Dear Dan,
So now the memorial concert is over.  And I come home.  I am happy to be home in my bed- happy to be here writing, thinking of you.

It was harder than I thought.  When I first got there, once I got to the reserved seat up in the balcony, I couldn’t stop crying.

I felt at any moment you’d come by like you always did at gigs, drinking a water or beer or soda, put your hand on my shoulder.

I feel the shock every time someone says something about you being gone- or I see the date of your birth and death together.  Every time it is a shock.  And then it is a shock that I’m just sitting there when it seems like I should be screaming.

I saw a few couples embracing or leaning on each other during the concert and thought how dare they?  Why should anyone get to do that kind of thing anymore.

I looked at the other bands and members and all of the people there and thought, “Why do all of these people get to be alive?  A lot of them have lived much more reckless lives than you did?”

Mostly I thought of you and our little girl at home sleeping.

I didn’t have to see too many people which was good.  The few people I would’ve wanted to see, I did somehow get to see.  Our old pastor came over from the other side of the balcony and just hugged me for a long time.

It was a long night and I am tired.  I thought about music- and how transcendent and spiritual it had been for me- and you I think- before this.  Tonight- though beautiful, music seemed a poor imitation of something much greater- an echo of something profound but just man’s feeble attempts to reach it.  Rather than divine, it seemed full of earth.

I thought about your hand again and how much I miss holding it- how at a concert like this, you would’ve reached for my hand a few times.  This must be what withdrawal feels like I thought- when people stop taking medication or doing drugs.  This hunger and longing and emptiness.

One friend who I said hi to told me she felt your presence so strongly tonight.  “Really?” I asked, “I don’t.”  Because I don’t.  I ask for signs and demand of God to just throw me something, but nothing.

Before I left tonight, I just sat and asked God if you are there if he could just let you see a little bit even of this show tonight…in your honor.