Odd Feeling of Loss

So, a woman died this last week. This was a woman who was very important to me about thirty something years ago. She was my best friend in junior high and a lot of high school. We went through a lot of things together during those years and we were together more than we weren't. I was there the day her dad told her he thought her mom was having an affair (why would you do that to a kid?). I was there when her parents divorced. We went through a lot together. We had our first boyfriends at the same time. We had our first jobs together at Dee's Drive In. We were in Pep Club together. We skipped a lot of classes together. We went to the prom and other dances together. Her name was Annette Lemmon during those growing up years.

Both of our high school boyfriends joined the military. Mine joined the Army and hers joined the Coast Guard. We were both in our junior year when they left. She dropped out of high school and married her boyfriend. I was the maid of honor in her small wedding at the groom's house. Her mother refused to go. Her father gave her away. Things were never really the same with us after that. She was only married to him for like four or six months. But, I had moved on (I had broke up with my boyfriend and was dating other) and things were too different for her - she couldn't go back to high school after that.

We really lost touch. Our touchstone was Rayna. We both always knew how to get in touch with Rayna, so every once in a while Rayna would hear from Annette and let me know what was going on. Annette had a very colorful life. She had five kids. One died like three hours after she was born. The oldest two had one father, the rest had different fathers. I think she was married four or five times.

Apparently she finally found happiness with her most current husband. He was seven years younger than her. They didn't have any children together.

Out of the blue, about two years ago, she reached out to me. She sent me an email through Classmates.com. She told me about her husband, about her children, about her grandchildren, about having back surgery and living in pain, about completing a medical assistant course. We sent a couple of emails back and forth. The last one I sent went unread, was never answered. She was now going by Cynthia Small (it was her first name, she always had gone by her middle name). I never would have known it was her obituary if she hadn't sent me those emails, because of the different name. I was actually kind of hoping we would re-connect, because I was really quite curious about what she had done, since she had lived such an odd life. But, it wasn't to be and now it can never be.

She died last week. Apparently she went to sleep and never woke up.

It's so odd that someone that can consume your life for so many years can just disappear and you just don't have a clue as to what they are doing. So odd. So odd to look at an obituary and say, "I KNOW HER!!" I kind of had a freak out that night. I just felt this odd sense of loss - kind of a disconnect from reality - this strange feeling of leaving something undone. I still have that feeling somewhat. Our touchstone, Rayna, kind of helped me out that night. I kept texting her and unloading on her. She finally called me and talked to me and talked me down a bit.

I felt kind of sad that I was unable to attend her funeral. I had a prior committment that kept me from going. Rayna went - still being the touchstone. She filled me in on the goings on. Apparently the service was almost as odd as her life. That's all right - nothing wrong with being odd and different, I guess.