The Graduation Night that Wasn't

Tonight is the graduation for Tallahassee's Lincoln High School.  Christopher should have been there tonight, although he was not a student there when he died.

Christopher had been attending an alternative high school in Tallahassee, the Academy for Academics and Technology.  Due to budget constraints, that school was closed at the end of the 2007-2008 academic year.  Truth be told, Christopher really wanted to finish out his high school career at Lincoln.

So hear I am at home, rather than at the graduation that should have been, but wasn't to be.  Know that I know that Christopher is not in heaven wishing to be at the Tallahassee Leon County Civic Center for a too-long ceremony.  He is where he'd rather be, I know that, but it doesn't change the fact that I miss him so much and would so prefer to have him here.   Call me selfish; I won't argue.

You know, when you have a child, it is like instantly that you begin to envision the future milestones, high school graduation just being one of many.  You never imagine that these things won't come to pass; you just assume that everything will progress according to the "normal" script.  

I have found that there is no script for the life that you have left after the death of a child.  I have met people who try to tell me when I will "turn the corner" on this grief.  They don't know squat.  

Truthfully, I don't know squat; I just take it a day at a time.  

I have no choice.