We have been trying to figure out the logistics of getting to Florida and paying for it all. I figured it would cost about $1000 if we drove as opposed to $1500 to $2000 if we flew. That's the problem with the airlines, their idea of a reduced bereavement fare is not very reduced. We would still have the cost of a hotel and rental car after we arrived, not to mention food and whatever else. Driving would require getting tires on Sue's Jeep and getting a tune up. Then the gas and I guess I could attempt to drive straight through, I've managed before. It wasn't easy but I did it. That would save on a motel both ways.

None of us have appropriate funeral clothes. I have lost so much weight that I have nothing left in the way of dress clothes and Sue just plain old has no really nice dress clothes anymore. Kaitlyn only has a pretty frilly Christmas dress, not appropriate for a funeral in Florida with the rich relatives watching. So I guess we will go shopping at some point in the next day of so and try to find some very inexpensive dress clothing, appropriate for this not so festive occasion.

When we are not at work, neither one of us gets paid, we are just off work, losing money. And all just before Christmas. Good for us that we bought the big present for K already. Somehow we will try to get some more smaller presents so that the tree is not so sparse. I would hate for the way that K finally discovers that there is no Santa to be because Grandpa died and we spent all our money dealing with taking Grandpa home to be buried.

The timing would have been better if it had been a couple of months from now, but honestly, nothing like this is ever convenient. We are always just a step ahead of all the bill collectors. Barely. So no time is ever convenient for us financially. Other people go through this thing every day. Everyday, thousands of people have to deal with the financial burden of burying their loved ones. Somehow they all get past it one way or another. So we too shall get past this, one way or another.

Our last bastion of hope is gone. Marty's heart can take no more. He has fought the good fight for 28 years, ever since they diagnosed him with this terminal illness. He should have died years and years ago, but he wasn't ready and he fought the good fight to live as long as possible. Even in this last hospitalization, he has fought for all he was worth to keep going on. But his heart is done and the doctors can do no more. Now it is time to let him go and that is an almost impossible thing to comprehend.

For a man who has only been in my life for 10 years and some change, it seems difficult at best to imagine life without him in it somehow. I think Jay summed it up best tonight when he said that Marty was the most selfless man he had ever known. I owe him everything in my life. Every vehicle we own, our home, everything. I look around this home and everything I see came from Marty. Even the very desk I sit at now typing in this journal. And when I go to bed tonight, I will crawl into the bed he bought Sue 7 years ago in Florida.

I cannot pay him back for his love he has shown us. I cannot ever back give to him all he gave to me, to us.

I will always remember my very first encounter with Martin Goldberg. He was going to send Sue out to visit us here in Arkansas. Because we had met over the internet, he was concerned that we were not axe murderers. Which was and is a valid concern considering the internet and what may lurk out there. So I got on the phone with him and I gave him every piece of personal information about myself that I could think of, my SS number, my business name, address, tax ID numbers, anything he could use to verify that I was real and not an axe murderer. In a way, I think he was getting a real chuckle out of me trying to prove to him that I was for reals.

I wanted him to trust me, to know that I loved his daughter and meant only the best for her and would never intentionally harm her in any way. Eventually he grew to trust me with everything. It was and is a trust I cannot ever break, even in death. I am that son-in-law you hope your daughter marries. He used to joke about me being his son-in-law. He really never knew just how right he was about that. What he does not know is that I have given my life for him. Not out of some since of owing him anything, but out of honor and the deep love I grew to hold for him in my heart.

Now with his end imminent, I grieve the loss of never having told him how deep my respect for him was. Yes, I told him how much I loved him, that did not go unspoken, but I never got to have that conversation about how much I honored him as a person and respected him for all that he was.

What a great and loving man he is, how deeply he has given to those he loves. He has built himself up some good karma in this lifetime. I love you Martin Edward Goldberg. And I will honor you and the memory of all you are and were until the day I die. I should only hope that people love me and grieve my passing as we all love you and are grieving now.

Now I am off to bed, tomorrow another day filled with things neither Sue nor I wish we had to deal with.

I love you Poppy.....