The Wall

If I’m being completely honest, the most brutal part is that life keeps teaching me I can continue without her, and I never wanted that lesson. I wanted the opposite. I wanted permanence. I wanted the ordinary miracle of growing old together. I wanted more of the same, not because the same was boring, but because it was ours. Instead I got this. This relentless education in survival. This forced adaptation. This ongoing demonstration that a person can keep breathing after the thing they love most is taken. I know there is strength in that somewhere. People see it. They say it. They mean well. But from inside it often just feels like this: I was robbed. The kids were robbed. She was robbed. And I am still here doing dishes in the ruins, trying to raise three hearts while dragging my own. That is not wisdom. That is just the truth.