My Husband’s Birthday – AFTER He Died – Year Two
I have been a Billy Joel fan all of my life. When we were newlyweds with hardly a dime to our name, my husband, John, splurged and bought us tickets to the Billy Joel/Elton John Dueling Pianos concert. The concert was held at the Milwaukee Brewer’s baseball stadium. He really wanted to take me to a solo Billy Joel concert, but in those archaic days before the internet, news of concert tours was only available through newspapers (which we couldn’t afford) or by listening to the radio.
If Billy Joel had been touring alone, we hadn’t known about it. On the other hand, we heard a radio announcement for The Dueling Pianos tour every 3.68 seconds! From the first radio advertisement he heard, John knew that we would go.
During that concert, John apologized every single time that Elton John sang a song.
“I know you only wanted to see Billy Joel. I’m sorry! This isn’t what you wanted,” he apologized over and over and over.
“Are you kidding? Shut up! This is amazing!” I repeated, finally jabbing him in the ribs to get him to be quiet so that I could hear!
Decades later, on a June evening, John found himself stuck in a hospital bed. He had been there for weeks. I sat on my cot beside him in his hospital room. I scrolled through social media in order to maintain some footing in the real world, some connection to people who were not living the drama filled, emotionally exhausting alternate reality that we had found ourselves trapped in. My Instagram and Facebook feeds showed several pictures of different friends. I scrolled through lots of smiling faces at the Billy Joel concert two hours from my home.
I showed the pictures to John. “You should have been there,” he told me. “I wanted to get tickets and surprise you. I’m sorry you’re here instead.”
“I’m not sorry I’m here,” I told him honestly. “I’m sorry this is happening to us. Someday, we will go to a Billy Joel concert! He will come back, or we will travel somewhere to go and see him,” I responded, hoping that by saying those words I could control our destiny and a future trip to a Billy Joel concert together would become a reality. I felt the power of those words, the planning of a future event that then must become a reality.
But it did not.
After his death, while I traveled for 83 days to learn how to live with my loss, I learned that a member of my new cancer family had a connection to the Billy Joel organization. I was offered tickets to go and see him perform. One of those performances landed near John’s birthday, and coincidentally would take me back to Miller Park, home of the Milwaukee Brewers!
So, one year after the Miller Park baseball game we attended for his heavenly birthday celebration, we were back! This time he gave me the gift of those Billy Joel tickets he had promised so long ago!
There would be no way to top this, or so I thought.
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After reading your article (and drying my tears) I went to uTube to listen to some tunes and concerts by these two icons. Thanks for your captivating storytelling
Awwww…. I didn’t realize this story would be a tear-jerker. I hope they were good tears! I don’t know if you’ve read my story called, “A Magical Gift and a Thank You,” but I talk about my alltime favorite Billy Joel song, Lullabye, and why it is my favorite. That story is TOO long in my opinion and I need to rework it, but it’s a good story! Take care!