What Else? Let's Talk About The Boss

A bracelet twice.  Earrings, nice earrings.  Two rings.  And anklet, and ladybug earrings and toe ring for mother's Day the year I got pregnant with Dodi.  For the longest time I saved One lone ladybug earring that was left..  A dozen roses at least three times.  Twice a bouquet of tulips and once an orchid in bright fuschia.  Steak and shrimp on our anniversary, music lyrics to special songs when we were broke.  A card for every holiday, and sometimes just because.  A green sweater, a melon colored sweater, boots.  Three times he bought me boots.  He did the most romantic things.  Buying me those things was his way of showing love and appreciation. I still have the gold lighthouse pendant.  A pair of blue topaz earrings, and my set of tanzinite earrings, necklace and ring.  Suddenly I would give anything to have our wedding bands.  They were engraved with kMk to dab 9/17/01 and dab to kMk 9/17/01.  I bought the bands, and had the engagement ring he gave me mounted to the wedding bands.  He was really romantic about that too.  He had a gig in Macon and we stayed at a hotel.  He left the ring in the bottom of a glass of champagne when he went to play.  He came in that night and I was so excited we went out to eat at Denny's after midnight.  The next day we were supposed to go see all of the family and suddenly he didn't want to.  I was a little disappointed but I sure did enjoy that day with him.  I wore a chambray sheath dress.  In denim blue.  He loved me to wear a dress.  He just likes seeing me in a dress, and I like dresses.

What says I love you most to me is time.  Being present in the moment for the little things that make big memories.  I have vivid memories of him picking the guitar on my leg to a song on the radio.  Every now and then he would look at me and smile with so much pride, and say there's OUR baby girl and grin at our beautiful daughter in the backseat.  He also had a special way of calling me Baby.  Sometimes he would look at me and say good old Katherine.

We seldomly fought in our eighteen years of marriage.  When we did, it was usually a good throwdown and a lot of fun making up.  It doesn't mean we didn't disagree.  We loved each other so much that it was okay to disagree, unless we were extremely passionate about something.  Most arguments were over addictions, or money.  He worked so very hard.  I mean he worked hard physical labor.  My arguments about money were usually when he had worked so hard,  both of us had and had nothing to show for it due to the addictions.  He would also go through long stretches of sleeping all day long and loafing around the house.  Usually this occured during a down time or due to addictions.  In hindsight I hope he knows in heaven now how much I loved him for working so hard for us, and how much I hated what the addictions took from not just him, but our lives together.

I loved this man so much and our family we made together that I could not wait to get home to him.  I was consumed with him, and in awe of our child we created.   I absolutely thought we could conquer the world. I mean when we had a really bad problem we prayed together.   Somebody who sat at the table and held hands and prayed with his family.  A gift from God.  He had the best taste for good food, wine, music, and weird movies.  I loved his weirdness.  He was very antisocial at times.  Ups and downs throughout our lives together.  We could go somewhere and have the very most fun with the simple things.  We could also have a dinner party and look up and he would be gone to bed and no one knew where he was.  He would just disappear off by himself.  In the times when he was down, he would disappear to hotels for several days at a time on a binge.  I always thought that I could make it better,  that somehow if I was better he wouldn't have gone on a binge or be so antisocial.  That is the silliest thing because it was never about me.  Not the addictions.  The addictions were not who he was.  Just his addictions.  Now as we sat out by the fire pit one night, the strangest things happened.  It's when the ransomware and the hacking started.  They kept sending me Ashley Madison stuff.  He came inside with me that evening and I was showing him where somebody was going through the AOL and I was terrified.   We cooked chicken breast sauteed with white cooking wine and a spicy seasoning.  It was so strange because we could actually hear someone say that combination doesn't really go together.  Somebody was sitting there going through pictures and hacking our computer and phones.  He kept trying to play it off like it was no big deal and then a couple weeks that followed he acted like it never happened at all and tried to make me out to be crazy.  Except when the fellow randomly approached Dodi at TJ Maxx and started asking her about her Mom and Dad. Damon tried desperately to find out who was following on cameras, and even requested an IP address from the computer.  I don't know what he did with it but it seems like one of the police officers gave him the IP address that was accessing.  It was awful.  He immediately started drinking out of the blue and withdrew from me and Dodi to a point.  I suppose that was the beginning of the end and I don't like to think about it anymore.  It hurts.  I'd rather think about all the things I loved about him.  The list of those things is endless.  See they didn't just hurt him over secret addictions,  they hurt him over private conversations as well.  I'm certain that happened.