Long Lasting Love

It was a random late night watching Netlix, I was enjoying a nice movie.  It was a real feel good type... man meets dog and they become best friends, family setting really nice little town, little family, little people loving and going on in this world, When suddenly one sentence changed everything in my mind.

  The man in this movie who accidently meets a dog and brings it into his family, Has a wife and a daughter who just recently got married to yes a nice young man.  His daughter is having lunch with his wife after they speak about the fact that she is pregnant.  The daughter wants to speak to her mother about how her parents met.  Which is so sugary sweet you just want to love all over the both of them LOL, When the wife says something that really touched me. 

The conversation went something like this:

Daughter: Mom, you and Dad have been together a long time.

  

Mother: yes 25 years now.

  

Daughter:  Wow.

  

Mother: Me and your father have been together longer than we have been apart. 

   And there it is... They have been together longer than they have been apart.  When you think about that... out there in this world, people have been together, married, in love, through the good and bad, longer than they have been without each other.  The math behind that… to count your years on earth, and have spent most of them with your partner.

     I was in love with the idea, in love with the reality of it, in love with the fact that I know it is true.  Right now there are couples all over the USA all over the WORLD who have that.  Then I think... I might have already missed my chance at having that.  Chances are I will never have that

     You see... I’m almost 38 years old now, a widow for 11 years, and if you do the math.  If I met someone today that I ended up marrying, I would have to be with them at least 39 years to be able to say I have been with them longer than I have been without them. Which means; I would have to live until I was at least 77 years old.  Is it possible?  Yes it is completely possible, though with accidental death and health problems more and more people are dying younger.  Plus one more thing I don’t have a man in my life that fits marriage material.  I don’t have prospects currently which means every day and year that pass comes the reality that I might not ever be able to say, I have been with someone longer than I have been apart from them.

     That fact kind of crushes me a bit. For a moment I thought how amazing it would be, how I wished I could say that.  Isn’t that the true test of love?  Long term, forever love, for better or worse, in sickness and health until the day you die?  Isn’t that what people seek, love that is strong enough to stand the test of time.  When you have been together so long you don’t know nor want to know what it is like to be apart.

      I say to myself, that this type of love isn’t superior to another love.  It is just different.  Just because you were together longer doest meant that another situation cannot have just as much love and care involved.  Being a widow first hand I know this is true.  I had my husband in my life for 3 years in total 1 year dating then engaged and 2 years married.  It also made me relate even more to the movie.

     So back to the story our nice family now includes, A great husband, talented wife, loving daughter who is now married to a nice young man with a baby just born and man's best friend ever faithful companion.  With a dare I say a special soulful connection to his master.    

     The husband and his furry friend walk everyday to the train station where man and beast part ways.  The man off to work the dog taking a tour of the neighborhood then home, before returning to meet his master again by the train.  As they are happily living life the unspeakable happens.  The man dies and on that day dog waits and waits ever faithful yet confused, Until family comes to retrieve him.  All attempts at keeping and relocating him failed.  He escapes again and again to wait for his best friend and owner who will never return.  For ten long years he waits everyday he waits until his dying breath.  With dreams and memories flooding into this kind creatures mind.  His last moments of life, were filled with fleeting moments in time of him and his master running, walking, meeting at the train where they walked home.  Is that not love? a Loyal pure love, though they are owner and pet still you can’t help but see that it is a undeniable showcase of love.

It makes me think about how I related to the movie:

I can relate to the wife whose whole life was devastated at the loss of her mate a good man one who she spent most of her life with,  More years together than apart.

I related to the daughter who tried to keep her father’s dog to love him and to care for him but finally understood she had to let him go to do what he needed to do,  wait for his best friend.

  

I related also to the dog, to the loyalty of love, to knowing what it is like to love someone so much that you want to wait for them, even though you know in your heart you will never see them again.  To find comfort in the act of remembering and giving honor to what you had.  To still be waiting after all those years.

  

     Isn’t this love just as amazing as the love of those who have been together longer than they have been apart?

     I even started to think about how many widows (wives who lost husbands) and widowers (husbands who lost wives) never marry again, some just can’t seem to get past the loss, others cannot put another into the position that will always belong to their mate who passed.  Being a widow myself I understand the feeling at a point in time I could never see myself marrying again.  Sometimes even though I am still young I wonder will I ever find someone who I am compatible with in that way again.  Others may  see it as you trying to replace your love with another and that just won’t do.

     Some feel like our canine friend in the movie, who went off on his own, he could have stayed with his master’s daughter in their home, with the nice husband and new son.  But he left never returning almost as though no other person could replace and be his owner now.  He rather wait until they can be reunited.  Loyalty and love is a powerful thing.

     Still yet when it comes to love you can’t say one love is better than another.  That you cannot know what love is unless you have been together longer than apart, unless your willing to spend the rest of your life alone. I know that is not a reality, that doesn’t mean I don’t dream about it.  Wish I could say that sentence and have felt what its like.  To be with someone longer than I have been apart from them.  

