This morning, I took the subway to Coney Island. It was always your favorite place. The noises, the laughter and the screams. You always said the smells brought you back to your childhood. I looked out over the water as the sun was rising. My whole world shattered on this day eighteen years ago and all I could do now was take a deep breath, hold it for as long as I could and slowly exhale.

Eighteen years ago today. Sometimes it seems just like yesterday, other times it seems like a lifetime ago. What I wouldn’t give to have you back, to go back in time and keep you from going to work that day. How much different would my life, our life had been? Would it have changed that much? Life went on without you, even though I still don’t know if mine has completely.

Our kids are grown now. Eighteen years of memories, smiles and tears. I am a grandpa now, which means you would’ve been the best grandma. Sometimes when I hold her I can see you sitting in your old chair smiling. I can see you holding her like you held our daughter. You were the best mom. The best wife.

Eighteen years and we have survived, even if we are not whole since a piece of us is missing. Eighteen years of wishes and prayers that will never come true.

I think you would be really disappointed with our world now. Eighteen years later and the terrorists still hate America, maybe even more now. Eighteen years and we are still fighting the same war and I don’t even know what we are fighting for anymore. It seems hopeless. This world is a mess. Hate is rampant. Mass shootings every day it seems like. All those lives lost for nothing. It seems like most people have grown numb to it all and have given up hope.

Sometimes I wonder if God has abandoned us. Sometimes I wonder why he doesn’t do something. Sometimes I wonder why I don’t do something. I know you would’ve done something. You always saw the best in everyone and everything.

Most of those times I will find comfort and hope in your old Bible that still sits on the table on your side of the bed. The answers are there in your favorite highlighted passages.

In a way I am happy for you that you aren’t here to see all this. But maybe if you were here you would be the one that would change it all. I know there is good out there. I know there are still good people in this world. We just need more of them to step up and do something. Change this world you so loved.

Anyway, most days I am good. Some days the wind will blow and caress my cheek and I feel like you are still here with me and I can’t help but smile. Other days, like today and even after all these years, I can’t stop crying and I have to stop and pick up the broken pieces of my heart and push on.

I can see you giving me that look now. I know, I know. You wouldn’t want me to be sad, but even a warrior has his moments when he isn’t so tough. But like a warrior, I will fight on another day.

So today, eighteen years after you left us, I still will not say goodbye. I will never say goodbye. How can I when, like on that day and all days when you left for work, I can still see you smiling at me, giving me a wink and saying love you hon, see ya later.

So babe, I love you just as much today as I did the first day we met and I will see ya later.

If you want to cry, listen to this first song, I tear up every single time I hear it. And it is a good story of how a child grows up without her dad she lost in 9/11

I Miss You Daddy-

The Ones That Didn’t Make It Back Home by Justin Moore –

If I Had Only Known by Reba McEntire-

Jersey On The Wall ( I’m Just Asking)  by  Tenille Townes-

Why God by Austin French –

Miss You All The Time by O.A.R. –