Some Infrequently Asked Questions

Q. When did you and Deb meet, move in together, get married, etc.?
A. A brief timeline:
Dec. 8, 2000 -- Deb and I meet on my birthday at Olive Garden when we show up separately with friends.
Dec. 10 -- After spending a couple of days working up some nerve, I ask our friend Erin for her phone number. After spending an hour working up more nerve, I call her. She's not home. I go to work and find that she has called me while I was driving in. We make a lunch date.
Shortly after -- We have the lunch date. Seems to me it was a Monday.
2001 -- We date frequently, but since she is distrustful of men after a series of bad relationships, we start out as friends. I start showing up at her place on Sunday afternoons with bagels and we read the newspaper together. I meet her mother. Deb and I go ice skating, the only time we did that. Her mother and sister visit. Sometime that summer I tell her I love her. It takes her a while to believe me. Eventually, she does.
New Year's Eve 2001 -- We ... um ... start a tradition. Use your imagination.
March 2002 -- Her car is repossessed. Our first real crisis. I help her find a used car.
Juneish 2002 -- Deb has been working days while I've been working nights. We have little time together. I make a fateful decision: I ask her to shack up with me. She agrees. We find a house and agree to split the rent. Then on the day we are to sign the lease, she is let go from her job. Undaunted, we find a cheaper place and move in together.
New Year's Eve 2002 -- The tradition continues.
January 2003 -- Deb finds a new job. She keeps it until we leave Colorado.
Spring 2003 -- We visit Disneyland.
Sometime in fall -- We visit my mother. She approves of Deb.
Dec. 7, 2003 -- I propose. She accepts.
Shortly thereafter -- I have the panic attack to end all panic attacks.
Dec. 24, 2003 -- We nearly break up after I tell her about my doubts, but we decide to take it five minutes at a time.
New Year's Eve 2003 -- Yada yada yada.
June 13, 2004 -- We get married.
August 2004 -- We honeymoon at Disney World. We might as well have stayed, because ...
October 2004 -- I quit my job in Colorado and we move to Florida. We find a small rental house.
New Year's Eve: "Skyrockets in flight ... "
March 2005 -- During a visit to her ob-gyn, a lump is discovered in Deb's breast.
A couple of weeks after that: Deb is hospitalized with a bad cold. During her stay, the lump is biopsied, and found to be malignant.
Shortly after that -- She undergoes weeks of chemotherapy to shrink the mass.
June 2005 -- Deb has a mastectomy.
July and August 2005 -- She undergoes radiation treatment.
September 2005 -- Thinking the cancer is licked, we start house shopping.
November 2005 -- We move into our house.
Late December 2005 -- Nodes reappear on Deb's chest wall. We know it's bad news.
New Year's Eve 2005 -- The tradition is broken. She doesn't feel well enough to even go to a Barenaked Ladies concert. At her insistance I go alone, and have a miserable time.
February 2006 -- She's hospitalized with breathing problems and restarts chemo.
Through September -- She is hospitalized twice more. We go to Disney World one last time when my friend Matt brings his family.
Sept. 11 -- She dies.

Q. Deb was married before?
A. Yes. She didn't like to talk about him. From what I understand, after they got married, he quit his job and moved them in with his mother, who thought he could do no wrong. He also expected her to support them on her salary. They divorced after less than a year. I've never met the man, and if I did, I'd injure him badly, and if I couldn't, I'd pay someone to do it. Seriously.

Q. What is your favorite memory of Deb?
A. The way she looked at me on our wedding day.

Q. What would you change if you could?
A. Besides her getting sick and dying? I'd have married her sooner. She hinted that she wanted to for months before I proposed. I should have taken her up on it.

Q. When was your first kiss?
A. On the ice rink in Colorado Springs.

Q. Did you guys fight?
A. We never had a screaming match. When we got angry, we went to our separate corners until we cooled down, then we talked it out. We never went to bed angry.

