Chapter Fifteen

Home

We take home for granted. As the metaphor says, “Home is where we hang our hat.” But what is a true home to a widower after his wife has passed? Home was a place of experiences. I bought my home at the age of twenty-four, and within the first year I was married. I lived there over thirty years and never moved until a year after Hope died and our children had flown the coop. I could tell you the fairy tale of home; instead I’ve decided to lose the breadcrumbs and “fall off the wall.”

Home is where you play ice hockey on a Friday night in lieu of cuddling with Hope in bed.

Home is where you gain weight with Hope’s pregnancy but decided not to lose the extra weight as your Hope did. It’s too much fun, after all, to eat more and exercise less. You know Hope will still love you the way you are.

Home is where you fought over Hope’s buying that new designer handbag. How cute Hope looked with it, but out of spite you never paid her a compliment.

Home is where you played computer games until 1:00 am. Hope pounded the floor for you to come up, but you didn’t listen. She waited for you in bed only to fall asleep alone.

Home is where you had to work late even though you’d promised to be home on time. Hope waited for you as dinner got cold. Did you need to stay at work? Why did you really stay? Hope and the employer are now gone. You became disillusioned with life and work as you tried to grasp why you hadn’t come home that night and so many other nights.

Home is where, for years, you squirreled away money for retirement, and just as your last child graduates from college Hope dies. She doesn’t get to enjoy all the years of tough decisions and the arguments that went with them. You get to play and live your hard-earned fantasies and Hope does not.

Home is where we are in separate rooms. Hope is watching a comedy and I’m watching a violent movie. How I wish I could laugh with her one more time.

Home is where you take a walk after dinner. Hope is walking slowly, savoring the night, and you’re walking fast with the patience of a two-year-old because life or TV is on your mind, not the sheer joy of having Hope by your side.

Home is where Hope is exercising on Saturdays and I’m watching or coaching the kids in sports. Who was right? Did our kids become superstars? My parents never attended my sporting events, and I don’t love them any less. How I miss the days when Hope was my assistant coach in intramural ice hockey and it was a family event.

Home is where you curse out Hope in an argument and the next day regret your stinging words. Hope is gone, but the words still haunt your memory.

Home is where you don’t tell Hope every day how beautiful she is.

Home is where you refuse to go shopping with Hope for new clothes. You hate clothes shopping, but it would have made her feel so good if you’d joined her and watched her try on each new outfit.

Home is where you complain constantly as you perform “honey-do” chores. You always completed them, but you could have accomplished them with a smile and not a frown.

Home is where you’re out with the guys and don’t bother to call Hope to tell her you’ll be hours late.

Home is where you bring work home with you and don’t give your family the attention they so deserve. Tragically, only as Hope’s years are coming to an end do you discover how to switch off this savage circuit breaker of work.

Home is where you hold the grudge of a disagreement for days when those lost hours are never regained but the disagreement melted into the fabric of time. We learnt how a fifteen-minute “time out” solves disagreements too late in our marriage to regain those hours or days lost to needless acrimony.

Home is where Hope and I used to giggle and laugh as young lovers building a life and home together. Laughter faded as the children turned into teens and my career and fatherly demands grew. Hope laughed alone for a while, until I realized what closeness I had squandered. I regained my fun self again in the last years of Hope’s life. A few years too late, as my anguish over lost time never ceases.

Home is the thousands of other things I haven’t mentioned that are either too mundane or trivial to you, dear reader, but ever so precious to me because I’ll never have the chance to correct them. Oh, how I cry over each and every one of them as the regretful memories return.

Home is where I am a broken man from work and caring for a very sick person for seven long years. The last two months of Hope and home were not memorable—they were a rush to the end for me, and for Hope a clinging to the last vestiges of life. The doctors, social workers, and hospice nurses tell me I earned the “Gold Medal” for caregivers, but my inner self taunts me that it could have ended more peacefully for us.

And then one day you go home and the home is empty of your best friend, the person you took for granted. You wish you had lost the weight, watched the comedy with her, worked out with her, walked slowly with her, shopped with her—but it’s too late for that now. Hope is never coming home again. I wrote my letter of apology to Hope and burnt it as the sage advised. As long as I believe in the Divine, Hope has received my penance. When and if I find a new home, I promise I’ll try not to make those mistakes again. I promise.