This is for the ladies who may believe I have an attitude towards the opposite sex after reading some of my articles. But I thought that through my articles I could get black women and men to learn to respect each other, and to be united regardless of each other's frailties. If as a black man who found something so great about men I should hang onto, I would still include black women because many men are great individuals because of women.

Although I never knew my grandmother or grandfather, remembering my mother and the siblings she brought forth, I would say genetically she gave all of us just what we needed, to be the kind of individuals we are today. So here it goes.

Although my first wife after 22 years decided she needed her space, I could never be angry or say anything that would suggest she wasn't a great person, mother or wife for those years. But time takes us in different directions, sometimes.

But the most positive thing to come out of that separation was me meeting another woman a few years later. Although she was younger, I realized later she was really my soul mate, in the spiritual since of the word. At the time, I wasn't familiar with the seriousness of diabetes, but discovering she had it seems to make no difference. When I met her, she had survived giving birth to a daughter, over the suggestion of her doctor to abort it because the physical burden of diabetes and giving birth could have killed her.

So just learning how she was willing to give her life giving birth to have her daughter was enough for me to know she was unique and a person who never gave up when she wanted something. And it didn't take long for me to realize she had already made up her mind about us also.

Married as long as I was, I never just lived with anyone without an intention, but shortly after compromising our reasons for being together, she moved in. Anyway, she was driven to be as smart or successful as she allegedly thought I was, although she was seeing things I didn't see about myself. But I never changed that feeling in her because it helped her to excel to great heights.

There was an underlying competitiveness growing in her spirit, which seemed to persevere. Regardless what she wanted to do in regards to her future, I felt I should be there and support her.

Within a few years, she had lifted herself from a low paying job to become and executive with the Department of Probation in New York. Was it because of me, or was it because she had a partner who was always there? Yes, it may have been because of me, but not because I was smarter. It was because she knew whenever she looked up, or needed someone to help get her to the next level, I was there. But never jealous or envious.

The most miraculous part of our relationship was we never argued about anything, which made me feel sometime I had to be dreaming or maybe paranoid, something else was going on. But I realized that was the weakness of the human mind when things are going good. We usually have to find something wrong just to be satisfied.

Three years later, we were married in the chamber of a judge friend of ours. Because of the baby and other circumstances, we didn't have a honeymoon, but soon we enjoyed traveling to and from the Pocono's, so in many ways we were on a honey moon, just about every weekend we could get away, although we always had her daughter with us.

Soon we decided to lease a place we could call our own, because hotel fees were expensive. It was approaching 1990, and my retirement was coming up soon. What was she going to do after I retired, because we decided to move to the Pocono's. But the most amazing thing came out of her one day when she said she would resign her job and find something where we were planning to move. I didn't want her to do that because she had worked so hard to get there, but I couldn't change her mind.

After we moved to Pennsylvania, unfortunately, the pay wasn't as good as it was in New York, so she suggested she go back to the city to work. I knew I would never commute to New York, but her concern to get back to work often left her quiet and sometimes feeling sick and I didn't like that. Especially remembering her saying she was never as sick as she was before, after we got together, and I never forgot it.

So my thing was to try to help her deal with her ailment, without any additional problems. But she decided to go back to New York anyway. The particulars that got her the job in New York isn't important, she eventually became an executive in the Deputy Sheriff's office. However, there was something I didn't like about it. It wasn't the job; it was the wear and tear on her body, traveling back and forth.

Within a year, it started to take its toll on her. On a few occasions, she was picked up from the sidewalk and taken to the hospital nearby, after almost going into a coma. But her ability to make friends allowed the guy who drove the bus she rode regularly, to always get her personal affects and call me when something happened.

It started to happen so often, I soon discovered she gave him our home number, just for that reason. Although some people don't believe in God or doing good for others, the concern and respect he had for her paid off. He hit the lottery. Anyway, her condition didn't get any better. She was soon forced to retire and ended up on dialysis.

I always felt her commuting to work caused her health to get worse. Of course, she didn't like what was ahead, but she had no choice because she had to live. She refused to use the dialysis machine at the clinic, so she did it at home. I would travel back and forth to Brooklyn to pick up her medicine to do her exchanges and eventually set up something in the car so she could do it there, no matter where we went. Luckily, she was in the right place because they put her on the list for a transplant.

