legacy

Our step daughter-in-law put toether some marvelous pictures she had taken over a half-dozen years into a slideshow.   She asked me what was my wife's favorite song.  I choked out "All I need is the air that I breathe and to love you."  

A few minutes later she had blended the song and pictures into a symphony of emotion.   I could hardly watch. 

I wanted to share this with my wife, to dial her cell phone and hope she would answer.

I had the weird feeling that my wife had repeatedly told me this was a favorite song just so the song could be used in this way at her funeral.  It being settled between us (in my wife's mind at least) that I would survive her.  "I want to go before you,"  she told me many times.  

I am not a loveable or loving person.  Can never utter affectionate words without stilt or discomfort.   And my wife was a type A hard-worker who wore herself out far too quickly.   But as I experienced the slide show I was overcome with the legacy of love left us by my wife.   Even to me, who never wanted this terrible role of survivor.