pretending

 The worst parts of my day are when I have to pretend to be him. 

He's a hard act to follow. He was brilliant and thoughtful, funny and beautiful. He also knew the difference between a stock and a bond, a pan for frying and a pan for sauteing, an americano and a machiatto. 

I do not. Nor do I care about those things.

But sometimes I have to pretend to.

Like this week.

For some reason so many calls have been popping up on his cell phone - mostly business - mostly people who don't know yet.

At least 8 times this week, I have had to stop somebody in the middle of their biscotti order and say, "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry, but you'll have to call the other line. Rico can't help you right now."

If that was it - if I could just get away with that, it would probably be ok. But it's never enough info for the caller and invariably I have to just blurt it out - "He died. He died a month ago."

There is silence - always silence. Then the apologies and the questions and the shock and the reminiscing start. I am so grateful to love a man who has touched so many souls, but also - yikes. I'm just sort of trying to get through this myself and it keeps popping up. 

Mayo clinic called this week - to follow up on his physical therapy. They've called 4 times and each time I tell them to please stop - each time they say they will and that it is protocol to check the screen before they make the call. So this week, I was done. They called and asked if he could come in for an appointment.  "It's a little tough for him to travel," I said. 

"Oh, we can arrange for a ride if you'd like."

"No, no I mean I can bring him in if you really think it would be helpful at this juncture. It just seems like an awfully long ride considering."

"Of course, well we can make accommodations with the equipment here too I'm sure."

"Great, he'll be needing a lot of those accommodations, his situation has really gone downhill."

"Can you tell us what's happened?"

"Can you check your screen?"

Again with the silence. "I'm so sorry. I'm sorry. I should have looked at the screen."

"It's ok - you just caught me at a bad time. Apparently he also won 10 million dollars in the Publisher's Clearing House Sweepstakes and I'm having trouble wiring the $4,900 to claim it."

And so it goes.

We are all doing a bit better each day - but then we aren't.

Billy Joel said Taylor Swift was the Beatles of her generation. Kaia thought the issue had finally been resolved and went to text Rico - but no.

I went down to his office - a place I have avoided for months. He wasn't there to say "Hey Baby" or hold up three fingers to tell me he'd be just three minutes (it was always more).

Our sweet friend was having a conversation with me. A completely harmless conversation about what foods were good for people and how people would be healthier if they ate better, and I lost it. Lost. IT. I started crying and saying how sometimes that wasn't enough - how sometimes NOTHING works. 

Everything still hurts. But there is so much good in our world, in what he left behind - we will be ok.