Hope in 2 seconds flat

My only true love: Today you filled my day with hope in two seconds flat. I asked you to open your eyes for me and you did. I felt seen like no other time in my life. Then, I asked you to hold my hand and you did. After five days of agony this was a refreshing rain on my soul.

You can't imagine the light you brought to so many of us. You see, your eyes have been closed to our world. You have not shared with us our gray days and cold nights. You have been travelling in those unknown places of your mind unavailable to us. Is it luminescent? Is there music? What have you seen? Who did you talked to? Where was your mind these past six days? You have been in conversation with Ma', with beings of light and love, and surely with God. You have walked in a different reality unbeknowst to us all. You are close and far away. I see your body living on that bed, I see all this machinery ready to help, but you hadn't until today opened your eyes.

Day after day, hour after hour, I kept repeating to myself your last words: Fede, my love, Oh my God..., and drew from there the confidence that you were well protected and in good hands. The days are long and we are just yearning dust weaved on the fabric of time. Your mind left, your body stayed. We stayed in this reality wondering where you had gone, sad for the silence imposed on your lips, heavy for the absence of the light in your eyes. We were left wanting to see ourselves reflected in your eyes, blanketed by your smiles, embraced with your words. But for six days all we got was silence and no light, until today...

Thank you, thank you for touching ever so briefly my world again. I know the doctors are intent on not building false hopes, but what I saw and experienced was no mirage: we were communicating! We had a silent conversation for a few seconds. You were right! communication is the channel of love, of life. A life and a love not expressed do not exist. How did I missed the point? You were telling me this for so many weeks and here I am. Looking at you in this hospital bed, hurting together with you, learning a lesson on life and death, remembering your very own words: Let's talk! And now I would give anything in the world and beyond just to keep talking to you!

You know, the hardest thing in this process is the wait, living, breathing, walking in an impasse. A crisis with a resolution extended over what it feels like an eternity. A couple of days ago the doctors asked us to be aware that this is a long process. That you are walking all this time at the edge of the abyss and that we may be following you too closely and building meanings and hopes that are not real. They said you could skip and fall into the unknown at any moment and I felt depressed, with the wind knocked out of me, I went with a heavy load in my heart, as if they would have left a sword hanging by a thread over my head. Where do we draw the line between fantasy and hope? How can I wait and for what if they want me not to build hope? Today, I know you saw me and this filled me with hope. I choose the light of hope to be able to walk through the roughness of these days.

Ah! life is so delicate, fragile, like the flame of a candle in a strong wind. you are walking so close to the edges of life and I watch you powerless, devoid of any answers, forced to wait, wondering where you've been. My dear friends touch me and support me with their hope, faith and love, but I kept feeling lonely, wanting to reach you wherever you are.

And then, today, you opened your eyes and gave me that beautiful look. What did you tell me in that second? It was a long discouse on the essential things of life. I told you I love you so deep that I don't know how to reach the bottom of its source. In your eyes I read a million words mixed with the calla-lillies of your wedding bouquet. That was all I needed to live to be able to go on with my day.

I love you Janita. I miss hearing your words and being touched by your intense gaze. Get well so we can continue this conversation about life, about the snow and the children in your classes, about the families and our dreams, or maybe, just about how bad my cooking tastes.

FC