Dear eema, 

Now that the condo has been sold and all of my boxes of memories have been given away, thrown away or put away, I feel a kind of silence has filled up the space around me. Like the air itself has let out one, big sigh. I wonder if the the new owners will feel you in that space from time to time. 
They'd be lucky if they did. 



Today is the last day of 2015. I know that there's a tendency to look back at a year that was full of challenges and say, "this was a bad year." But I don't feel that way. Why blame the year? It wasn't the year's fault that your time came. Or that my beloved dog, Lucy's time was also up. Or if I did or didn't get the jobs I wanted, or if I got sick, or didn't get sick. The year was just being like any other year. A year in a person's life full of... life. 

Around the time that I felt you weren't going to be with us much longer, I upped up my meditation practice to include mindfulness. Mindfulness is mostly about being fully present in the moment with an open awareness and curiosity to what comes up. With no judgement. A focused attention to what's going on in you and around you. An intention to pay attention. Easier said than done but I committed to it and it's brought me a calm and a peace that i'm a grateful for. I think partly because of this practice, when the time that I'd feared since I was a little girl finally did arrive, I didn't feel like running, hiding or avoiding. I just wanted to be there. 
Fully there. 
For you. 
For me. 
I actually surprised myself. I didn't think I'd ever be able to, not only watch you die, but be a sort of tour guide on your journey. I feel like it's the best thing I've ever had the honor to take part in. 
I'm writing a book about it, for you. I know you'd like that. 

About a month ago I dreamt that you didn't know that you were dead and I had to break the news to you. You sobbed and I comforted you telling you that it's okay. That it's all okay. My crying woke me up. But after that night, you seem pretty happy in my dreams and I love that I get to see you so often now. Oh, and last week when I got my new iPhone, I asked Siri to play me a song. Out of the thousands and thousands of songs she could choose from, she played the one I haven't heard since you've been gone. 
Your ringtone. 
Que Sera, Sera
Thank you for that. 

I don't know if I will ever fully get used to a world without you in it, but I can still hear your voice in my head tell me what you've always told me, enjoy your life. be happy.

So I will. 

I love you always,

annie