George and I met on one of those hot June Tucson days when all you want to do is sit in the shade and sweat. He was my neighbor. The first time I saw him he filled the doorway of my still unpacked rental, all 6' 2" of him covered in only a pair of swim trunks and dirty tennis shoes that looked like the dog had gotten the best of them. Everything about him was big and loud. His voice bounced off of the empty walls, his laugh was so powerful it shook me. He gave me jocular warnings about my new landlord and boss, then left. And when he did, my new landlord gave me warnings about George.
     We were friends for a long time. When my marriage went bad, he told me I would live through it. When I wanted to quit college, he threw such a fit I had no choice but to finish. When I couldn't make my rent payment, he forced a check in my hand. And when I couldn't find a job, he offered me one, complete with a room to rent.
     He was a postal worker. Said he'd been at the P.O. for most of his life and he'd likely die before he got out. I thought he was kidding. Why, I wondered, would someone work at a job they hated? I was naive. When I realized he was serious, I made it my mission to help him live beyond his hated job and impending death. And George, he made it his mission to take care of me, no matter what.
     He bought a home-based business and I ran it for a year. When it was time for me to move on, we both decided we didn't want to live alone, so we ran off to Las Vegas and got married. It was great. We were like kids discovering a new friend. Slowly, George began to trust himself, and he found a way to retire from the P.O. without losing his pension. That's the picture of him above at his retirement party. He was so happy. After all, he'd done what he thought he'd never do: live past the post office.
     George became a real estate broker and he loved every minute of it. He flourished in the self-motivated arena and delighted in helping people find the home of their dreams while handling the details for them. He just couldn't get enough of it. He was always working on something, and it was always complicated. His website was the most convoluted site I had ever seen. Of course I was expected to maintain it. That was almost a full-time job, and it opened new opportunities for me too. He gave me plenty to do, designing fliers, postcards, brochures, and everything else you could think of that demanded a creative touch. He knew he was stretching my ability, that, he thought, was his job too.
     Last November everything stopped. He'd had headaches for about a month. He kept pushing them down with medications, denying and hiding the truth from me. The day before Thanksgiving, I went to lunch with a friend. When I came home he was gone. I thought he'd probably gone out to look at a property or something. He called at 3 p.m. and said he was at Urgent Care at University Medical Center, that he'd be home after they ran some tests, that I didn't have to worry. I was there before he hung up the phone. They kept him. He had brain cancer. Looking further, they found he had lung, liver, and lymph nod cancer. They put a shunt in his brain. After a week he got up, got dressed and said, "Whatever you were going to do, you've done. I'm going home." And he did. He took radiation to keep the swelling down in his brain and the headaches went away for awhile. He took one chemo treatment, but it was too much. He ordered a hospital bed, signed up for Hospice, and called in two repair guys to get the house ready for me to be alone. The next six weeks are a blur. He gave orders and I obeyed, denying what was in my face.
     On January 31, my love took his last breath. He was my life. I am broken.

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