words that should have stayed silent

i thank You, God, for the ex.

He has a sense of wit that sometimes gets his mouth in trouble. 

Apparently, so do I. 

When he texted a chemistry joke to me this morning, I took it as a sign.

me: An oldie but a goodie. Nice to hear from you, though. Was thinking about you yesterday.

me: Found out my friend Barbara was murdered. Looks likely that the man she was helping recover from hip surgery shot her, as well as himself.

me: You can find the story by searching 'rigger court' Savannah.

him: Wow, I am so sorry.

me: Thank you. Yesterday was hard.

me: Their relationship had become quite strained for the last month. I had no idea he had guns. He was a philosophy instructor for SCAD.

me: Carolyn called me Thursday night, since neither were responding to her texts and calls. She had checked Barbara's house, his car was there but not hers. So I told her I would drive out to Wilmington Island to his house.

me: Her car was in the driveway. I knocked, no response. By the time I came off the porch, a police car had arrived and parked by my car.

me: He told me they found the two both dead, after being called for a "wellness check".

me: Still in shock.

me: I will be okay. It's just ht me really hard. I had made a glib comment to Carolyn on Friday night during our phone call, and I feel really badly about it.

me: When she told me she had no responses from either of them, I said, "You don't guess they've killed each other, do you?"

me: They were both already dead by that time, but, still. I knew Carolyn was well aware of the anger and frustration the two had about the situation.

me: Still, I regret having said that, in light of what has become.

me: I just wouldn't have put those words into the world if I'd thought they might actually be true.

him: I suppose it's only human to feel that way. But it's also human to have made that comment. Forgive yourself that, at least. We all make sardonic jokes about the extreme possibilities *because* they're so unlikely.

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I had texted my story to Christina shortly before he'd sent me the joke.

She had told me almost exactly the same thing that Jeff had.

her: You had no way of knowing what was already done. Mourning the loss of your friend is fine. But don't hold yourself accountable for what happened.

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It's reassuring to have such wisdom from two I love.