Twenty one years later.

Twenty one years ago today my life changed forever. It was that day that my mom called me to tell me that my brother Mike was in the hospital and that I needed to get there quickly, they didn't know if he was going to make it. It was 21 years ago when I saw a fear in my parents eyes that I had never seen before. I watched my parents go through the most gut wrenching experience any parent will ever endure. I, myself was going through the absolute worst thing that I had ever been through. My brother, my idol, my favorite person in the world was dying and there was nothing anybody could do to save him. I was heartbroken, scared, sad and beyond devastated. But you know what? I would go back to that time in a heartbeat. Without question, without thinking twice. Knowing what I know now I would go back just to experience being a family again. Just to feel something as a family. We were suffering, we were broken but we were a whole family. I had a mom, a dad, my brothers and we were whole. So much has changed since then. If someone would have told me that 21 years later they would be gone and the rest of the family as I knew it would fall apart, that there would be no cousins, no more holidays, no more traditions for my own kids to see I never would have believed it.

I am so lucky to have had the family I once had. So fortunate that we were so close and there was so much love. So glad that I knew that love and that feeling of being a part of a family where we all cared about each other and we all came together when we needed to. I never, ever want my kids or anyone else to read my blog and think I am ever feeling sorry for myself. I realize there are so many people who never had what we had. That never know how much their parents love them or never bond with their sibling the way that Mike and I did. I am so grateful that I had it. But you know that saying "it's better to love and lost that to never have loved at all?" sometimes it's true but sometimes it just sucks. When you love somebody or in my case your whole family and you lose them. It sucks. No two ways about it. I can be grateful all day long but when all is said and done it sucks to love and lose. Period.

I think I have written before about how I usually don't make a big deal about dates, I don't cry just because it's a certain day or remember somebody just because it's their birthday or the day they died, but for whatever reason every year on this day I get a little sad. I don't dwell on it or walk around with a mopey face, as a matter of fact at this moment there is not a sole in my house that even knows what today means to me. This year this day means even more, this year it marks what was the beginning of the end. The end was on May 18th when my mom died 21 years after her son. I know 21 years seems like a long time but you know what? It has flown by and I really feel like I lost them all in no time. All of these losses were not just mine, they were also my brother Danny's. He has also lost his whole family. All we have is each other. We rely on each other to remember stories, to recall recipes, to remember relatives names. Thank God we have each other.
Well the day is almost over and I am grateful for that too. I am ready to move on and to think of other things. The future is going to be bright, I know there is something big in the works for our family. I can just feel it. I wake up every morning and pray for it and go to bed praying for it every night. We are ready, we are so ready for big things.