The Coach Key Chain & a Broken Heart

I watched Phantom of the Opera last night and remembered when we saw it on Broadway with your godmother in NYC.  And the other day, I found your wax hand from Madame Tussaud's, probably from the same trip.  Sometimes I don't think my heart will ever be whole again.  Like the Coach key chain you got me after my first trip to India.  Remember how the crystal fell out of the heart and I put a substitute in?  Well, that one fell out, too.  I have been to every Coach store trying to find one I could take the heart off of but no luck.  I finally found one on ebay that I'm bidding on but, of course, it won't be the same.  My little key chain and I will still have a broken heart.  I love you and miss you so much.

Remembering Tiffany Gallo (Facebook)
August 9, 2011
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I wrote this just a month and half or so after you were gone.  The story of the key chain has a somewhat happy ending.  I had exhausted every effort to find the same key chain...it meant so much to me.  Of course, mostly because you had given it to me but also because also because of the reason you gave it to me...for Breast Cancer in memory of your grandmother.  I even went so far as to write to Coach but it was a lost cause.  I ended up buying one from eBay just to get that heart.

However, shortly after I bought the key chain from eBay, a wonderful thing happened.  Nancy and Nicole were in Atlantic City and they found a key chain -- not the same one -- but one that had that pink heart.  That was really the most important part.  Nicole called me and was so excited that at first I didn't know what she was talking about.  When she told me what they had found, I immediately asked  if they could buy it for me.  And they did...because they knew how broken my heart was, not just about the key chain, but about losing you.

 

Upon their return, they came to my house to give me the key chain and Nicole insisted that it was a gift from her.  I was so very touched.  She also gave me a card which brought tears to my eyes, it was so beautiful.  She told me that even though she could never replace you, she was there for me whenever I needed.

  

I haven't yet replaced the heart on the key chain and I don't carry it with me anymore.  I have it tucked away in a safe place...for now.  In the time being, I have little mementos of you that I carry with me.  There's only one key on the chain...the car key.  Everything else is something that reminds me of you.  I have a tag that I gave you for your birthday -- I think it was your 18th -- with your name and Happy Birthday on it.  A Coach key chain that your Jeep key was on with a moon and stars silly band still remaining on it.  There were 3 other silly bands but they have since broken off and gotten lost.  The Breast Cancer heart from Coach that you carried, as well, with a bobby pin clipped onto it.  And lastly the key chain from the funeral home with "In memory of Tiffany Marie" engraved on it.

 

My heart is still broken and will forever be so...