Bubbles on the wind

It is now the end of March, and Spring has begun, for the most part, with temperatures in the 60’s and beautiful blue skies and lots and lots of wind. I was driving home the other day, thinking of a quick note I had sent a friend of mine, and I started having a bit of a little girl daydream, thinking about what my wedding would be like someday (if I were getting married, having found the person and made the commitment and all those lovely things that haven’t quite happened yet).

I wandered in and out of this musing as I drove down to Aurora through an incredibly dull and drab industrial complex over long and somewhat bumpy highways and overpasses. The best parts of this drive are that one, I’m not driving into the sun, and two, when it’s over I get to have dinner with my mom. So my daydream was a pleasant diversion, giving my usually overactive imagination something to grab and shake a bit.

I had visions of a poufy (but not meringue) white dress with lace and tiny buttons, a thinner, healthier me, a handsome groom (somewhere in the distance and a bit out of focus), and my friends and family. In the past I had thought about who would give me away and the friend who graciously accepted the honor stood beside me, looking quite dapper in his tux. As I looked around to see the rest of the wedding party, my daydream burst into tiny bubbles and drifted away into the bright blue windswept sky. The image left in my mind was both comforting and sad.

I had always imagined I would have my two best friends stand up for me when the day finally arrived. I could see them in whatever puffy sleeved, sateen dress in some shade of blue the bridal party were forced to wear, one brunette with warm dark eyes filled with love and laughter, and one blonde with bright blue eyes filled with joy and mischief. For the first time, it struck me; one of my best friends won’t be there at my wedding.

I know she is gone, and I have accepted it with as much grace as I can. On the trip down to her funeral we had discussed needing more road trips for glad tidings, weddings, successes, vacations. It was not to be in those hot August days where you could hear the heat reflecting off the pavement drowning out all other sound. She has passed beyond us and nothing I say or do change that simple and final fact.

After the daydream disintegrated, I had this vision of her there, at my wedding, watching over it and smiling. The ones you love never really leave you; they live on in your memory. I only wish that I had more than my memories of her to share with me those milestones I have yet to reach.