Widow's Voice

Music and Memories

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I recently saw this prompt online: “What was the last song that brought back a memory you hadn’t thought about in years?”

Oddly enough, the night before seeing this prompt, I happened to click on my Apple Music app on my laptop and throw it on random and something that fit this prompt did come up.

Even in 2021, Mario was still using his old iPod to play his favorite music (fun fact, the iPod was made up until May of 2022 when they discontinued it). It mostly had electronic music, including a lot of his own stuff. He would put his headphones on and blast music while walking around the neighborhood. Towards the end, he oddly didn’t want to listen to anything.

Anyway, after he died, I put all the music from the iPod into my iTunes (which turned into the Music app). So what came on when I hit random was Antimatters by Bandulu …

Bandulu was one of Mario’s favorite electronic artists. The year this came out was 1994. It was pretty early on in our relationship and he’d invited me over to his mom’s house to listen to music. He had taken over her den with his music collection and turntables. It was a hot mess with stuff all over the floor, so you had to be careful where you walked. He threw on Bandulu and we sat out in the small atrium (about 6′ x 6′) that the outside door of the den led to.

We hung out for hours just listening to music and talking.

It was also the very first time I ever heard him say that he didn’t think he’d ever make it to age 50. I can’t even remember what we were talking about exactly to bring that up, but I remember how odd of a thing it was to say when someone’s only 21 years old. Little did I know …

While I was writing that last part the other night, I had the weirdest thing happen. The only way I could describe it, is it was the emotional feeling of hugging Mario without the physical sensation of it and then this tidal wave of emotion hit me. I just couldn’t write any more after that. Almost 6 years without him physically in my life and there are still moments where the reality of him being gone just crashes down on me.

About Sherry Holub

I met my spouse, Mario, at UCLA School of Art in 1993. After graduating in 1995, I founded a small agency specializing in web and graphic design. Mario became my partner in the company in 1999. In 2002, we were married at the Costa Mesa, CA court house because neither of us wanted a big wedding ceremony (after already being together since 1995).

Mario was a highly talented artist, musician, illustrator and 3D Designer, but a tortured one. He was one of those gentle, creative souls who ended up burning twice as bright for half as long. Mario lost the battle with liver disease induced by alcoholism (almost exactly 6 months after he became sober) on 2/10/21.

I’m a long-time artist and writer with a background in photography who enjoys cooking, getting outdoors, staying young at heart, and sharing experiences to potentially help others. When it comes to writing, I’ve written both for fun and professionally over the years. Writing is also sometimes therapy for me and I don’t mind sharing my personal experiences with a wider audience.