Six years ago today, I was cast Adrift At Sea. The amazing woman who had agreed to marry me in September 1999 finally lost her fight with pancreatic cancer. Gee passed away at 11:00 am, six years ago today, exactly seven months and seven days from the start of our wedding.
Even today, I find it so hard to believe that I only knew my beloved Gee for twenty-three months and one day. I often ask myself, “How is it possible that I knew her less than two years—when I can barely remember what life was like before I met her?”
It still amazes me that Gee chose me to marry. Of all the people she could have chosen, she picked me. I miss her greatly, and it seems like it has been so long since she’s been gone.
I still remember the very first time Gee and I spoke. It was on July 9, 1999. I had called her to ask her out to lunch—a blind date setup by mutual friends of our parents. I knew that she was the woman I wanted to marry the first time I heard her say, “Yes, this is Gee.” She had the most beautiful voice I’d ever heard, but my opinion may be a bit biased.
I remember the day in April 2000, when I told her to go see her parents, and asked her to talk to her father, a doctor, since I thought something was wrong—her color was off to me. Ten days later, we found out she had pancreatic cancer.
About a week after she was diagnosed, I remember her father asking if I wanted to cancel our engagement because of her illness. I looked at him, and said, “Her being ill doesn’t change who she is, what she means to me or how I feel about her—and why, in God’s name, would I abandon the woman I love, just when she needs me most?” The subject was never raised again. I’ve been told by a lot of people that they would have walked away. I never saw that as an option.
Today, her namesake, my sailboat, a Telstar 28 named Pretty Gee, is being prepared for longer voyages. Later this summer, I am taking the Pretty Gee down to the Chesapeake, and visiting Gee’s parents. I also hope to sail to some of the places Gee and I talked about visiting.
Cape Cod and the Islands was the first of those four places—we did get there on our last trip together. Key West was another. Greece was the third, where we were originally planning to go for our honeymoon. Napa Valley, the heart of California wine country was Gee’s fourth place to visit—and probably the only one I can’t get to in her namesake.
I know my beloved Gee watches over me and her namesake. As Woo Kyung, Gee’s best friend and the maid of honor at our wedding, described the woman I married in an e-mail to me: “Yet we get to know her, love her and be loved by her, how privileged are we…”
Gee—
Know that I miss you and love you still. As I said six years ago, “For a love as true and strong as ours, mere death is no barrier to.”