Remembering Carmen
She’s not dead or anything, as that title might suggest. I probably could have gone with another title. Maybe, “Reconnecting with Carmen”? That’s probably more accurate.
Carmen left the office and with it, our decade-long work marriage, in December 2016. I know that she was unhappy with where she was in the office, though I was not aware as to why or what those circumstances were. Maybe I could have asked, but I didn’t. I didn’t think that I could talk her out of it and I made no effort to do so. She was already fixated on the fact that she needed to leave and just before Christmas 2016, she was gone. She had moved to another office and with that, for the first time in our careers together, we were apart. It didn’t take as much getting used to as I would have anticipated, being that for several months prior, we hadn’t really been all too connected. I can’t explain why that happened. It just did and in retrospect, maybe it helped us to get over the split that much easier and quicker, but it also kept us apart for just over two years.
This past weekend, at our friend Christopher’s memorial service, we recently saw each other for the first time in about four years. We knew that we were both going to be there. She didn’t recognize me at first. This wasn’t because of any drastic change on my part. I didn’t go bald. I wasn’t clean shaven. My voice didn’t change. I hadn’t lost a limb. Since I last saw her in 2019, I lost 40 or so pounds and apparently, that was enough to make me a virtual stranger to her and some of our other co-workers who were also in attendance that day. The weight loss is an entirely different conversation, one that I might delve into in a future entry.
Once she saw me and convinced herself that she had found me, she finally formally introduced me to her boyfriend of a few years, a man who also works with us. She seemed especially excited to do so and I suppose I didn’t want to let her down or somehow mess it up. The introduction went well, though I had no reason to anticipate that it would have gone terribly. He had apparently heard a lot of things about me from her, which I can only hope were mostly positive or not entirely negative. I can’t help what people might say about me, so in that regard, that was a situation in which I had no control. I suspect that it was all good stuff. Call me an optimist.
Carmen and I planned late last week, before the memorial, to have lunch together this coming week. I figure this would been the prime opportunity to catch up and reconnect with her after all these years. When she had called me last month to let me know that Christopher had passed, she was a mess and I could hear it. She was in tears and from what I could gather just by her voice, she was an emotional wreck. But aside from her crying, I remember something else that she had told me just before she ended that call with me. Carmen told me that this was something that we both needed to use, as a sort of a wake-up call and reminder, that we need to maintain better contact and not become as distant as we had become. I knew exactly what she meant. She didn’t want to lose me or have me lose her like this, in a sudden fashion, where maybe we’re left with regret, wondering why we didn’t do more to stay connected. As I’ve said in at least one entry somewhere in this diary, I don’t live with regret. I don’t want to live with regret. I don’t even want to play the “What if” game, in the event that Carmen were to die suddenly and I never knew it, or had the chance to say goodbye.
I had even reminded her that we had even lost connection in Words With Friends, which we had been playing together since 2011. This hiatus was unintentional and something that even I can’t explain, but again, it happened. Carmen and I are much closer than she and Christopher ever were and I know that she was pouring out some of her heart when spoke in mid-June.
I know that she and I will talk over lunch this coming Thursday and it will be the pleasant mealtime connection that we have always shared in years past. I don’t need to get emotional with her and I don’t intend to. What I do think is going to happen is that we’ll share some words that maybe we once meant to share a long time ago, but just never did. I know that we are not dating and never did, but as work spouses, we might as well have been that close. I like to think that even though she’s in a relationship now, she still has some feelings for me. Even if I’m wrong, I know that I’m right.
As of this writing, we have not decided where we will be eating that day. To be honest, it doesn’t matter where we go. Just to be reunited with her again is more than enough. This could be the first of many meals that she and I hope to share in the months and years to come.
Now, having said all of that, how do I tell her that I don’t eat anymore?