Message Received

I think the universe is trying to tell me something.

Yesterday as I sat down to type the my-husband-does-me-wrong-when-did-I-become-a-single-parent? post, an email came up from my good WV friend. I'm always happy to get an email from her, so I clicked to read what antics her crazy kids are into and instead read that her husband had been killed in a motorcycle accident the night before. She was sorry for telling me in an email, but she was worn out from the calling. And the crying. And then I cried. Most of the day.

My friend was single for a long time, thought she'd be alone forever until she stopped in a restaurant for dinner on the way home from work one day and her future husband saw her sitting alone and offered to keep her company. They were married a year later. When I called to tell her I was pregnant with Adam, she came back with her own news...she was too. In fact our due dates were the same. I was so excited when I saw the caller ID the week after Adam's birth waiting to hear all about Baby Jack but I threw up when she told me instead how he'd been stillborn. Her husband really took care of her during all that even though he was just as distraught. They went on to have two sons who are now three and six months. Their oldest is a self-proclaimed Daddy's boy. Telling him was the hardest part, she said. Now she can be strong and make arrangements and do all that needs to be done. That. Is just how my friend rolls. I know she is sad, devastated even, but she's a rock I tell ya. Those boys are so lucky to have her.

Her husband was lucky to have her too. And vice versa.

I am so, so, sad she's dealing with this. I mean, my goodness, can't she catch a break? Isn't it bad enough her son is dead?

I tell myself that now Jack has his dad and that's a good thing. But now that Daddy's boy is going to have to learn to be Mama's boy and that is a very sad thing.

I don't get it. Just yesterday some angry husband stabbed his wife twentyish times in a fancy neighborhood across town. My friend's husband is in a box. Why does that horrible husband get to go on surviving while a good one doesn't?

The last time I visited them he took me down to his garage to show me his other "baby". That motorcycle. That stupid, disgusting motorcycle. The last thing I said to him in person: "You're going to die on that thing! Why don't you take up fishing instead? HAHAHAHA" And everyone thought I was super funny.

It's not so funny now.

At the end of my friend's email was this:

"I know Derick makes you mad. It's okay to be mad, but PLEASE, for me, tell him you love him every day and try to let go of the small stuff. Do stuff together. Enjoy each other and your family. You just never know what will happen tomorrow."

I pass that on to all of you, because I know she'd want everyone to do the same.

Message received universe, message received.