Q. Would you, knowing all the pain you'd have to endure, do it all over again?
A. Hell, yeah.

A little rambling on the relativity of time

It's been six months since Deb passed away, but it feels like yesterday and 100 years ago all at the same time.

I can still feel her head under my chin. I can still feel her hand in mine. I can still remember what it felt like to run my thumb along her chin when caressed her cheek. I can even feel her squeezing my tush if I stop and think about it.

But it seems like forever since she's been gone, since I held her, since we kissed.

It felt like that when we were together. We only knew each other for 5 3/4 years, but it always felt like we'd been together forever and that we had just met. Then, it was a good feeling. Now, not so much.

I used to go into stores, see things I know she liked and automatically think, "Deb would really like that," then have to stop myself from getting it. Now I find myself thinking, "Deb would have liked that" more often.

Slowly, painfully, she's becoming past tense.

Some things have become easier. I can listen to songs we used to sing to in the car without automatically breaking into tears. I can talk about her without having to excuse myself for a good cry. I even went to Disney World by myself and didn't spend the whole time thinking about who should have been sitting next to me.

I've even started getting used to coming home and not finding her in the recliner, watching "Countdown with Keith Olbermann."

But I haven't stopped missing her.

Things I miss this Valentines Day (and every day)

1. Deb's saying, "I love you, sweetie."
2. Her saying, "Honey, I'm hooooome!"
3. Her smile.
4. The fake smile she gave when I told her to smile.
5. The even faker smile she gave when I told her to mean it.
6. Her kiss.
7. The way her hand felt on mine.
8. The mole.
9. Her hugs.
10. The feeling when she'd keep hugging me when I would stop.
11. The feeling I had when I didn't want to stop hugging when she did.
12. The whistle she gave when she caught me on the way to the shower.
13. Her "puppy dog eyes" look.
14. Her "hur-hur-hur" laugh.
15. Her girlish giggle.
16. Her naughty giggle.
17. Any of her laughs.
18. Her blue eyes.
19. The look she gave me that made me feel like I was the only man in the world.
20. The joking way she said, "Yes, dear," like a old lady.
21. Her booty.
22. The way she said, "Thank you for putting up with me," like it was a hardship.
23. The feel of her caress on my face as I'd lean in for a kiss.
24. The way she'd prance when she pretended to be a model.
25. Her singing in the car, especially during "Bohemian Rhapsody," when she'd sing the high parts and I'd sing bass.
26. The way my hand felt when I slipped it under her leg while I was driving.
27. Her dancing.
28. The way she'd sing at concerts, like she didn't care if anyone else was around.
29. The way we'd dance during "Call and Answer" at Barenaked Ladies concerts.
30. Folding her clothes when I did the laundry.
31. Watching her sleep.
32. The way the top of her head felt under my chin when she stood in front of me.
33. Her karaoke dance (it's impossible to describe ... it was full-body singing)
34. Her giggle when I nibbled on her ear.
35. Her cooking.
36. The way she'd scratch my back.
37. That almost invisible scar she had near her upper lip where she had a mole removed.
38. The way she'd get obsessed over one videogame and play it constantly, then just drop it one day.
39. How she'd start knitting projects then set them aside and never finish them. The important thing was she kept trying.
40. The way she'd always say, "I miss the kitties," whenever we were gone from the house more than a couple of hours.
41. The way she'd say "I miss Boo," ever since that cat died.
42. The way she'd call for capital punishment for people who abused their animals on those animal rescue shows on "Animal Planet."
43. Washing her back.
44. Filling her water bottle when she was too weak to get out of bed.
45. The way she flashed her 1/2-carat engagement ring around like it was 20 carats.
46. How she'd go with me to baseball games, even though she wasn't even sure what teams were on the field.
