Empty Spaces

Dear Christian

Your favorite place to have Star Wars battles

Today mommy and daddy moved your bed. Your room was empty your walls were bare. I looked at the spot on the floor where you used to sit and play star wars, for hours you would take out each man and find their weapon and their card. Sometimes you liked to take off all their helmets (and heads!) and lay them out in a line. After you got all of the men with their proper armor and weaponry you would ask me if I wanted to have a battle. You were always the cool commander and I was the bad guy. I tried to tell myself that your bed wasn’t you. Heck you didn’t even sleep in it more than a handful of times and certainly never alone. But like a good friend said to me tonight it was a dream, a hope of a better life. It was the hope that one day I would get to hear you and Ryan giggling till all hours of the night. I wanted to walk into the room and tuck you into bed and bend down and tuck Ryan into his bed.

I never miss you more than when I watch Ryan following around other boys your age. Desperate to be their friend and looking up to them the same way he looked up to you. I would be lying if I said my heart doesn’t break when I realize that Ryan doesn’t have his big brother anymore. He doesn’t have his hero to look up to and want to be like. You were such a sweet heart with a kind and soft presence about you. You were a leader and a friend to just about anybody who was around. (I am sure until he got into your toys!) I pray that God will help him to remember you and feel you and know you. That your light and influence will finds its way into his heart and soul and he will know that his big brother always lives in him and protects him. So Ryan is getting a new paint color on the wall and I am going to paint one wall yellow for you, so that the two new colors will blend together and I can keep a little of you in our lives. I still have not moved your clothes out of the closet and your toys still stand on the shelves.

Evelyn is only a few months away from turning five. I don’t know where the time has gone. The world continues to spin (at an epic rate some days) and I realize that while I am waiting to find a new way to live life continues to move and grow and change. Evelyn is still in love with her stuffies, she packs her bags often to have sleepovers at Grammy’s house.  She loves to wear her black and white shirt and pretend she is a skunk. She loves Just Dance and I can picture you and her dancing together in the living room. She always asks to do the ‘cat fight’ song that you two used to do together. Are you watching her? Do you dance with her?

On your heaven day we took the kids to stir crazy. She asked me if you had ever been there and I told her sadly, no you had never gotten the chance. She pondered only for a moment and then ran back up to the top of the slide. When she same down she said did you see that mom? I asked did I see what? She said, "I winked at Christian! He was sliding right beside me." And I dreamed for a moment that you were playing with them and keeping them company.

What an amazing big bro

You are irreplaceable. An amazing older brother that is no longer here. And sometimes I have a glimpse that God must have something amazing planned for our family. He will surely figure out a way for us to be happy again, for the gigantic whole in my heart to be healed, even if just a bit. I love you my little monkey pants. 

Jayden, Big brother Nicky and Christian = Star Wars friends forever