It's Not Like You'll Never See Me Again

 






Dee and I had our 24th wedding anniversary on December 16. The next day we went to a Luby's Cafeteria that's near here and met our friend Sean for lunch. 

Afterward we came back here to Dumas. Sean and I did something that resembled work out there in the yard, where the storage units are and Dee stayed up here at the real nice trailer to work on some accounts. It was an idyllic and warm day, like it often is around Christmas in Texas. 

Nobody ever stays somewhere in Houston past about two or three o'clock in the afternoon by choice. After about 3:30 the traffic begins and it isn't likely that you'll make it anywhere in any reasonable amount of time. Just won't happen. This place becomes an unreal nightmare of seething traffic and people. That dictated the amount of time that Sean would stick around before he'd have to head for his house in Clear Lake to feed his dogs.

When that time came, we headed back up to the real nice trailer so that he could get his truck and say goodbye.

Sean wasn't much of a hugger. He showed affection in other ways, but in recent days had become a little less uncomfortable with it. Dee came out of the office and gave him a great big hug at the front door before he left. He kind of wiggled out of it and said sheepishly; 

Geez Dee, it's not like you're never going to see me again...

The following day, December 18th, his father's birthday, Dee worked outside of Dumas and didn't return till a few minutes before we got the phone call that he had been taken to the hospital and ultimately, died.

She never got to see him again. 

It is a poignant reminder that we should all take that stance, treat one another as if we may never see them again. 

Because we might not.

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