hear you me.

It's been one year.

And yet it still feels like yesterday that I heard your voice. I still remember your smell. I can certainly remember the food you liked to eat. The soap operas you enjoyed watching. Desperate Housewives FTW - which I just finished watching for the second time in tribute to you. I even got Jb into it! I still smile thinking back on how kind your heart was. There wasn't a person in this world that had an ill feeling towards you. Sometimes you made us all a bit crazy but that was your job. You were the glue that held the family together.

Since you've been gone every thing has fallen apart. Nothing is the same and yet everything is exactly as it was. It's complicated. All of us suffer in our own way. We've got different coping mechanisms. Julio gambles, Krystan goes out a lot and tries to fight her dreams, mama has found God and mine is strength. I am quite strong in the face of all the sadness still hanging over our heads but inside I am a total mess. No one understands and I can't explain it. There's not a single person on this Earth I can share my feelings with. I don't really want too. Letting people in is harder for me now than it ever was before.

Is it sad that I still pick up my phone to call you? Whenever something life changing happens to me I've always known that you were the ONLY person I could call to get a positive reaction. Support. Love. Advice. No judgement. I haven't had that in 365 days. Its not fair.

And yet I am sitting here basically saying 'woe is me. poor me. sad Ashley.' Then again, you do have it better than all of us still stuck here on this planet. You're in heaven laughing it up with all the lost relatives and friends that left this world before you.

Last week my grandfather passed away. You remember him well. He was that mean old man who always liked to pick on you at the parties. He had Alzheimer's for a long time and suffered greatly. When Gail called to tell me the news I felt no sadness and at first that confused me because I've known that man since I was four years old. Then I realized that...I feel no heartache because I know without a shadow of a doubt that it was his time. He needed to go. God finally ended his pain and now he could be happy.

It wasn't your time. You were so young, so beautiful. I only had 25 years with you. My kids only had 7, 4 and Teagan had none... I will try to keep your memory alive in them through photographs and old stories but it's not the same. The world is now without.

I am going to wrap this up because I don't like to let the sadness in. Just know that I will think of you always despite my inability to talk about you. You're in my heart forever Ann.

"If you were with me tonight, I'd sing to you just one more time. A song for a heart so big. God wouldn't let it live."