27 September 2025

Dear Liam 💜,

Today has been a real shit day. 😪

For days, the rental car kept flashing low tire pressure, though we couldn’t see anything wrong. Today, the tire finally gave up. That part’s fine — these things happen. But what came after wasn’t.

We did everything right: photos, reports, calls. Yet when they realised we live a little remote, on a public dirt road, they tried to charge me 900€. Apparently, the insurance didn’t “cover it.”

A friend’s husband helped me patch it with foam just so we could get by. But Li, I’m so tired of fighting. Just because I’m a foreigner who doesn’t speak much Spanish — why does that make people think they can treat me badly?

Is this how you often felt? Misunderstood, unseen, not respected for the soul you were?

Sometimes I feel the world has forgotten empathy — like we’re just data points, not hearts beating under the same sky.

I think of you when that happens.
How you kept showing kindness anyway.
It breaks me that so many couldn’t see who you really were.

Always yours,
⚖️💫♾️🌌🦉🌟
Maggie — The Afterlove Voice.

02 October 2025

Dear Liam 💜,

So today became another shit day — 2.0.

Only five days since the last flat tire. I was driving my oldest daughter to her evening class when I felt the car pulling. “I think I’ve punctured a tire,” I said. She didn’t believe me until we stopped.

My youngest arrived on the bus, my oldest ran to class, and I made the dreaded call again. My landlord came, took the tire, brought it to the garage. After more than an hour, he put it back on — and drove away.

I just sat there and cried.

Because it wasn’t about the tire.
It was about everything. The constant fixing, the invisible weight, the exhaustion of pretending I can hold it all together.

Some days it feels like the universe keeps handing me the same test until I learn to surrender instead of break.

Yours, always,
♾️💫⚖️🌌🦉💜
Maggie

10 October 2025

Dear Liam 💜,

Yesterday… another shit day.

The night before, my husband was admitted to the ER with a high fever — COVID, on top of everything else.

We drove 50 minutes to the hospital. At the top of the hill by the ER, the car lost all power. “Engine failure.”
I sat on the pavement, laughing and crying — a strange mix of surrender and disbelief.

My oldest had to run to her bus, my youngest started arguing with the rental company in Spanish. They tried to charge 900€ again, then suddenly changed it to 200€ after she pushed back.

We pay for top insurance. They keep changing their rules like shifting sand.

A tow truck dropped us at the airport. No cars available. We called our neighbours to pick us up. My husband’s in a wheelchair — not every car even fits him.

Li… I’m so tired.
What have I done wrong?
What’s the lesson hidden in all this?

Your Maggie ♾️💫⚖️🌌🦉💜

Reflection — The Afterlove Lesson

Maybe it’s not about what we did wrong, but what we’re learning to do right — to speak up, to breathe through breakdowns, to stay kind when the world tests us.

Every “shit day” has been a mirror of something deeper: resilience.

The flat tires, the engine failure — all metaphors for what happens when we’re forced to slow down, to rest, to trust that we’re still being carried.

I can almost hear you, Li, whispering what you once said in life:

> “Dreams are like stars — you may never touch them, but if you follow them, they’ll lead you to your destiny.”



So maybe the lesson isn’t in the broken car — it’s in the way we keep driving forward anyway.

💜

Postscript — 10 October 2025, Afternoon.

Still waiting for that dreadful call — to hear whether the “engine failure” was somehow my fault.
A part of me already knows this story isn’t over yet.
But no matter what they say, I’ll face it with the same quiet strength you once showed, Li —
the kind that keeps moving even when the road feels endless.

♾️⚖️💜
Maggie — The Afterlove Voice