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| April 2012 ~ Florida |
Two years ago this week, Jon traveled down to Florida with
us for the second year in a row to spend a week’s vacation on the beach. Little did any of us – including Jon, I think
– know that it would be the last week of his life. We decided not to return last year to the place we had vacationed for the 4 years prior, because the
idea of facing the memories there felt way too much to bear. But this year, with some trepidation, we
decided to return to this special place to honor the memories of Jon, as
well as create new ones. So here I am, as expected, flooded with memories of the time spent here with Jon. Even
the good memories are at best bittersweet, as death can turn the happiest of
times. It brings me both comfort and sadness
to remember that overall it was a good week, and in many ways, an ordinary
vacation. I remember standing at the
airport with him, waiting to board our flight - he wore a new green polo shirt
that made his eyes literally glow, and when I complimented him on it, he
laughed and said he treated himself to some new clothes (not something he did
very often) for the occasion. He was
happy and excited for vacation – I remember that so well. Something I’ve gone over and over in my head
many times is how, when we arrived, he struggled with the decision of whether
to put himself on the rental car we had reserved, at a cost of $100 or so for
the week, and ultimately decided not to. If he knew it was his last week on earth, would he have
even given it a second thought? While
here, he did the things he always did – read voraciously, slept a lot, snored
loudly, applied sunscreen liberally, drank coffee in the
morning and a beer at night. He swam in
the ocean, dipped in the pool, ate good food, and seemed to relax. I remember
him enjoying the sunsets and eagerly spotting dolphins in the ocean from our
deck. He actually wanted to swim with
dolphins, and looked into it, but couldn’t find anywhere around here where he
could do it. This was also the week that
he got an iPhone. We had bought
him one (in the form of a gift certificate) for his birthday (in October) but in
typical Jon fashion, he hadn’t gotten around to getting it because his old
phone worked just fine. Mladen insisted
on taking him to the Sprint store down here to get one, and I remember how
pleased he was with it, and how – as with everything he set out to learn – he quickly
mastered the new device. I’ll even
confess that he (on the second or third day he owned it) taught me (who had owned
one for two plus years) a new trick.
That week was the hockey playoffs, and he followed it closely. I vividly remember him joining a group of old
men sitting by the pool, trading remarks about the season and recent games – of
course Jon was up on all the current stats and history of the sport. But in addition to these ordinary events and
good memories, there are the more subtle things that my mind has poured over
and over for the past two years. In
retrospect, he was a little more distant than usual, a little quiet, and maybe even
a little resigned. The first year he
came down, I remember we had a big argument – he had a temper, no doubt, and we
had a history – the perfect recipe for a sibling fight. But that week, when we started to bicker,
he didn’t engage and walked away, which at the time of course was a welcome
change, though now only adds to the mountain of questions and regrets I have. Most poignantly, I regret allowing him to put
the distance between himself and the rest of us, thinking that it was good to ‘give
him space’. I regret not putting my arm
around him to remind him how much I loved him and that I would always be
there for him. I wish more than anything
I had tried and succeeded to have one of the deep conversations we had on occasion
where he really opened up to me. Listing
all the regrets I have would surely exceed the word limits of this blog. I have spent the last two years trying to accept
the fact that history cannot be rewritten, and that all the regret in the world
won’t bring Jon back. I try, especially
this week, to remember the good times and the things I don’t regret. One of those things did happen here in
Florida during Jon’s last week. I shared
it in my eulogy and will post it here again in the hopes of keeping it from
fading:
In one of the few times we connected that week, Jon and I played
Prokadima, the paddle ball game we played together as kids, on the beach. We
were a good match, and while you might expect a cut-throat game between 2 competitive
siblings, we actually cheered each other on as we made heroic and sometimes
embarrassing efforts to hit the little blue ball. We played until it became
necessary to go cool off in the ocean. As we walked into the water, he asked me
if I wanted to swim out to the sandbar with him, as he had done himself the day
before (I remember thinking he was crazy for doing it). I looked at how far out
it seemed, and how much deep, dark water it required swimming through first. I
told him I was too scared of what might be lurking in that dark water to do it,
even though I am a good swimmer. He said, "I was scared too, but I just
had to do it to conquer my fear. Come with me, trust me, you'll feel so good
for doing it." So I went. And while we were swimming out, he asked me how
I was doing, and I said "Ok, you?" and he said, "It's weird, but
I'm not scared this time, because you're with me."
I'm still with you Jon.
