on the weekend

We celebrated Mike's birthday Saturday night.  The temperature climbed to over 100 degrees and as we sat outside at the beer garden in Astoria we waited for relief from an occasional breeze and the setting sun.  Mike had been having a hard week.  I thought it was because we were gearing up for another "first" without Bernadette, but he said it was more from remembering where we were a year ago.  When we still thought we had time, when we didn't know that it was only a matter of weeks.  He had brief moments of panic in not being able to remember, "what did we do this weekend last year? Were we with her?"  And I reminded him, yes, we were there, we were all together, you were with her. 

But as people gathered on Saturday night he was happy and so thankful for his sisters and cousin and friends who trekked in the heat and through subway mishaps to be there.  He was reminded of all that he still has and that was such a gift.