     Maybe I won’t be gifted this experience in my life.    If I marry again it won’t be because I want to replace my husband.  He has his own place in my heart.  It will be because someone else was able to capture a piece of my heart. I don’t feel it is a dishonor to him.  If I don’t marry again it isn’t because I need to punish myself, It is not to honor his memory it is because the map of my life didn’t have that detour printed.  Maybe a bit because my husband treated me so well, I won’t accept someone who won’t treat me equally as good. 

  

     Either way… I know love is something that seems like a simple word, but with strong connections and I respect all versions of this connection, including those between man and beast.  Still when times are quiet and I have only my own thoughts I think about loving someone and being with someone longer than I have been apart from them.  We all can dream can’t we?

 

MOVIE:

 

  

Hachi: A Dog's Tale  2009

When his master dies, a loyal pooch named Hachiko keeps a regular vigil -- for more than a decade -- at the train station where he once greeted his owner every day in this touching drama based on a true story.

When Someone You Love Dies

This topic is one I am familiar with. Having lost my husband eleven years ago, having been there for others, during their losses. I understand the pain you feel and how living after the loss of a loved one’s life is hard… harder than some think.


Some people just ignore the feelings, and fill themselves with anything, and everything they can to distract from facing the pain. Some of us try to stay strong through the mixed emotions, until we have small break downs, usually in private away from others. Then some just break down deeply, and hard it seems like recovery would take a miracle, and we sometimes wonder will they follow their loved one?


First off there is no wrong way to mourn the loss of a loved one. But you must mourn, and face the feelings at sometime, even if we mourn as we go. We must also keep living and that can be hard for some of us to even think of.

Mourn as we go is a term taught to me by a good friend. One of my best friends actually, I called her Dee and she passed away this past month July 16th 2012. We started calling each other sisters, everyone else did, it didn’t matter that we looked nothing a-like or we talked differently. We both were big women and instantly people saw us as family. While we may not have been blood relatives we were Soul Sisters. We shared so much about our lives and feelings, we agreed to disagree on a lot of stuff but we still talked about it and made our jokes and crazy remarks. We laughed a lot and told lots of stories, we were both widows, and I was there for her during her loss. That brought back many feelings for me, and we were able to relate well since I understood what she was going through. Neither one of us thought we would marry again, so we had a little agreement. We would hang out and have adventures, be fat, drink and be merry. Live life as fully as we could and have a good time all the way. I would make sure she didn’t turn into the crazy cat lady, and she would make sure I didn’t turn into the smelly pee lady.


Mourn as you go was something we spoke about. I was totally devastated when my husband died, it was a shock. Dee’s hubby was very sick and his death was one that was coming, but still we all thought there was going to be more time. In the end we all knew his suffering came to an end, so it was a bitter sweet mourning. Thankful that his suffering ended, but yet sad all the same, and that they (as a couple) didn’t get to have that grow old together feeling. Many things felt like life cheated the family out of a great man, husband and father. But still everyone knew he was better off in the next realm. It was hard and mourning as she went, and teaching her children to mourn as they went was helpful in many ways.


For some reason people tend to rush the mourning process as if losing a loved one is not a full change in life. You have a whole part of you missing when you lose that person. Sometimes there are positive things when someone passes (if they were sick, hurting others, if they were not at rest, mentally stressed or strained to the point of disruption) but always the feeling of loss is negative and hurtful. Those mixed feelings are hard to deal with, a lot of people don’t understand that death is something that sometimes needs to happen, and you can feel many different ways about the death of a particular person, yet still have a hole in your heart for them. Mourn as you go is the art of releasing emotions as they come, even taking the time to mourn and release in positive ways. Laughing and smiling sharing stories, crying and leaning on another (allowing yourself to feel vulnerable and protected), thinking about the good times, the bad, and the sad, feeling lonely and hurt, yet still celebrating the time you had with them.


Mourning is not an exact science and there is no time limit on it either. Some people tend to believe that after a certain time period you should be over it already. They have no idea how to mourn.


First off losing a loved one is a permanent situation. Once you lose you cannot get it back, there is no replacement that will heal that missing part of you. I personally use this example to explain losing someone you love. If you lose a hand, arm, leg, your sight, hearing, sense of smell etc. Life will never be the same, you keep living but you live differently. You adapt to the loss of your senses or to the loss of a body part. You don’t do things exactly the same anymore but you keep going. That is what losing someone you love is like, you adapt to life without them, life will not be the same and you will always remember life before the loss, you just keep living and adapt.


Every loss will be different and your feelings and emotions will develop differently. That doesn’t mean the loss of one person is worse than another, it is different and you deal with it differently. But you must deal, and you must mourn, and you must go on. We shouldn’t be ashamed of mourning; it is part of moving forward after loss. We should see it almost as a celebration, to love someone so much that they affect our lives deeply. We must see some joy in that pain, because we have to have been very happy to be so sad. It is all up to the individual on how you mourn but I have found mourning as I go to help me in many ways. Not being ashamed of my emotions and living and mourning in the moment has brought out my humanity and allowed me to share myself with others during a hard time in my life.


I stopped asking why, I stopped thinking what if, I realized I was blessed to have such a special friend who became my sister and had to go on to the other life, the best life after this one. I will mourn as I go and never forget how much she meant to me. Why would I want to forget?