What Happened to Kurtis Wigton?

Someone keeps typing "What happened to Kurtis Wigton" into search engines, and always stumbles back to here.  So before I see it pop up too many times, and before the lump that rises in my throat each time I read that and wonder who it is that is asking gets any larger, let me answer your question for you...

This is all you need to know about what really happened to my husband...

He filled many of his dreams.  He fell in love.  He found a wife.  He had a child.

He learned to cook.  And do laundry.  And clean the toilet the right way.  I know - because I taught him.

He sang.  He played the guitar.  He found peace, solace, comfort, and amusement in music.

He stood in the ocean, and on top of mountains.  He gazed at the Grand Canyon, and gambled (and lost) in Vegas.  He kissed Mickey Mouse.

He found a job that he loved, and learned it is not what you do with yourself, but how you do it that matters.

He laughed.  He smiled.  He cried.

He loved.  Deeply.  And passionately.

He also died. Far too soon.  Long before he, and those who loved him were ready.  But of the nearly 13 000 days he graced this planet, that day is only one.  0.00007% of his time on this Earth.  And thus deserves only a footnote.

I know I concentrate too much on his death.  I'm working hard to see beyond it.  And trying not to let that define him, even if sometimes I fail.

So when you ask "What happened to Kurtis Wigton?", knowing that you are really looking for those last few moments, I ask you why does it matter?  Why should be be defined by how we leave, rather than what we do when we are here.

So what really happened to Kurtis Wigton?  What would he want you to take away from his life?

He lived.  A full, complete life, albeit a short one.  His life, my life, and your life are a mixture of good and bad.  Easy and hard.  Happy and sad.  And when he left this world, I have no doubts that he was happy.  His life was full.  And our corner of the world was a little better because he had been in it.

He changed his world.  He went from a place where he felt he had nothing, to a place where he felt he had it all.  And he did it just by putting one foot in front of the other, and keeping on keeping on.

Yes, I watched him change his world.  And in the process, he also changed mine.  He taught me more about myself and what I wanted... about love and life... in our 5 years together than any of the 27 years that came before.

That's what happened to Kurtis Wigton.  I hope you are all that lucky.  I hope it happens to us all....

Missing You

Image can be found here...

"Every step I take, every move I make, every single day, every time I pray, I'll be missing you....
Thinkin of the day, when you went away. What a life to take, what a bond to break. I'll be missing you..."

To say I miss Kurtis is an understatement. I know of no word in the English language - or any language for that matter - that fully explains about the way I feel when I think of him, wish he were here.

I miss his smile. His laugh. His voice. I miss having someone to go to the movies with. To help pay the bills and mow the lawn. I miss the intimate moments in bed.

But more than all that, I just miss him. His physical presence. Just him being here.

I know people look at me three years out, and think the depth of my emotions is too deep. That time should have erased a little of that miss. But I don't think it ever does, for anyone. Deep down, in those private spaces we reserve only for ourselves, it is always there. And that's not a bad thing.

The heart is the only thing I know of that has infinite capacity. It has room to love one, two, or a dozen children equally, without measure. It has room to love a husband, mother, father, friend. And it is in that heart, in the spot that is reserved for Kurtis alone, that my missing him resides. It lives right next to the love, intertwined with the love. In a pocket that will never go away.

Does the missing him ever change? Does it ever get easier? Some moments I say yes. The edges soften with time. Other moments I say no. It's always cutting just as deep. It all depends on what else is in my heart at the moment. Whether there is something wrapping it, protecting it, to soften the blow.  What I do know, however, is soft or hard, close to the surface or buried deep, it is always there.  

And when I see those things that remind me of him, or see that gap in my life where he once stood, I think of him.  Of what we had, and what we should have had.  Of where and who we were.  And I long to feel all those things again.  

I miss that.

And I miss him.

Image can be found here....

Inside the Pressure Cooker

The first Christmas gift my future mother-in-law gave to me was a pressure cooker.  Kurt was excited. That's the way his mom cooked her stew.  I was terrified.  I had never used one, and all I saw was an accident waiting to happen.  I saw the lid flying off well before the stew was ready, propelled by the building pressure underneath.  The slow simmering safety of the crock pot was more familiar.  And so Kurt never did get a stew cooked the way his mom made it.  Not from me.  And that first Christmas gift still sits untouched in the back of my cupboards (sorry Mom!)...

But I feel a lot like that pressure cooker these days.  There is so much inside me, bottled up, pent up, and still building.  The day - probably the moment - that Kurt died I shut my lid tight.  I sealed in the pain, the hurt, the sadness, the guilt, along with a host of emotions I'm probably not even aware of to this day.  Closed the rest of the world off from what was hidden deep inside me, and sealed that latch tight.  It made it easier for the people around me.  And easier for me to pretend.  To cope.  Sometimes even forget.  But deep down, where the emotions lived, they were still brewing, still building.  Feeding off one another, and getting stronger.

For over three years now, I have left it like that.  Really, I'm the only one aware that anything is left inside.  But the contents of my cooker have not stopped brewing.  The pressure inside has been constantly building.  And I know I am getting to that crisis point I was so afraid would happen.  I know it is only time before my lid blows, releasing the demons that dwell deep within.  I try daily to contain them.  I don't want the world to see what lies beneath the mask I have so carefully created.  But more and more they are starting to slowly slip out - inopportune emotions, reactions at inopportune times.

Nothing - not even the strongest of devices - can contain an infinite amount of steam, amount of pressure.  Even I know that to get that stew to cook properly, you have to vent the excess to the outside world.  But I have been unable to do that.  Afraid to do that.  Because I am not sure that, once that vent is open, I can control and contain the rate at which the contents will escape.  nAnd I'm head for disaster.

Some day, in the not too distant future, I know that my fears will come true.  I know that my cooker will prove insufficient for the burdens I carry.  I know my lid will blow off, and rather than a controlled vent it will become a dangerous rush of power.  And I feel helpless to stop it.

Watch out, world.  I'm about to open myself up, and you will be able to peer inside the pressure cooker.  And when that day comes, you had better duck, because the force at which the lid explodes will be massive.  And even i have no idea, after three years of simmering, just what will emerge...