When Will We Laugh Again?

I sat down the other day and did a short little inventory of my life, our life, all the insanity that this life brings and thought to myself, "Our life has been filled with so much sadness."

I had done this little inventory because I wanted desperately to share a funny story, or at least one that could be thought of as silly or funny after the fact.  I sat and thought about all that we have been through and realized how little we laugh.  It's so rare that we truly laugh.  Just laugh because we can or so hard that our stomachs hurt and our eyes tear. 

There is a void where our laughter used to be.  We used to laugh so much I thought no one would ever take us seriously as a couple.  My mother once remarked at how much we laughed at our wedding and how silly we were. 

We never laugh anymore.

There seems to be so few reasons to anymore.

When each day that my husband wakes up is a day that he must battle this unseen fight within himself, he doesn't often feel like laughing or that life is all that funny.  And each day I have to wake up and tell myself that we are one step closer to a life that WON'T be a constant battle.  It's hard to find much that is funny in a life like this. 

It seems to have been something that was missing, but I was never able to figure out what was different.  He was gone for so long.  I didn't laugh much during the deployment, I had so few reasons to truly laugh, from my belly, with all my heart, at life during that time.  And then he came home, and he was wrong, we were wrong, things were wrong.  We have been so focused on the fight, that somewhere neither of us noticed that gaping void of silence that used to be filled with the sounds of giggling in the middle of the night or loud, boisterous laughing as we made dinner.

All we have is a void.  A gap.  A space that used to be filled with who we were then.  And now that we are no longer them, we no longer laugh.

I don't know when we will laugh again.  Truly laugh.  A real laugh full of happiness and hope for the future.  A loud laugh that lingers in the air after the sound has stopped.  A joyful laugh that can only be laughed by someone who knows that things will be alright.  I hope soon.  I hope that I can say that I am laughing again.  But more than that, I hope that I can say he is.