It Would Have Been His 43rd Birthday

Yesterday was Leif’s birthday, the tenth since his death. If he were still with us, he would be 43 years old. What might have happened in those ten years? How do you celebrate the birthday of someone who is no longer with you? Probably most people don’t, though I imagine that they, like us, remember and miss their departed loved one on that day.

As I have written before, we decided years ago to try, when possible, to do something Leif enjoyed on his birthday. This year we Went to Bellows Beach, a place we spent many happy hours with our sons. Even after we moved away from Hawaii when Leif was only 11, we went back several times. The last time we took him there was in 1989, when I took this photo of him. How I wish he and his brother could have been with us again.