thank you deborah. i have missed you all so very much...i think of you all, especially you deborah and derek, we share such a close time line, one that i know, none of us wants. life for me has been so hard without my herman, i take 5 steps forward and 6 steps back, like we all do. i am a grandma now as you can see, a wonderful granddaughter who will be 19 months on the 27th of this month. yes, it is very bitersweet for me, herm would never, ever let anyone, and i mean anyone hold her and play with her and just be a big goof with her, if only he was here to know her. but i do know in my heart and soul that he talks to her and plays with her all of the time, i can see that in the way she kisses his pictures and knows exactly who he is, yes, that is my doing and my boys as well. craige got married on july 14th of this year in my back yard and gave his dad a wonderful speach and he and ange will be giving me and herman a grandson sometime in early may, that right now is what i hold on to, 'cause if any of you had had the chance to know my herman, and i have thought about this more times than i can count, he would kick my a*@...can't say that word here, if i did not hold his grandchildren close for me, for them and especially for him. Yes, i still stuggle, all of the time, just like we all do and will always do...how could we not, we lost the love of our lives, our very best friends, our everything.....and yes, there are times when i am ready to pack it in and honestly i don't know why i have not and yet i do, it is because of how hard herman fought to stay with me and our children, to the very second that i saw him take his last breath on earth, wow, i have never shared that with anyone. i also know, that he tried so very, very hard to stay with us for as long as he could and he did...for 17 years of fighting, through all of his surgeries and treatments and pain, and i know in my heart and soul...only because of god, that he was so very tired, so tired and lately i have been thinking that yes, i did tell him (as our boys did) that if he could not do it anymore that it was okay to go, that we would be "ok" and yes often i question myself why i said that when all i wanted was for him to get better and to stay with us, but i know finally that he was listening to me, even though he barely could, and what right do i actually have to go against my word to herman when he did everything he could to stay with us....that is the exact question that i am struggling with now. tomorrow will be 2 years and 3 months since i lost the love of my life, i am now 40 and we were together since i was 14...way more than half of my life, i have never been able to dream since the day herman died and that night i had a nightmare and that was it....but he sends me songs...country songs...and i so do know that they are from herman....that i do know in my heart and soul. looks like i have been rambling again and most likely made a lot of spelling mistakes because of the tears that are flowing, but oh well, some how i think that you will all accept that from me.... i miss you all and i love you all....lori