Dear Walt,

Birthday.

You hated your birthday. Not because it marked another year but because of the attention. You would seriously have hated this one with so many people coming to celebrate your life. A life deserving to be celebrated. A life cut too short too soon when December 21st happened.

I’m looking for a version of “Amazing Grace” you would like. It was the one memorial service request you’d ever made. You hated funerals, too. The only two we attended in our entire married life was your father’s and my mother’s. You were a very private emotional person.

Yesterday was the first New Year’s Day I can remember spending without eating black eyed peas and cabbage. The luck and money thing hasn’t paid off so well in the past and you weren’t here to cook. It tickled me how you would whip up both even before coffee to ring in the year.

I’m going to try to cook them tomorrow. I just have to get through today. This cold weather snap is turning my head into an ongoing migraine and I’m so reticent to leave the house should the pressure blow up and start me puking, ugh. Nothing to be done about that, though, is there?

I’ll stuff my prescription bottles in my hoodie pockets and cross fingers. And I’ll wear blue jeans and Skechers because neither of us had replaced our clothing lost in Hurricane Harvey. We had what we needed for construction and writing and seeing Thor; Ragnarok and The Last Jedi.

You would so roll your eyes and tell me I was being ridiculous with my over-prepping for the cold weather, but since you’re not here to handle the pool and the pipes I’m doing it my girly way. Our son in law and daughter are helping, of course, but we three are completely rudderless.

I love you. I’ll start the new year tomorrow. I’ll eat black eyed peas without you. They’ll be good.

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