47. Fixing her coffee, and how she'd tell me I made a mean cup of coffee for someone who didn't drink it himself.
48. The way she'd wiggle her eyebrows when she said something naughty.
49. Having someone who knows why "You look good in anything" is the all-purpose answer to all of life's questions.
50. The way she'd whine, "Awww, Riiiicky!" after I'd say, "Looocy, you got some 'splainin' to do!"
51. Opening the car door for her.
52. Telling each other, "Valentine's Day is for amateurs."
53. Fixing her ramen.
54. The way she'd sing along with the Winnie the Pooh ride at Disney World.
55. The way she stuffed her jacket pockets with things because she didn't want to carry a purse.
56. The way she'd play on the computer until it was almost time to go to work even though I'd nag her about the time, and she'd have me microwave a Hot Pocket as she hopped in the shower to gobble before she went to work.
57. Calling her "Girlie-Girl."
58. Her saying "Mini Cooper" every time we passed one.
59. The way she'd have me fill out an Amazon wish list so she'd know what to get me for Christmas.
60. Her trying to explain soap opera storylines to me when I was silly enough to ask what was going on.
61. Buying her DVDs she said she wanted but she'd never open them.
62. Having her pick out clothes for me at the store.
63. Having her thank me by saying, "You're the bestest hubby in the world, you know that?"
64. Finding a strand of her hair on my clothes.
65. How Kraft macaroni and cheese was her favorite dish.
66. Her snoring.
67. How she delighted in telling gruesome tales from her days on the crime beat at the Miami Herald, then would coo over a cat food commercial.
68. How she called soap operas "her stories," like she was an 80-year-old woman.
69. Standing next to her at our bedroom window in Colorado Springs, watching the fireworks off Pikes Peak on New Years Eve.
70. Waking up beside her and us vowing never to leave the bed ever again.
71. Calling her on my dinner break, even if there was nothing to talk about.
72. Holding her jacket when she went clothes shopping, and her telling me, "At least I'm not making you play Purse Boy."
73. Hearing her exclaim "Tigger!" when we spotted him at Disney World.
74. Finding her staring at me, and when I asked her why, she'd say, "I'm checking out my hubby. Nothing wrong with that, is there?"
75. Staring at her, and when she asked me why, I'd say, "I'm checking out my girl. Nothing wrong with that, is there?"
76. How half a glass of wine would get her tipsy.
77. Having her tell me, "If it wasn't for you, I'd be curled up in a ball somewhere," and knowing the same was true for me.
78. Waiting up til midnight on Christmas Eve to open presents.
79. Hearing her whine, "I don't wanna go to work. I only go because they pay me. If they didn't pay me, I wouldn't go."
80. Our ritual when I came home from work. Her: "How was your day?" Me: "WAAAAAH!!!" Her: "Same as usual, huh?"
81. How she had a couple dozen pairs of shoes, but always ended up wearing the $6 pair from Wal-Mart.
82. How she'd refer to our current president as "The Moron" or "The Idiot."
83. Watching her guzzle down bottled water like a camel.
84. Having her correct me when I told her she guzzled down bottled water like a camel, because camels can go for months without water and can store up to 20 gallons, and therefore don't need to guzzle water.
85. Her fuzzy black jacket.
86. Her talking about how we were going to do things "in 10 or 12 years," even towards the end.
87. Having her say, "Do you want to be left alone?" and having her understand when the answer was "Yes."
88. Hearing about her dreams.
89. Telling her, "You make me happy."
90. Her smell on the pillow.
91. Slipping my hand into her back pocket.
92. Having her sleep while I drove, knowing it meant she trusted me.
93. Knowing to hand her six packets of sugar whenever she asked for it in a restaurant, because I knew that's how many she put in her coffee.
94. Having her tell me, "How did I get so lucky?"
95. Her "Huked On Fonix Werked Fur Mee!" T-shirt.
96. Watching her with small children.
97. Running my thumb over her chin when I held her face.
98. Her nibbling on my ear.
99. The feel of her head on my shoulder.