Years ago I bought my husband a big blue cup for his morning latte. It was “his” cup. I never used it and I never let anyone else use it. Once when he was sick we had an acquaintance over to stay with him while I ran an errand. When I came back they had made themselves a cup of tea and were using his cup. I didn’t say anything, it seemed silly to do so. Still, after that, I made sure to hide the cup when I left the house so no one else could use it.
I’m not sure that my husband was as attached to it being his cup as much as I was. He’d make a joke about it being his cup every once in a while. Every morning I made us both lattes and I almost always made his in that blue cup. Every morning when he was sick he’d ask if I was going to make him a latte. I would roll my eyes and say, “Honey, I always make you a latte why are you asking me that?” It became our little routine as his health failed. I miss that question every morning now.
For the last seven months that blue cup has sat in the cupboard untouched–almost like a shrine. I’ve opened the cupboard door and gazed at it wondering what I was going to do with it. It’s funny how attached you can become to an object that you associate with a loved one who has died. I can’t be the only one who feels this way, right?
One day when just about all my other coffee cups were in the dishwasher I pulled that blue cup down out of the cupboard and held it close to my heart. I fired up the espresso machine and filled that cup with a latte. Once I did it was as if a spell had been broken and it became just a cup again instead of some sacred connection to my husband. I don’t think he would mind.
It occurred to me that our relationship with loved ones who have died never really ends. Don’t get me wrong, it sucks wide that they aren’t here with us anymore. And I really don’t subscribe to that whole they’re alive as long as you remember them line–no they’re not.
But in an odd way, when I think about telling my husband something that’s happened to me or some joke we used to share comes to mind, it’s like I’m interacting with my memories of him. Yes, it’s a very one-sided interaction and at this point intensely painful. However, I can see glimpses of a time when I’ll think, my husband would have liked that or he would have hated this, that won’t hurt so much. Instead it will be as if my remembering him and all his humor and quirks will be how I relate to him. Yes, he’s no longer here but I’ve come to think of relating to his memory as an odd type of relationship that continues post-mortem. Let’s face it–it’s the only one available to me now. I don’t believe he’s alive as long as I remember him. I do believe that my love for him still exists, it hasn’t gone anywhere and no matter who else I love in this world, my love for him will always be with me. His memory will live in my heart forever.
“You’re here, there’s nothing I fear
And I know that my heart will go on
We’ll stay forever this way
You are safe in my heart
And my heart will go on and on”
WH Auden said it much better than I ever could. This poem was used in Four Weddings and Funeral too.
Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone,
Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone,
Silence the pianos and with muffled drum
Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come.
Let aeroplanes circle moaning overhead
Scribbling on the sky the message He Is Dead,
Put crepe bows round the white necks of the public doves,
Let the traffic policemen wear black cotton gloves.
He was my North, my South, my East and West,
My working week and my Sunday rest,
My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song;
I thought that love would last for ever: I was wrong.
The stars are not wanted now: put out every one;
Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun;
Pour away the ocean and sweep up the wood.
For nothing now can ever come to any good.
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Years ago I bought my husband a big blue cup for his morning latte. It was “his” cup. I never used it and I never let anyone else use it. Once when he was sick we had an acquaintance over to stay with him while I ran an errand. When I came back they had made themselves a cup of tea and were using his cup. I didn’t say anything, it seemed silly to do so. Still, after that, I made sure to hide the cup when I left the house so no one else could use it.