# 141: THE FOLLOWING MORNING: THE 9TH OF SEPTEMBER, 1994, (PART 22 )(C)
BLOG: #141: THE FOLLOWING MORNING: THE 9TH OF SEPTEMBER, 1994, PART 22 –(C )–
I tried, I tried SO hard. But I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t sleep in the hospital bed even though I wanted to. My Tony was gone and there was no other way I thought I could reach him except through the bed.
I touched the sheets and the pillow and the blanket. But that is all there was. The empty bed and its belongings stared back at me in its horrible unkind and unforgiving whiteness and the silver railing that had kept Tony from falling out shared its own coldness with me as I leaned across it still touching everything.
I did not ask my tears to come. They just came. And they wouldn’t stop. I tried to wipe them away but they kept coming.
Finally I left the bedroom and forced myself to go and lay on the couch. But I couldn’t sleep. I just laid there the whole time. My eyes wide open and full of my non-stop tears. There was nothing but silence in the apartment. There are three kinds of silence, did you know that My Readers? The first one is the Silence of Death. That is when a person you love has died and has gone to be with God. And you are left alone. The second one is also The Silence of Death but this second one is for those left behind. It is when the entire world STOPS. It stops for them because their loved one has passed away. It doesn’t REALLY STOP. The time keeps going except the one left behind who is dealing with the Death can not deal with time moving forward at that moment. THEIR WORLD HAS STOPPED. ENTIRELY. IT HAS ENDED FOR THEM.
On The 8th of September, 1994, my world ended for me and came crashing down. I was alone and had no one to turn to. I wondered where Tony was. Oh, I knew. On this 9th of September, 1994. Friday, my Tony’s body lay in the hospital morgue with a sheet covering him. What I couldn’t figure out was why he wasn’t here with ME like he was supposed to be this morning.
I don’t know how much time passed as I continued to lay on the couch but yes, I knew it was morning and I heard someone coming up the stairs. Two voices. Then one said as they passed by my place: “And this is where that man died.”
I recognized the voice as belonging to my friend Claire’s daughter. They lived downstairs in Apt. #5
at that time. It wasn’t really her fault what she had said, but she made me cry more.
After I was super sure she and her friend had gone back downstairs, I came outside and leaned against the bannister rail and looked up at the sky.
I asked God: This is me, Mrs. Mary Ann Feola. Why didn’t You answer my prayer last night? Why am I still here? I asked You to take ME HOME TOO. Why didn’t You answer my prayer and take ME too? I wanna go too. I wanna be with my Tony.
I looked downstairs at the empty area where the ambulance had been parked the night before and I could still see it parked there even though it wasn’t really there at all. It had taken my Tony away hours ago. But I could see it still. It was all I COULD see. My eyes could only focus on that one spot. I could only see the ambulance that wasn’t really there now. Nothing else. For many days and nights afterward I would go outside and look downstairs and that would be what I would see.
The 9th of September was long and I liked it even less than the night before. The first real day of My Widowhood. My first real day without my husband Tony. My Tony who was gone and wasn’t coming back. EVER. God had taken him HOME.
I SO wanted very much to go too.
But what could I do? I was only 45 years old. Forty-five years old and a Widow. I wanted to go HOME too. I didn’t want to be left alone. I wanted to be with my Tony SO VERY MUCH.
I had asked God for that for me so I could be with my Tony but God had told me gently, that HIS answer was NO. Not now. Not yet.
Please……. I begged. I want go Home. I want to be with my Tony.
How could God tell me NO, when Tony was all I had?
To go Home and be with him again was all I wanted.
Blog : #142 Part 23 (D) to come soon.
Aloha,
Your Mary Ann-san
Mary Annさんはカリフォルニア生まれです。
旅行で訪れたハワイに魅せられて21歳の時にオアフ島にやってきました。
パパイヤ工場で20年間働き、退職後はハワイ島のキラウエア火山から４６キロ離れたヒロの郊外に住んでいます。
今は猫との暮らしを楽しんでいます。
初心者から楽しく英会話♪
本八幡・津田沼・西船橋・佐倉
英会話・英語塾ネイティブ講師レッスン
バイリンガル講師派遣
