Waiting

Waiting.  We did lots of that my love.  Waiting to hear your name called, the ever privacy compliant Richard S.  We would go back together, wait for the blood draw, wait for the doctor, wait while the promise of your future slowly drips into your system.  We were always together.  Even when I couldn't be there in the same room as your scan I would be there, toward the end I would undress you and help you into those fashionable gowns, and when you were through I would help you dress again.  We would sit and just be together, you were ready to go and waiting for your turn to enter the room with the machine to tell our future.  In the beginning I would be out in the waiting room, you would dress yourself in that sexy gown and I would wait and listen to the quiet of the waiting room.  I still remember that Friday night in May.  We knew it was cancer but didn't know where.  I sat in that room waiting and worrying.  That was just the beginning.  I will be in that same waiting room.

I'm sure you remember in October, waiting in that room.  I was in having a more detailed mammogram because the first showed something unfamiliar.  You were sitting in that waiting room & I could just see the tension and worry in your whole body.  I had results before I came out to see you, I gave you a smile and a nod from the doorway I entered and the relief and tears just flooded your face.  You hugged me so tight & we left that waiting room hand in hand.

Nearly a year later, you had been gone seven months & I did the waiting on my own.  A growth was found on an ovary and it was being monitored.  I went to the same building where you had your treatments and took the elevator up to have an ultrasound.  This would determine if the growth was stable and therefore not a concern or if there was further growth.  I went in that building, I hadn't been in there since I was there with you.  There were no results before I left and there was no you sitting waiting for me to come out.  There was just me taking the elevator down and staring at the oncology office as I exited the building.  All my thoughts were of our little girl.  Relief and tears hit me as I read the electronic notification of the all clear. I did not have to return to that building, to that office on the first floor.

Here I am, you've been gone one year and seven days.  I'll be waiting once again.  I'll go to that waiting room where the machine determined your fate, we waited for 43 hours.  The phone rang on Mothers Day and we had our answer.

I love you handsome man.

take care,