This isn’t the first post I’ve had difficulty writing. This isn’t the first time I’ve delayed writing something because putting something baddownin words makes it feel more real. This is a post I feel I must write, though, and time is not my friend. It becomes clearer and clearer to me every day just how few chances I have left to say the things that need to be said. Every day, the fight to stay and finish the last things I have to do becomes harder. So now I have to face that fact that I will not be able to finish them all. This will be rather more melancholy than my last list, and for that I apologize, but here is the list of things I regret…

• I regret that there are so many wonderful people out there I will never meet
• I regret that there are places I’ve never been
• I regret the wrongs I’ve done which cannot be undone
• I regret the wrongs I could have undone but did not
• I regret that there are so many in the preceding category
• I regret that my daughter died before me
• I regret the violence I’ve done
• I regret that I was a thief
• I regret that I couldn’t make my wife happy
• I regret that I will never finish my story
• I regret half-finished painting
• I regret that I’ve never swam with sea lions
• I regret that I cannot say goodbye to L
• I regret that I will never raise a child
• I regret every name I’ve ever forgotten
• I regret that I didn’t carve her name into the side of a mountain in mile-high letters
• I regret the stories I said I’d write but haven’t

• I regret words left unsaid

Mostly, though, I regret that I was never good enough for my Dove. Of all the things left undone in my life, the things I really could have changed, nothing hurts so much as the knowledge that I promised her that I would always be there for her, that if she ever needed for anything, I would always be waiting… and I failed. I’ve had good frineds in my life, and I’ve knownlove beyond any words I could ever say. I’ve never deserved any of it. If any of you evermeet her again after I am gone,  let her know that I loved her. That is the only truly good thing I can claim, the only real value in my life. If she misses me after I’m gone, please tell her not to cry – I’ve shed enough tears for the both of us.