It has been said a thousand times over that in your final moments of life, your life will flash before your eyes.

I have always wondered about that. I wonder if it truly does happen, but also I wonder what my life would look like if it were to be replayed in mere seconds during my final breaths. Would I be proud of who I was, what I accomplished, how I lived?

Since April 1st, my mind is constantly plagued by so many new thoughts – thoughts I never in my wildest dreams would imagine could cross my mind at the age of 25. Thoughts about what Nate saw in his final moments. Did he see his whole life? Did he see me? Could he envision Cecilia? What was his last coherent thought? I know I will never know the answers to these questions, but most of the time that is not enough to stop my mind from wandering there…

However, the thing they don’t tell you when they say “your life flashes before your eyes”, is that, for us survivors, it doesn’t last just a few seconds. It is a constant, everlasting, process of my life with him flashing before my eyes. Every. Single. Day. I can be doing some mundane task and suddenly be overcome by a random memory. Just today I was chopping vegetables and felt everything, every emotion, every scent, every sound, every touch from a dinner Nate and I had 2 weeks after we were married. I remember laughing with him, sipping on wine, just enjoying my new husbands company. It felt so real. These memories, these moments, come on so suddenly but (thankfully) have happened often since my last day with him. I never want to forget him so I always appreciate these little sudden chances to remember another moment I was blessed with with him.

Jennifer Trapuzzano