springdellgirl

The Memory Keeper





What do you do when you find out that your high school boyfriend has passed away? I have no idea either. I guess in my case... you blog. Sometimes the Internet is your friend and sometimes you find out things you never wanted to know. Aaron actually passed away awhile ago but I just found out yesterday.



Aaron was my boyfriend for nearly two years. Most of my memories of high school either revolve around him or my best friend, Mary, or better yet the four of us: me, Aaron, Mary, and Mary's boyfriend, Jimmy, wrecking havoc on good ol' KC. He was there for all the highlights. It just doesn't seem like it was that long ago that he was taking me to Mario's on the Plaza for dinner before Homecoming, looking snazzy wearing an electric blue tie and cummerbund to match my bright blue prom dress, pulling up in front of my house in his big red truck with the American flags flapping in the breeze on the sides, driving me and Stacey to early morning seminary every day senior year, dreaming of how we were going to get the heck out of Kansas City and never come back, spending every waking moment possible together (much to the dismay of his father who was our bishop), Aaron screaming my name as I walked across the stage at graduation.



I remember we filled out our college applications full of hopes and dreams for the future. Where were we going to live? What were we going to become? But as it turned out I got into BYU and Aaron didn't. He went to Ricks and I headed to Provo. Our paths separated. We stayed in touch and Aaron even came to Provo for a visit. Then he left for his mission and I had fun at BYU. We wrote occasionally but by then we each were on new paths. I have always known for the most part how Aaron was and where he was and he knew the same about me. Marriages, children, divorce (on his part)...An email here and there... updates from mutual friends or an online posting. I knew he had some health issues a few years ago but he seemed to be on the mend. It's funny how fast time flies...years just whipping by...when I realized last night that I hadn't heard anything from or about Aaron in quite awhile. It didn't take long to learn why. Living far from KC and Utah...his family moving to Chicago and mine moving up here... the news just didn't reach me.



Sad. What happens to the thousands of inside jokes, memories, promises, secrets, and special events known only to the two of us once one of us is gone? Do they cease to exist? What happens when I am the only person in the world who understands the significance of "clammy claws and Penner paws", "Faron Chanute", a mangled gum wrapper, a "stolen" napkin from Gojo's? I become the memory keeper. But for what and for whom? It is this thought that breaks my heart tonight.



I should eat at Taco Bell tonight in his honor and order a "coke so big I can SWIM in it" and think of a cute blond boy with mischievous eyes and a big ol' grin who used to make me laugh.



"If a man die shall he live again?" Job 14:14



Jesus said... "I am the resurrection and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live...And whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die" (John 11:25-26).



I am so grateful for this knowledge.



To: "N"...Love: "P"