remembering

i have been thinking this week that i should write a little about my kristen....it was october, 2006 when i lost her, when we all lost her....but i want to write not to make anyone sad but because of what she did/does for me everyday....my journey has pretty much sucked the last two years, but i guess it's the going on that's important....

anyway, she was in a doctorate program....in april of 2006 she came home from a counseling conference at albany to announce to me she thought maybe she wanted to go back to school....her and one of her bosses had talked about it all day and she felt this was the time..."what do you think?" on thing about kristen was she always was thinking about what was next....and i thought for one second back to the time when she came home and announced to me that she thought she was going to take the state police physical exam and maybe go to the academy....she had scored very high on the written exam and they had called.....it would be good she told me....my answer, "i will support whatever you want to do." the same answer i gave her that day in april about school....

the difference was- she didn't go to the academy...she did get in and start school. that summer we talked about school...what it was going to mean for us everyday, what it meant for her future, how we were going to balance our relationship, families, friends, and everything else....we, of course, were very busy people :), so adding this big commitment in was going to change things....we also talked about my future....she knew that a doctorate was on my mind....so, she told me to ask...."it doesn't hurt to ask. they're letting me do it." but her "they're" was different than my "they're" but i did it...i asked....

that fall i started my studying for the gre's....kristen would study for school, i would study for the exam....well, she studied more than i did....i mostly did other things like knit, quilt, cook....whatever i felt like....and then i studied once in a while....i knew that i could probably study in 8 weeks and be fine....and i hadn't signed up yet, so i would study later....always later. but the plan was i would start the following fall....we would be in school together....supporting each other and getting it done at once....and maybe even commuting together once in a while....

then we lost her....and there was no more studying....

but i knew for her i had to go through with our plan....and that it was going to have to be put off a year....so, here it is two years later and here i am in school....i remind myself when i get frustrated with the drive or the homework or my classmates that in the end, i am doing it for us....and she would be proud.