Sunday, March 22, 2009

A hard week


It has been a hard week. Not as hard as I thought but still hard. Hamid fills my mind nearly every moment. Everything reminds me of him, of his laughter, of his body, of his love for me. I see the ocean and its immensity and wish I could just feel him or see him one more time.

I just finished the book, “Embraced by the Light.” It had some interesting concepts, some new, but many I had heard before. It talked about how in this life we are supposed to experience things that help us to grow spirituality. That is our purpose here on this earth. We make our own choices yet there are some things that are set in place by God. I believe I was chosen to be with Hamid, to love him, to learn from him as he accepted his diagnosis of cancer and so bravely loved me, ariyana, and afshin. When I think about how he faced the last year of his life, I am filled with admiration. I don’t know that I could do it so bravely, so selflessly. He loved me more that past year than ever before. Even when he had pain he would tell me how much he loved me and would find a way to smile and laugh at ariyana and afshin.

I remember Hamid was so excited to cook a dinner for me…he hadn’t been able to eat in over 5 months, yet he wanted to make a dish he had seen on the Food Channel. So while I was at work, he had my dad drive him across the street to the grocery store. He even got to ride one of the carts around but it ran out of gas in the middle of the parking lot so they quickly drove off and left it! For those of us who knew him, it was always an adventure with Hamid. That night we cooked dinner together. He would get weak so I had a chair for him to sit at and then he would tell me what to chop and mix and then he put the final piece together. We all sat around our dining room table with him at the head and we ate a wonderful dinner that he had prepared for us. Hamid watched and even though he couldn’t enjoy the food you could see that he was basking in our love for him.

I think God wanted me to stand by his side and help him through this experience. We talked a lot about our life together, and mine and the kid’s life without him. Those are hard conversations. Conversations that we were too young to have. But together, we faced what was ahead of us. We talked about the Tree. I believe that night Hamid made his commitment to God. And then on July 1st, 2008 when he decided to stop his treatment he was scared yet relieved to have the power to move on from this world of pain. I know it was hard for him to leave us…maybe that is why those last 36 hours were so difficult. I wonder if he saw us there, gathered around him and heard me telling him that it was alright for him to leave. Did he want to reach out for me just one last time? Did he want to comfort me and tell me that the light was so warm and loving? Did he want to tell me that we would all be alright?

God is there waiting to help us when we ask, but only when we ask. I think about the past months and when I have asked God from my heart He has answered. The message from Hamid, the balloon, the way Ariyana’s one butterfly sways above us when the others aren’t, the peace that suddenly descend on me, the touching and sometimes profound words of Ariyana, and then the song “It’s a wonderful world” playing after I prayed. I truly believe that all of these are His way of letting me know that Hamid is there giving me strength. It does help me but yet I have this hollowness inside that was never there before. It is a place that was only for Hamid. I am going to be alright and I will try to think about what I was supposed to learn from this experience and how it will make me, Ariyana, and Afshin stronger.

No comments:

Post a Comment