the dress rehearsal

My husband, Bob, died 15 years ago. After ten years of sobriety, he drank. He struggled for nine months, sporadically maintaining bits and pieces of clarity. In the end, he gave birth to death-he crossed the line too many times and couldn’t stop drinking.
The car hit the railing, took flight, and flipped numerous times, ejecting him through the windshield. He had extensive injuries to his head, lower abdomen, and legs. Beer cans littered the scene, and he had a blood alcohol content of .23%.
He died Sunday, May 2, 1993, at five in the morning. On our eighth wedding anniversary. The day after our daughter DaNae’s fifth birthday and a week before Nik’s third. The day of the big doubleheader birthday party, which we had anyway. The ice cream churned and the cake decorated, the bread had been baked and the cheese finely grated. Wrapped presents sat on the table, and a pin the tail on the donkey poster covered the door. My mom drove from Idaho for the birthday party. She helped keep me together. She called the neighbors, the employers, and the relatives.
“Stop crying,” DaNae said. And “When will Daddy get home?”
“Honey, Daddy died, and he’s in heaven watching.”
“See my new bike?” she’d ask twenty minutes later. “Will Daddy put the training wheels on? Look, Nik likes his red tricycle.”
The piñata hung from the patio. Ten-year-old Ben swung the bat with a knickety-knack, then off came its head with whickety-whack. Candy and coins fell from the tufts of fluff remaining on the body that swayed like a dead man on a noose. Dead dead dead echoed in my head, and no one used the camera to take photographs of the elated children and devastated adults.
It felt like my right hand had been hacked off with a dull axe. I repaired copiers for Pitney Bowes and I never told a single customer what had occurred. I didn’t understand the process of bereavement, and one month after Bob’s death I went to my family physician, who prescribed antidepressants. A year later, I had a nervous breakdown and couldn’t return to work. Two years later, I moved to Idaho so that my mom could help me with the kids.
Bob’s death was a morbid dress rehearsal for Nikolas. This time, I have a grasp of what the grief process entails. I understand the importance of sharing my experience. When Nikolas died, I felt like someone had cut a hole in my heart with a rusty razor blade. I wanted to shout from the rooftops that my beautiful son had died. At the same time, I cowered in the aisles at grocery stores when I saw somebody I knew, afraid to confront them and make them cry. Worst yet, I noticed people avoided me, as if my presence made them uncomfortable.
I wrote letters to Oprah, trying to find a grand finale, a way to spread the message, don’t drink and drive and wear your seatbelt, but she sent me a form letter reply. I ranted and raved, screamed and yelled, made a video, joined a community action group, became a student ambassador, trying to find meaning in my son’s death. The best thing I’ve done, is everyday, I do one good deed and ad it to Nik’s life. That way, I can honestly say, I have become a better person because of his death.