There isn't a day that goes by that I don't think of her. Someone says something, or I see something, or hear something... and it all comes rushing in. My daughter, the first from my womb, my beautiful girl is gone, gone for real and I will never again see those gorgeous sea-grey eyes or feel her hand slip into mine as we walk across a parking lot. Everything that seems wrong or annoying pales to insignificance and for a moment, the world is water colored. Unreal and washed out.

I can't predict what will bring it, but today in particular there were three things. The first, that damned song by Michelle Branch -- "Everywhere." I was eating lunch at the gym after filling out all the paperwork and there it was. A simple thing, a song, a video. But my eyes stung and I thought about that same video playing on TV right before we turned off the ventilator.

The second, a bright yellow flyer cooked up by Gab and Deeda's girls, Lou and Rice for the Witchie Chicks. I smiled, thinking of the play on "Dixie Chicks" and then remembered the four of them last year before Jasmine died. When we visited in December, they dressed up in black and called themselves the Goth girls. I joked with Jasmine and Lou about educating them about Goth music rather than Goth attire so they wouldn't be posers. Jasmine was a Glamour Witch for her last Halloween. As soon as I saw that flyer, a vision of her in that costume came so strongly I could have made myself believe she was in that house with the other girls, getting ready to put on a show. The strength of that made it that much harder when I realized she wasn't in that house and never would be again. Still, my eyes kept going back to the flyer and I smiled a little thinking of her joining them in spirit if not in flesh.

The third was the end of the movie, Frida. Actually, the whole concept of being trapped in a body -- when Frida says, "Burn this Judas of a body," I got it. I remembered Jasmine's tears at the end, her anguish over being stuck in the hospital so many days of her life while other kids could run and play. And the very last scene -- the painting of the bed burning with her sick body in it, overlaid by this quote, "I hope the exit is joyful and I hope never to return." Yes. I watched the bed burn, took in the beatific smile on her face and thought of Jasmine's body at the end. She never asked us to burn her body, but I think she would have empathized with Frida Kahlo.

So I sat here and wept a little and felt good for doing so. I realized that most of my moments of deep grief have been alone -- they have to be because it's the only way I can really let go. And I thought that maybe this night shift Jeff is working is a good thing, at least for a little while. Some time to weep, knowing that when I want to be held later, he will be there.

Anyway, I just wanted to say... not a day goes by -- not one -- that I don't think about her and wish I could share something with her. Not a day that I don't wonder what she would be doing if she hadn't died. Not a day.

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