I Can't Take My Eyes Off Of You -- April 17, 2022

 Home alone. Easter Sunday.

Enjoying a wonderful English breakfast. The ones we  enjoyed almost every Sunday. 

Great memories.

And then this song popped up on YouTube rotation.

And it all came flowing back. 

You said it would take eight years. 

It's been seventeen? 

Do you realize how long seventeen years is? 

It's three years short of a military career. It's one's entire first seventeen years of life. I have less than seventeen years to live, no doubt. It's two years longer than the total number of years I've been retired. It's too damned long.

Love.

Visits To MHS, June, 2002 -- September, 2004

From my journal;

    Visits to MHS:

• 1 Jun 2002 -- 19 Aug 2002
• Oct 2002 -- the visit that changed everything and changed nothing
• Nov 2002
• Mar 2003
• Aug 2003
• Jan 2004 -- was this the last time I saw Pat? If so, on this visit, I saw her for one hour despite being at MHS for one to two weeks. We knew it would be our last visit. It was incredibly painful. 
• (Pat’s last day at MHS:  May 16, 2004; probably 30 days home leave; first day in Australia ~ 16 Jun or 16 Jul 04)
• Sep 2004: this, too, would have been a painful visit since she was no longer there.
  

        I need to confirm these dates. I never did confirm those dates but probably quite accurate. 

From 2000 to 2007 May and I lived in San Antonio. I was the Surgeon General for Air Intelligence Agency, headquartered at the large air base on the southwest side of San Antonio. 

"9/11" was September 11, 2000.

My first visit to Menwith Hill Station was in the summer of 2002. 

I stayed at the Wellington Inn, about a 30-minute walk down the hill from MHS.

Pat lived in a detached home in a rural setting, overlooking a most incredibly beautiful valley of the River Nidd.

I Can't Help If If I'm Still In Love With You, Linda Ronstadt, Emmylou Harris

Someone Once Told Me ..... February 7, 2022

 .... it took eight years to get over an unrequited love. 

Not true. Has it been seventeen years? 

Not a day goes by that I don't think of you. And the memories seem stronger than ever. 

Google maps, satellite photos, and street views of Yorkshire bring back bittersweet memories.

I haven't changed a bit ... except normal aging process and "slow" at that.

Tabla Rasa, Arvo Pärt -- October 28, 2020

You were the only one who ever thanked me for doing the dishes and cleaning up after dinner and / or cleaning up after cooking.

To this day, whenever I wash dishes I think of you. I will never forget you. I will never forget loving you.

Tabula Rasa, Arvo Pärt
You would not know this this was the music I listened to whenever we stopped by the small church after midnight.

I Can't Shake This Thing From Fifteen Years Ago -- October 12, 2020

Fifteen Years Ago, John Prine, featuring Lee Ann Womack

Not A Day Goes By That I'm Not Thinking Of You -- July 1, 2020

Nothing else to say.

I Never Shared This With You, Pat, But If I Could, I Would -- November 2, 2019

Oxygen, Jean Michel Jarre / Hank Marvin
I still remember the "carvery" you took me to on our last real day together. You were so incredibly kind.

My hunch is you would prefer this one:

Te Deum, Arvo Pärt
The little church, at midnight, in Pateley Bridge.