HELLO, I’M KOLETTE HALL.
MOTHER. ENTREPRENEUR. GRAPHIC DESIGNER. WRITER. WIDOW.
When Jason died without warning, I was shocked and heartbroken.
I truly couldn’t believe that my partner that I have stumbled along with, struggled with, made mistakes with, kept moving forward with, overcame with – was no longer doing life with me.
I imagined him in heaven. I know he is there, without the challenges of a quadriplegic body to weigh him down, making friends and watching over Coleman and I.
And my broken heart feels a bit of peace, even joy, as I talk with him in that “after death” way that puts him nearby. I exclaim, “Look at what we just did, Jas! Can you believe it?”
I have an image of us in my mind, making our way to the winner’s podium of life, battered and bruised, crawling.
Shoulders weighed down with fatigue from the challenges that had our name on them.
Sitting there, worn out from the everyday battles, breathing heavily with the exertion of doing the best we could during our 27 years of marriage.
Then we look at each other. Smile. And laugh while we give each other a high five, “We did it!”
It wasn’t always pretty and it definitely was never perfect.
It was messy. It was blundering.
It was make it up as we go and fly by the seat of our pants.
We didn’t always get it right.
But then sometimes we did.
We stuck with it. We learned things.
We worked hard. We never gave up.
We got better. We overcame.
We loved. We laughed.
We chose to be happy in spite of our circumstances.
Sometimes we got it right.
We had those messy victories.
Sometimes we actually won.
“Look at what we just did, Jas!” I say, laughing.
And I feel his response, “Yep, we did it.”
Kolette Hall 