The original timestamp reads "9/5/12, 12:23 AM" - obviously I had no idea of it, but I was three years out from my wedding day. I was also within six weeks of moving out of Binghamton.
Not That This Written Thing Really Rereads Right, Either
I had thought, at the time I decided not to send the first card, that it was the exclamation point that had ruined things (it had looked wrong without it, but much worse with it), or the probably-too-inarticulate thing I'd tried writing about God's love to people whose spiritual status I didn't really know. It didn't sound right. And it probably wasn't straightforward enough. I had to try again, even though I'd spent quite a while drafting the message the first time.
Tonight I tore open the sealed envelope (still there, on a dresser), made myself reread it. It probably wouldn't have been either of those things. It probably would have been the last sentence: "If there's anything at all I can do for you two from here, please let me know."
You two - for something that would have arrived on the day she died, had I sent it on the day I'd intended, that probably would have been the problem.
Of all the people in Syracuse's folk-dance group, her husband, C., is my favorite. A middle-aged college professor, teaching chemistry, owning at least one t-shirt off of ThinkGeek. Quirky and gentle, classy as he guided me (my headlight-freeze very badly, or not at all, concealed) through English country dances (at which, like so many dance genres, I do not excel). My sympathies lie with the geeks of this world; I would have liked to have known what to get him talking about (that I could have followed, that is - probably not chemistry), since I'm sure it would have been fun or good to hear. Somehow I'd missed how close he and his wife were, but later I could tell when I looked at their Facebook pages, at his webspace - he'd written dances in her honor more than once.
Their marriage had been somewhat late, and now, I had recently learned, he would have to watch her die; it reminded me of C.S. Lewis losing Joy. I reread most of A Grief Observed by cell-phone light in the dark, trying to guess how it'd feel, what to say. I ended up unsure there'd be anything helpful I could really say.
I went to the local gift shop back on Saturday before I picked up Leah for the movie we went to see; I bought the card for the second attempt. This card was better, being handmade, like the ones she'd made when well. I'd try again to get it right.
I meant to write the message today or tonight, but a busy day at work, dinner-making, prayer group, grocery-shopping got in the way. I scrawled myself a reminder on my whiteboard. But as my last thing tonight before going to bed, I also went back to Facebook, went to C.'s page to see if anyone else had said anything - any piece of information that would help me know what to say.
...How did I - ? Well...it's true that I wasn't on Facebook as much last week as I might have been. Either way, somehow the program couldn't tell what news I would have thought was important. I saw other people's sympathy there on his page before I saw the official announcement with the date - August 30th. The first card would have gotten to them that day. I read through the obit, checked the funeral day and time. I'll be at work - and I don't know that I really know them well enough, anyway, especially her. She must have been at folk dancing sometimes - but I don't have any memories that are definitely of her, only possibly.
Swearing in my head (which I actually rarely do), I reached up to my whiteboard, swiping my thumb across the green letters. Too blunt a gesture now, but I was frustrated and sad. Write to C[--], it says now, with only a smudge where I'd had and G[--]. A blank card, still bagged, still out in the backseat of my car.