"She talks to Angels, says they call her out by name...."

Well when you have enough loved ones in the heavens above you...that sounded a bit too religious but you get what I am saying. I remember it like it was yesterday, 11 years ago today, sleeping in my pink walls and pink rug childhood room, home from college for christmas break, just returning from our last family trip (all five of us) from disney on january 3rd, only to experience one of the biggest heartaches a kid should not have to go through. I still remember the sound of your voice down the hall, my youngest brother, tears and cries you can't even imagine. To say the sound was heart wrenching is an understatement. He just turned 13 1 day shy of a month before his godmother, our aunt had passed from her 4 year courageous battle with breast cancer. My three cousins, motherless. There were no words, only tears. I remember the phone ringing, I remember my dad trying to hold back the tears to tell me, I remember my mom was already gone to tell Sittoo with the others. I remember rolling over to face the wall, shutting my eyes, so numb at first that it took a few minutes for tears to start rolling. And the pain. all of the pain I could hear from down the hall and from my other brother across the way.

It's been 11 years. I don't remember your voice, but I do remember your smile. I don't remember your smell, but I do remember how you'd call my mom everyday, even if it was just to say hi. I don't remember your touch, but I do remember the way you walked.

It's been 11 years, eleven years since all of our lives changed, and if somehow you could just let us know you are ok, and that you are watching us, we all know you'd say to be happy, keep going on, don't worry about me, I am rested, pain-free, comfortable. I am living, we are living, but my sadness on this day, I guess is my way of respecting you and what you meant to me, to all of us. Not a day goes by that you are not missed, thought about, or talked about by one of us.

So today, I remember you, we remember you, by being together out at dinner eating a cinnamon roll just for you!

Love and Miss you Auntie, you're all around us...

hate. love. sittoo.

so it's been bothering me about my last post, about having so much hate inside me towards others and just sometimes life in general.. like how unfair it is sometimes, beyond our control. I don't want to come across as an unhappy cruel person, because I am happy, this is one of the most happy times of my adulthood thus far. We can all vent and be envious of other peoples lives sometimes, the good with the bad. I know that people die. We all do. And I know that the very bad people rotting in jail are peoples loved ones too, but they did very bad things, and naturally should be punished for what they have done...why do they get to live? why do they get three cooked meals a day? why do they get to have visitors? I can't visit you anymore, and it's just not fair. simple as that. I visit your headstone, even though I know you are not there. You are all around, you show up in the most happy times, when we are thinking about you or talking about you.

"You’ll get over it…” It’s the clichés that cause the trouble. To lose someone you love is to alter your life for ever. You don’t get over it because ‘it” is the person you loved. The pain hurts less...but the gap never closes. How could it?...This hole in my heart is in the shape of you and no-one else can fit it."

six years. its crazy how day to day nothing seems to change, but looking back on six years, my how things have changed, the people I've met, the jobs I've held, the relationships I've been in, the new friends I've made, the old friends I've lost, the cars I've bought, the places I've lived, the places I've visited...so many stories, so many memories that I can't share with you. If only you could see me now, part of you might be shocked at the stuff I've done and changed, but I know that deep down you'd be proud and you'd be happy and you'd be supportive. I wish I knew what you would think of all of this, and what you would say to me..if you could be here now. We all wish you could be here now. I never thought I'd miss the sound of someones voice the way I do, the way you answered the phone and we'd always laugh, the way you went down the line of your childrens' names to get to the right one you were trying to talk to or about...your voice, your smell. two of the things I miss most. funny, because you'd think it would be your cooking, but mom has stepped it up a bit... it's crazy how much leb food she cooks these days. maybe it's the house, maybe it's you. It is the house, it is you. maybe it's her way of missing you, cooking like you used to. six years. love you. miss you. thinking of you always.