Just Joshin' You 2

I used to think I had a good sense of character. That when I met someone I could truly tell if they were a good person, I guess most people think they can, but this man showed me how wrong I was. It's still so hard to believe that someone can be so sweet, seem so genuine, actually help out when you need it, and then also be a complete psychopath with tunnel vision and no sense of reality.

This man kept appearing everywhere. Suddenly he was friends with all of my friends, he knew everyone I knew. He brought his son around who immediately connected with my own kids. In a matter of a week, this man had completely intertwined his life with mine and I never knew the wiser. In my blur of reality, he was just another body, another human that was just... there. Like everyone else, being in existence with the rest of us; grieving, hurting, wishing the truth of my husbands death was somehow going to change and he was going to walk through the doors.

I specifically remember a night a huge group of us were at a bar, sharing stories of my husbands life, remembering all the good times through the pain. I remember feeling so terrible that night at the bar because the woman that was with me the night I got the news of my husbands death, shared with someone else how much it had traumatized her when I reacted to the news (the whole falling to the ground, screaming out crying thing- it's real, not just something that you see in the movies). And I guess even beyond the tears, and obvious pain that the grief was bringing, this man saw the sadness I had from something else, from feeling like I had negatively effected that woman's life somehow even more than the actual loss of my husband.

He came and sat with me, asked me what was going on, and I remember we just talked, all throughout the night. He shared work stories with me about my husband. He explained to me that he was currently going through the same cancer my husband had as a teen, and my husband was constantly giving him pep talks and making him want to keep fighting when he felt ready to quit. He shared with me how much my husband really saved his life and he was forever grateful and wanted to be able to help me in any way he could, to sort of pay back my husband for helping him so much. He told me how him and my husband talked everyday and how he felt like he already knew us because my husband would go on and on about his wife and kids and how blessed he felt. Every time he spoke, I didn't want him to stop. I wanted to hear more and more about my husband, it felt almost as if he was there, sitting right next to us. I could hear him laughing and smiling at the stories as the stranger told them. It was such a warm moment in such a dark time.

I can't remember it happening, but I imagine it was that night that we exchanged information and began talking on a regular basis. He would check in, ask about the kids, ask to bring food by or if we needed anything. At some point, I remember him just always being around. And then I started realizing his son wasn't around anymore. When I asked him about it he told me with his cancer being back, he didn't want his son to see him sick and going through chemo again so he sent him to stay with his grandparents in another state. I didn't realize until almost a year later, that I never once saw that man sick, looking like he was on deaths door step, or even throwing up. All things I did see with my sister when she was going through chemo and had cancer, but again, at that time, most things were a blur and things that should have been obvious, just weren't. If they had been obvious, or if I was able to actually see what was going on... the next year of my life would've been so much easier.