someone, yes “someone” I “know” died.
And for whatever reason, THIS moment has become one of THOSE moments–
Why is it death that stops us in our tracks? Why is it the grief that takes us through reality? Why is it the unyielding words of hope never comfort “just” enough… and why is it that years later, emotions still grab you like one of those claw games…as though you’re just about to win the stuffed animal you’ll hug until it explodes only to drop it, and with it an emptiness in the pit of your stomach that looses excitement yet gains disappointment, even sorrow…
yah. years later. but the tears still welled up…
I met Andy three years ago. He asked me out– and being tall with dark hair and blue eyes, I gladly said yes. And I was nervous. And giddy too. He was older than me… significantly older. But his heart wasn’t. I can hear his laugh as he told me about his crazy, college roommate. And I can see his smile as I discover the “Cake Pandora” radio station. *And I can feel my smile (now more closely), each time I listen to it because of the memories I get from it….they’re good, and even a little “butterfly-ie”…
but it didn’t work out. my heart was elsewhere… like it seems to have a way of being/doing. And he still, STILL would call me on my birthday. He still, STILL would text me when he saw something that reminded him of me. Mostly pictures of cats (because he knew they’d make me giggle while reminiscing of a story I told him when we first met…) He still, STILL would pray for me when I needed it most. And he never, ever hesitated from asking me to pray for him as well….
Here I am, smiling over the small but significant impact he had on me…giggling over his fun company…giggle as I hear in a faint memory his goofy laugh that was so contagious…. And here I am with my own reasons to call him, but I can’t. And here, there is a sad shock filling my presence. and words that, I still can’t don’t want to comprehend:
Andy went to his eternal home in Heaven on Saturday, September 28th. His departure was unexpected, even to him…
and in my presence, is an Everlasting God, that welcomed him home, a future that grace has given. But what also stands with me in the present, is a short past with this man that made me smile, and a boy that made me giggle, and tears that I’m going to let fall–because I cared.
Vividly–those short moments with him replay over and over and over again. And I’ll let them play through this unexpected sorrow. I’ll let them play through this moment of reality… I’ll let them play through the tears, and I’ll still care…with love, for you Andy–
with love for you.
*please pray for Andy’s family… and for so many who were also impacted by Andy’s gentle and kind spirit. We truly cared so deeply for him….
