Loved You More

It’s November of 2011.

I’m sitting on the steps in front of Union Square, San Francisco’s thriving city center. Lights flash all around me. People hurry past, eager to enjoy Sunday night before it fades into the monotony of Monday morning.

My life statistics are currently bleak: I have three friends in this brand-new town, four hundred dollars in my bank account, a questionable apartment in the East Bay, and absolutely no idea that my buddy Alvin will be dead in a week.

But I’m oblivious to these facts. I’m too busy enjoying the moment. The sun is setting and the air is crisp. A sweet scent lingers around me.  Local musicians stand on street corners and strum their guitars, banjos, ukeleles.

The world feels whole.

From my perch in front of Union Square, I spot the 38 Bus. Within minutes, it will stop and Alvin will get off. Of course, Alvin’s disembarking will take a longer than usual. Due to his wheelchair.

The bus stops just before Powell Street, in front of a big painted heart. This is my favorite of all the heart statues scattered throughout San Francisco. It shows the Golden Gate Bridge, set against a hazy blue sky. The painting captures the intrigue of this West Coast city which became my home one week ago.

I approach the bus.

“They let me ride for half-price,” Alvin declares as he descends the special platform. “Because I’m disabled. Score!”

He’s laughing, which is typical.

Alvin’s two years younger than me. He hasn’t traveled much, yet he has this worldliness…the kind that doesn’t come from sipping wine in Italy or hiking through waterfalls in Trinidad. The kind that has a lot more to do with enduring pain, then choosing to push forward anyway.

We make our way to a café and order bubble tea. I hold Alvin’s cup while he drinks through a straw.

He tells me he wants to apply for a job at Costco.

“I could be a greeter,” he says. “It’ll get me out of the house and into the real world again. It’ll give me a chance to do something.”

“You’d be great,” I say, and I mean it.

Then I tell him a story about the time I knocked over a display case at Costco. Alvin chuckles at my stupid anecdote. We talk a little more, sip our drinks, and watch the dusky sky fill with stars.

That was 2011.

This is 2014.

March has been a rocky month for me. April can’t come quickly enough...seriously.

I lost someone I cared about this week.

Also, my niece was born Wednesday night. This is both exciting and terrifying. I don’t have much experience with children. I want so badly to love her, hold her, help her grow into a beautiful woman. But there are times when I don’t feel like a beautiful woman, so what advice could I possible give this impressionable little girl?

Last night, I heard the old cliché: “Tis better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all.”

My initial thought was, Yeah, right.

Loss is not fun. Loneliness is not desirable. Nobody looks forward to waking up in tears, or feeling as though their chest is collapsing because it’s filled with so much ache.

Alvin died in his mid-twenties. It doesn't make a lot of sense. I opened my heart, then he was gone. This is one example, but my resume is filled with similar stories. My life is an all-you-can-eat buffet of unfulfilled desires and endings with no closure.

My tendency is to love too much and too hard.

I loved, and in 2011 I lost.

This week I also lost. Big time.

There’s a possibility that I'll lose again, with my newest (and tiniest) relative.  I don’t know how to be a decent aunt. I’m afraid I will screw things up. There’s a good chance I already have.

But that won’t stop me from loving. In the end, there’s always someone who cared the most, right? Someone who can take a step back, once the dust has settled, and honestly say, “I loved you more.”

I’m willing to be the one.

 

Love,

Lisa