So Very Angry at You

Yes, we are angry. We are very angry at you. But I am going to speak for me, and the anger that burns inside. The anger that I try and suppress because. I really want to yell at you. I want to scream and shout and just be angrier than you ever saw in our 32 years of marriage. I want to pound the walls, stomp and throw things. I want to break things. I want you to know just how angry I am, but you're not here.

You didn't listen. Oh you heard what we were saying. You heard us tell you, ask you, BEG you to get up and move more. You would make a joke out of  it when we went shopping and you had to walk a little bit. Saying that I was making you get your exercise in for the day. I wanted to do more. I wanted you to get in better shape. I wanted to do the things we once did. Climb mountains, hike trails, go places and you not have to stop repeatedly to catch your breath. I wanted you healthier, I admit it, I was greedy, I wanted you here with me longer. I asked you, when it was safe, when you stopped at a truck stop or rest area, to walk if possible. To park as far away from the building as was safe and walk back and forth. If it was safe and if it was daylight, to walk around the truck or walk around part of the parking area. I begged you to move more. You had exercise bands, I have no idea what happened to them, they may have been thrown away not knowing what they were, or you may have lost them at some point when you had to change trucks. It doesn't matter, I doubt you used them anyway. If only, if only you had moved just a bit more. If only you had tried, but you didn't try. You didn't try and I'm so angry.

 We tried to get you to eat better, to eat just a little less. That part you were actually working on. I remember the days when you would embarrass us at the buffet when you would come back with a plate so full we were amazed that it all stayed on there. Wishing above wishing that you would slack off. You did, start to do just that, but you still did not eat healthy. You complained that was difficult on the truck. Yes, I know, but others do it. It just takes a little more effort than popping something into a microwave. I even bought you that ninja cooker, the one sitting on the counter here that you never tried. I made a special effort to save you portions of what we had here, freezing them so that they would fit into the small freezer that you had. You said that you actually liked them even if they didn't have meat. But it was too little, too late.

 We tried, really tried, to get you to work at losing some of the extra weight that you carried around the middle. I told you of all the reports that said that all of that belly fat caused so many problems. I told you that if you would lose that, you would ease a lot of your medical problems. It was just too difficult. The way you chose to eat and the lack of exercise, it simply wasn't - didn't happen.

 We tried, to get you to calm down. You would get so very frustrated out there. You didn't have a smart phone so you had to rely on us to go online here at home and help you find places and how to get in and around them. Many times we had to do a search and find because your information was limited. Many times your dispatcher was the one finding what you needed. He did have access to things we do not. You would get so worked up, so afraid, when your hours were limited and you feared being late or running out of time and not being able to get there at all. It always worked out in the end, but you always had to get so angry. You feared losing the job I know. You liked this job and the people, you enjoyed driving for a change but the frustrations always got you. Even as we tried to calm you down. How many times did you hang up on me? How many times did you tell me that you never could get us to do anything, simply because it took us a while to find what you needed? We tried to calm you, but you didn't listen.

 I'm so angry at you. I need you here, to help me with things that I have never had to do before. I need you here to help me handle the things I don't want to handle. I want you here to tell me a million times what you're going to do, or need to do, all the while knowing you aren't going to do any of it. I need you here to help make decisions. I need you to ask me if I want that shirt or those flowers or tell me that once the Discover Loan is paid of you're going to buy me a new car because the Explorer has seen better days. I'm angry, because I'm having to stand here, look out the window at the same scene that was there yesterday and the day before, and yet it is so different because you will never cross that yard again. I'm so angry because I'll never hear you shouting across the house asking me something I can't hear, for me to get up walk in there and have you ask me to get you a cup of coffee, meaning I have to walk back across the house, prepare it and then take it back..I'm angry, because I'll never hear you call me, I'll never see you walk in that door again, I'll never see you throwing sticks for the dog, or handing me that bag of laundry as you sheepishly mention that you should have done some of it on the road..I'll never feel your arms around me again, or hear you complain that you don't want any of that vegetable crap, lets go to the Cracker Barrel.

I'm angry at you, and there's nothing I can do about it but pray. Take it one day, one step, one breath, one prayer at a time and wait for the anger to pass as I go through the process called grieving.