I know I promised by 45th year goals today but I didn’t want this thought to go too far into the future to make it less relevant. tomorrow I will get to the goals which I guess should include, “I will not procrastinate.”
I watched the 9/11 coverage on CNN for almost three hours on Sunday. Many things touched me: the beauty of the memorial in New York, the strength of Joe Biden at the Pentagon as he recalled his own loss, the children who lost their parents, and the carving of “unborn child” on the monument at the World Trade Center site. Fighting back tears the whole time. Then I got smacked by the biggest tearjerker of them all, “We miss your laughter, your smile and your meatloaf.”
Your meatloaf. I felt the tear start to drip down one cheek as I tried to cover it from my teenage daughters. Fake a wipe of the nose. They won’t know. Why in the hell am I crying over meatloaf? My wife makes a damn good one (uses salsa instead of ketchup) but never does it produce tears.
So what is it? I thought about it a lot and I came to this conclusion: It is about the little things. Everyone thinks about the weddings, the birthdays, the births that they won’t get to share with their departed friend or relative but does anyone think about how to deal with the little things? The things that make your life different. My wife would probably think about me every time she parked the car because we have had a lot of laughs about what a terrible parker I am. I would think about her every time I see the dents in the garage door. I would miss Olivia passing gas and laughing hysterically as well as Hattie butchering the pronunciation of words. I would definitely miss the meatloaf!
My point I guess is to not forget the meatloaf. The tragic thing that happened on 9/11 still touches the hearts of everyone who was witness to any part of it but we can’t forget that no one ever promised us that we would live any longer than one day. I know that’s not the lesson of 9/11 but I know it can be a reminder to seize the day. Celebrate the meatloaf!
40phor 
I started missing meatloaves (or is it meatloafs?) after 9/11. I realized that being separated from my family by 400 miles was not something I wanted to do anymore. That day was the beginning of the end of my marriage because I think both of us started realizing there were numerous things we were missing. Selfish? Maybe. But 10 years later, I am where I always wanted to be.
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