Now we were both anxious about having it done and she wanted it soon as possible, because she was sick of needles and being sick. But I'll never forget the last week in May of 1995. It was around 11pm and I was about to nuke a cup of coffee when she called me from me from upstairs.

First, I thought she wanted me to bring her something, but she said her personal pager went off. I realized I didn't hear it because of the microwave might have beeped the same time her pager did. She was being called in for her transplant and the organ was waiting. Suddenly I had mixed feelings for some reason, it didn't feel right. It seems to be happening at the wrong time. So I asked her to tell them she had a cold, which would have prevented them from doing it then.

I will never forget the look on her face when I asked her or her smile as she stroked the corn rolls in her hair. She walked in the room and came out, she had convinced herself, and this could be her last chance, so I knew it was her choice. As fast as I was driving from Pennsylvania to New York, I was hoping to be stopped by an officer so I could get an escort, but oddly enough, I never saw any.

After I got her to the hospital in Brooklyn about an hour later, they registered her and got her a room. But for some reason they put her in the wrong room on the wrong floor. Soon, she was settled in. After talking to her doctors for hours, my daughter and I were on the way home.

The next day I called and they had done the transplants of her kidney and pancreas. When I found out how extensive it was, I was worried, but after seeing her, I felt pretty good. As the days passed I expected her to soon be up walking around, which I was told should have happened. But for some reason it seem hard for her to rely on her strength and some of the same persistence she always had. She was already in the hospital longer than she should have been, according to her doctors, so I started to worry.

It was getting tough driving to and from New York because I usually had to find someone to take care of our daughter, especially staying as long as I usually did. But that day, I took her with me. When I got there, she was upset about something and didn't look or sound too good. I kissed her, we talked and she had enough strength to muster up a smile, which made the atmosphere in her room a little better.

As she laid there with tubes coming out of every part of her body, I remember walking to the window to pray as usual, asking God to make everything that seemed bad about her situation go away. But our daughter, being young, who had no idea of the seriousness of the matter, suddenly decided to kid around. I got upset and told her to stop. Suddenly my wife takes the tube from her throat and tells her, to "stop" also. But then she say's something, I never heard her say before. "Grow up and listen to your father".

In all the years we were together, she never told her daughter I was her father. But I didn't think much about it, because I always felt I was her father anyway, but why now? For some reason, she suddenly remembers her bag that was left upstairs when I first brought her to the hospital and told me to get it. I made sure she was comfortable and was about leave when she indicated by hand movement to take my daughter.

Seeing the nurse was pissed off, she took the tube from her throat and replaced it and remembering how my daughter was acting, I thought it was best to do what she said. We took the elevator upstairs and it took me a few minutes to locate where it was. On the way back, I prayed again silently for things to get better.

When we got to her ward, there were security officers, doctors, and a few other people standing outside. I didn't think anything about, so I started to walk to past them, but they stopped me. A cold sweat came over me and I knew something was wrong. As I looked through the glass to her room, I could see them resuscitating her.

My screaming or tears couldn't bring her back. Within minutes, she was dead. I'd lost my friend, love, and soul mate, because she wanted to live like normal people and not be sick. She was 38 years old, in the prime of her life and with much yet to give. I try to forget, I almost died myself, but that would have been tragic for our daughter.

I lost more than 40 pounds in a couple of weeks, but the support of siblings, my children and friends, got me through it. I feel in my heart I will never meet another like her. She may have been supernaturally sent into my life to show me real love does exist, regardless of the age of the person giving or who's on the receiving end of it.

But for those individuals who seem to always be dealing with some kind of social pain, during our marriage, my first wife and my children from that marriage ended up being very close to her. The reason here is sometimes people pick up on our vibes and act accordingly.

Note: If you want to know what happen after her and what inspired me to write the way I do, read the Black Matriarch at afromerica.com

© 2004 By Thomas Duffy
Afromerica staff writer

Brother Thomas Duffy will be keeping the Black community updated on the most current Black expereinces effecting our lives. Visit regularly for new information that could help you overcome and make the best of your everyday experiences.

To subscribe to Duffy's column join the Afromerica email list to receive new information as it is updated. Or E-mail T Duffy at: tduffy870@msn.com or tomas@afromerica.com

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