What I’d give for one more night of hearing him ask, “what do you want for dinner?” even though the repetition of that question night after night after night used to drive me crazy. What I’d give for one more slow dance in the kitchen after we’ve put the food away and washed the dishes.

I miss his touch. I miss being touched. When I get my hair washed at the salon, I can’t believe how great it feels to have fingers moving up and down my scalp. When I get a pedicure, I think of the foot massages he used to give me. On my birthday and our anniversary, he would print up gift certificates entitling me to 5-minute massages from a company called “Hands by Eddie.”

When I had my blood pressure taken at the doctor’s office a couple weeks ago and the technician asked if it’d be ok for her to hold my arm while she did so, I got tears in my eyes as she gently cradled my arm in hers.

I cry sometimes when I least expect to. In the closet reaching for a ball cap the other day I brushed up against his fringed suede jacket – the one he wore the first time we spent the whole day together. I had just turned 18 and I thought Eddie was the most handsome guy I’d ever met. Especially in that jacket. Brushing up against it brought back a flood of memories.

Sometimes just looking around the apartment makes me cry. Intellectually I know he’s not at the gym or the grocery, but it’s so easy for me to think that’s exactly where he is. I reread Joan Didion’s book about magical thinking, and boy, is it ever true. But I think she was wrong to suggest it only lasts a year because I’m into year two now and I still keep his shoes in the front hall closet just in case he needs them when he comes home

Often, I just sit and wonder: where is he?

The poet Andrea Gibson, who died last summer, suggested in their piece called “A Love Letter from the Afterlife” that when we die, we are reincarnated in those we loved and will stay there as long as they continue living. Andrea said that dying is the opposite of leaving, that when people die and leave their body they don’t go away.

“I am more here than I ever was before. I am more with you than I ever could have imagined. So close you look past me when wondering where I am,” they wrote to their wife from the imagined afterlife.

This isn’t a new concept for me. Growing up Jewish, I learned that those who die live on through the hearts, lives and minds of others. I feel Eddie with me always. The morning he died, I was curled up next to him in the hospital bed - my hand over his heart. The second it stopped beating, I felt it move out of his chest and into mine, and it’s been there ever since. I know that on a certain level, but I’m acutely aware of it at special times. Like whenever I listen to certain songs. I’d honestly never paid much attention to the fact that love songs, the ones that are about break-ups, sound a lot like they are about death, about losing your beloved for good, which I guess is what it feels like when you break up.

I wouldn’t know, because Eddie was the one love of my life, and we never broke up.

But break-up songs, they level me now:

the bed’s too big, the fryin’ pan’s too wide

we were something don’t you think so?

you’re calling to me, I can’t hear what you’ve said

love you forever and forever, love you with all my heart, love whenever we’re together, love you when we’re apart

I remember every night, your ocean eyes of blue, how I miss you in the morning light, like roses miss the dew

I’ve been afraid of changing ‘cause I built my life around you. But time makes you bolder, even children get older, and I’m getting older, too.

Singing with Eddie in the car on road trips or even short jaunts to the coast is one of my favorite memories. Probably our best top-of-the-lungs-sing-alongs were “Closer to Fine” and “Galileo.” I loved that he knew the words to Indigo Girls songs. And, of course, Alan Sherman songs, which I did mention at his memorial service. I also told the story about how he ordered me a big bag of M&Ms that had the word “sorts” printed on them so I could eat a few whenever I felt “out of sorts.” I’ve never felt as out of sorts as I do now, and sadly, the M&Ms don’t help. The crazy thing is that the one person who could best help me navigate this death is the one who died.

I do use art to help with the navigation. At first, I hurled paint, dripped and splashed it, scratched at the canvas, used huge gestures to slash the paint onto the canvas. A year later, I’m calmer. I’m not expressing anger as much as I’m simply trying to find a creative means of connection. I’m taking a class that’s helping me become more of an intuitive painter, letting my feelings out, painting with my heart instead of my head, trusting the process. A few days ago, I was getting frustrated with my lack of progress, so I set aside all my brushes, tubes of paint and the tools I use for mark-making. I took out a piece of cheap paper, used only a couple colors and laid the paint down with my fingers. I was quiet and thoughtful and tried to be as open as possible to what might come. What came looked to me like a ladder. The ladder was simple and childlike, and it broke my heart in a way I can’t really explain. The tears, always so close to the surface even now, leaked down my face, and then I painted another little ladder and then another. When I looked at them later, I guessed they might be about trying to pull myself up out of this hole I’ve been in since Eddie died, but now I think it’s more about simply trying to find my way. Today I filled a canvas with a sky ranging from light to dark and added a ladder connecting the two shades of blues.

I did a little research into the symbolism of the ladder in art. Words like growth and ascent popped up. A ladder can symbolize a struggle to overcome challenges, a pursuit of dreams, a connection between the living and the dead, the steps toward a higher understanding.

It occurred to me that this intuitive drawing/painting approach could be the key to unlocking some deep-seated and inspiring stuff.

It’s also occurred to me that I’m getting older and Eddie is not. It’s occurred to me that there are songs I’ve listened to this past year that he’s never heard, that I’ve met new people, people who never knew him and who I cannot talk to him about (how I would love that). It’s a sad fact that babies being born now will not know him and he will not know them. And if I’m being totally honest, it’s occurred to me that he’s really not coming back.

That last one is, of course, the hardest truth of all.