03 February 2010

Warm Sands

This morning was difficult. I got to YVR at around 6:45 late late late and Westjet had already closed the gate for my flight to Palm Springs. The check-in staff managed to get me through but I don't think they expected me to make the flight since I had to get through security and U.S. Customs and the flight was to begin boarding at 7:10. Another testament to not bringing any carry-on crap...I was at the gate at around 7:20. The flight was in the air at 7:50. YVR is getting streamlined for some reason; good for them! :)

I got choked up a few times on the flight. The original reason for a large part of this trip was planned as a recuperation trip for Murad once he got out of the hospital. We had planned to hang out by the pool, check out the Palm Springs gondola and the shopping centers in Palm Springs and Palm Desert and some of the other sites such as Andreas Canyon and the Wind turbine tours. I had a picture we took of us in our seats on our flight to Chicago in November that brought me to tears again. It just seems to surreal to be doing this trip without him. Now it's just a trip alone for me to try and catch a grip on my life again and lick my wounds. I can't put into words how much I miss him.

I've been reading a book called "Life After Loss" that my friend Neall gave me and quite often passages in it will choke me up. Today I came upon part of the grief healing exercises where it suggests writing letters to your lost one at particular intervals over the first year of grieving and to read the letters regularly until you can do it without breaking down. I think this is a great idea and will be an exercise I will begin attempting tomorrow. I know most of what I want to say to him, but I want to be sure that I don't miss anything...I'm looking at this as being a one-time deal, as if he's only going to be able to hear me read it to him only once, therefore it needs to be as complete as possible. I am planning more thoughtful (and not so sleep-deprived) hours at the pool tomorrow so this will be a good thing to do.

Tomorrow I am also planning on going to the El Paseo shopping district. Tomorrow afternoon is the El Paseo Art Walk, I think it might be interesting to check out.

Friday will be a complete pool deck day before the Los Angeles crew shows up for the weekend in the evening.

...

I have something that's bothering me. I went to Murad's gravesite last Friday evening before coming downtown after work. The week after the funeral I had put two beautiful roses on his grave along with a picture of him with some writing on the back. On Friday, one of the roses was gone. It didn't blow away; there are other flowers there. I'm not sure what to make of this and I'm trying to not let it bother me but it does cross my mind again from time to time. There was no indication with what I left there who might have written the notes and put the picture and roses there, so I'm not sure why someone would take one of the roses? First I thought that someone else in the cemetery needed a flower, thus took one from Murad's grave since there were two there, but that sounds kinda stupid. Then I thought maybe someone thought having two there was 'inappropriate', thus removed one. Maybe it was offensive to have two there? I'm not sure. I don't really understand this, but it kinda bugs me. I think it's sort of insensitive, like someone is judging someone else's grieving process. Sorry, I just needed to rant about it.

Okay, I'm off to bed. Good night.

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