We went to the cemetery today. It’s the first time I’ve been there since we buried him two days after Christmas. My step dad decided to wait to bury him until 2 days after Christmas, instead of before Christmas, because of the kids.
How can you wait to have a funeral?
I don’t know…
A lot of people in shock, trying to make decisions about something as tragic as burying a loved one, while trying not to traumatize the children.
You ask yourself the crazy question… what is more important a wonderful funeral or a wonderful Christmas? The children win. The children must win.
One question stands out now. One of the kids, not one of my own, one of the younger ones, was asking me if I thought that Santa Claus knew who killed him.
My response was “I don’t know sweetie; but Jesus knows and Jesus came here and took Pat with him. Pat’s spending Christmas with Jesus and the Angels”.
This has been a year of firsts for my family.
Our first New Years Party without Pat.
Our first Easter and Father’s Day without him.
Every holiday we are faced with the same question…
How do we do this?
We can’t celebrate like normal people anymore… now we spend holidays trying not to say or do anything that will bring up the thought that Pat’s not here. Although we all feel his absence no matter what we do.
A couple of things that I need to say, just for myself.
First off, I may remove this post… it won’t be the first time.
I have removed every post that I’ve written about Pat on this blog, usually within two days of writing it. The constant reminder of his absence is painful… and of course, I am worried that a family member may unsuspectingly stumble across one of my posts about him and get dragged down into the unfathomable depths that occur anytime we come across anything that reminds us of Pat, when we have not had a chance to prepare for it.
Second,
To Pat;
I miss you.
I miss riding back and forth to work with you.
I miss when you would come to my house to eat. You used to say “You ever seen a fat man turn down a steak dinner”? I remember you shaking your head and looking all serious and saying to me “Trish, do you have any idea how hard it is to stay fat in America”?
I miss the way you used to mimic me… yeah sounds weird now, cause it used to piss me off… well, really you were very good at doing me ‘driving’ and that used to crack me up. I just used to get exasperated with you when we needed to work and you wanted to play with me instead… yeah, big regrets there… I should have played more.
I remember all the times you told me how good I would be at sales.
I remember when we worked at MCI and I would call you after a bad day and you would stay on the phone with me for hours giving me pep talks.
I miss how excited you used to get when you came in from the studio with the new music you had recorded… and you took my advice on the background vocals for the Jack and Diane remix… I was flush with pride when I heard it for the first time.
I remember when I did your voice mail message and you told me that all of your friends were asking ‘who is that white girl on your voice mail”? And you were cracking up telling me that you told them all that I was your secretary. Ha-Ha… we laughed our a$$e$ off about that one.
And when you got the tickets to go to the Grammy’s and I was going to go as your chauffeur… remember that cute little outfit I was gonna wear with the chauffeur’s hat? Wish we had gone now.
And the time you told me that I needed to help you with that video shoot? You had me rolling on the floor, dancing around the room, doing that impression of ‘Tricia and her b00bs’ in a video. Oh God, I’m laughing now just thinking about it.
I’m sorry about the fights we used to get into… didn’t seem like such a big deal then. We were sure there was plenty of time to kiss and make up… even if I always did have to call you and apologize first or you wouldn’t speak to me for days.
I’m sorry about the argument we had over the website. Little did you know, though I did try to tell you, I didn’t want the pressure and I was interested in seeing your guy’s work.
All in all I should’ve been a better big sister… I missed a lot of opportunities to be a better big sister.
I just miss you so much. I don’t take the back roads from work anymore. Driving by the entrance to your apartment complex makes me break down in tears.
I think about you every day.
I planted a desert rose and a windmill on your grave today.
The windmill was a birthday present from the kids.
We were going to have a ‘Q’ in your honor tonight, yes with a steak for you, but after the cemetery, I just couldn’t get myself motivated to fight the rain storm that had set in. It’s a rainy night in Georgia, feels like it’s rainin’ all over the world.
We all pray every day for God to work through the investigators in your case... to allow them to see with God's eyes the things that they need to solve your murder.
We also pray every day that God will work his way into the heart of your killer and he (they) will find the faith they need to come forward and admit their wrong and we pray that we may someday, find it in our hearts to forgive them for causing our loss.
Peace up A town
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