Heather was born in Atlanta Georgia in October of 1985. Her parents, Jim and Cynthia were both career military so she spent most of her youth moving around the country and the world in true army brat style. Patches of memories from Korea, Portugal, California, Arizona, New York, Virginia and Texas are still alive and well inside her head, but in the end she has always claimed Texas as her home state. While living in this nomadic world has left her with scattered memories of her youth, she remembers all too well the regular experience of being in the hospital.
At the age of 9 she started getting very ill, putting her in the hospital sometimes for days. At 12 she had a biopsy to check for the lymphnode behind her heart. There is still a large scar on her chest today that I rarely notice any more. They found a mass, but it had calcified. Her doctors weren't sure quite to make of it and it was quickly dismissed as a result of an overproduction of calcium. At the age of 19 they biopsied a lymphnode by her lungs. After reviewing the x-rays, one of the doctors discovered that she had sarcoidosis.
You've heard of sarcoidosis right? The disease that killed Bernie Mac (may he rest in peace)? It was suggested as a possible diagnosis that would be quickly ruled out on almost every episode of the TV medical mystery drama House MD.
It's an auto immune disease that attacks different parts of the body and creates scar tissue, mostly in the lungs. Heather and her parents were told that there's a good chance that she won't live to see 50.
I'd like to believe that everyone knows how they would conduct themselves if the knew that their time in this world would be shorter than most. Heather choose to experience and enjoy as much as she could.
I would love to tell you that the first time I met my wife I saw her and bells began to ring and doves appeared as if from nowhere as I looked deep into her eyes and realized that this would be the person I'd spend the rest of my life with. My wife would prefer it too because she doesn't like the way I tell the real story.
We met in a geology class at a popular community college in Virginia shortly after we had both moved back to the area in 2006. We were both members of the oh-so-popular, "MovingBackInWithMyParentsForAwhile" club, a group that was growing at a rapid rate at the time. I checked her out from two desks back and one over during the first class (I was 24 and checking out all attractive women was more habitual than ever before).
She had long, straight, dark hair that hung half-way down her back, covering most of the logo on her black t-shirt. Her dark skin offered a suggestion of exotic ancestry but her clothes were blatant evidence of an American upbringing. She had all the right curves in all the right places and she slouched her shoulders like someone with an abundance of don't-give-a-shit.
I thought she was pretty hot. Then we got to know each other during the periodic five minute smoke breaks we were given during the three hour class. She was outgoing, smart, and most of all funny. She had a raunchy sense of humor, the kind that comes from being a tomboy and making fart jokes as a kid instead of whatever it is that girlie girls did as children. It was her smile that really drew me in. Her big beautiful smile like something out of a magazine ad for lipstick would spread across her face almost every time she spoke.
I thought she was awesome, to the point that I had created a dilemma in my mind. I thought, "This is the kind of girl that I would leave my girlfriend for." Yes, I had a girlfriend and yes, that is the part of the story my wife doesn't like. I knew that spending time with Heather and trying to conceal it in any way would probably get me in trouble so I very quickly introduced her to my girlfriend, Livia.
Years later, Heather confessed to me that she was attracted to me at first too, but that introducing her to Livia had turned that switch to the off position in her head. Besides, she had a long-distance boyfriend at the time anyway. Heather and Livia became friends and we fell in and out of touch with one another over the next few years.
Livia and I moved in together, broke up, moved out and rejoined the MovingBackInWithMyParents club. A few months after that I moved into a house with some friends as well as some strangers that I met off of craigslist.
Heather ended her long distance relationship, and almost immediately found a new boyfriend at the dinner theater she worked at named Ryan. I heard from her less and less after that. Until one day in the spring of 2009.
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