Yesterday I was busy getting our house ready for a party, then I went out to the lanai to check it out. There are two very healthy and happy Boston ferns living out there. I looked at them and realized I have lived with these plants longer than I have lived with any other living thing or being. I bought the first one for my new place in L.A. in 1998. I split that one in two a few years later. That means I have lived with them for over 20 years.

That’s longer than I lived with my children. They each only lived with me for 18 years give or take a few months. It floors me to realize I have been living away from my children and with these plants longer than they were with me.

The thing is I still miss my boys everyday. I mean I wanted them to go on, grow up, and live their own lives. I just never thought about after, when they are gone or that I would end up living with plants longer than I lived with them.

Our children are our children for the rest of our lives, but we really only get a short span of time with them. I suppose it is different if the family is close and stay near by, but for me we three musketeers went from very close to spread across country and not together much. Separate lives with new in laws being our family now. We never stopped caring, we just got busy.

Christopher in the army in Colorado. Michael in school in Phoenix. Then both married, Michael now on Chicago. Me in L.A., central California then in San Diego. Then me married and living in Florida.

The past 20 years flew by. I saw Michael every year or two, but I didn’t see Chris for five years. Then suddenly, I would never see him again. But I still have those frickin plants.

It is two and a half healing years ago that my baby boy Christopher was taken. It would have been therapeutic to have been writing this blog at the time of this loss. For now though, I am still trying to accept that he is gone.

He is proof that no one is immune to the devastation of heart break. A young successful handsome intelligent and loving man. He had so much life ahead. A family could have been possible, but he couldn’t cope with the loss of everything again.

He couldn’t see what he had. He had a brother who loved him and would walk through fire for him. A mother that would give all she was, is, and ever could be to help him. A best friend that was like another brother.

Rest in peace Christopher my love. 1980-2016