The world was softened around the edges for a time. A most romantic time. He was profoundly romantic. In the early morning light he would go out into the dewey garden and compose bouquets. Enchanting, passionate bouquets so vast in their expression as to obscure my view of him standing there on my doorstep...in love's full bloom.
And when he had plucked all of the flowers from his garden he searched out wildflowers, foraging through a field on the cliffs and when he'd reached the farside of that he went on to another field, his passion bringing him to a place so glorious, to find love's expression so exquisite and so moving.
Even on days when he had but a moment, on his way to work, he would honor me with that expression. Sometimes just a tiny delicate rosebud, so fragile, so meaningful in it's innocence. I wept many times from the purity of it all. Time stood still. Time seemed endless, immeasureable, unrestrained. I've never known anything like it.
The sad circumstance is that we had to say goodbye while we were both powerfully, passionately in love. Now time stood still in a different way. Time hurt. It constricted and narrowed in on me. I thought it would never pass. I felt I would never reach the other side of the pain. I saw him a few times in passing after that and we both tried to make ourselves into stones, frozen, without feeling. Finally, after some time, the sharp edges were dulled enough for me to have other thoughts besides those of him. Of us. Then a certain song that had meaning for us, for our dreamtime, would play and it all came rushing back, like love's ghost.
I found a book of his, a memoir, in the book shop one day but I wasn't ready to read it yet. That was about four years ago. He died unexpectedly a couple of months ago, a week after his birthday. His obituary was published in the paper on my son Marcel's birthday.
An excerpt from a tribute article in the local newspaper written by his best friend:
"Eric would often say, 'We are as good today as we will ever be.' And I would reply, 'And you are good, Eric, very good.' I can still hear Eric's knowing voice, and fortunately, I always will."
Time is fleeting and precious...and on the best days immeasureable.
