For widow Beth-Ann Simon, life without her husband is a painful daily existence. A fundraiser is set to benefit the family.
By PHYLLIS DAY
Published June 26, 2004
SPRING HILL - She visits his grave every day. It's where she can feel close to him, where she can talk to him and cry - something she dares not do in front of her children, if she can help it.
It has been two weeks since her husband died in a cave diving accident, yet Beth-Ann Simon still feels as if she is stuck in a horrible nightmare. She still expects to see him walk through the door. When she's out shopping, she still expects to get his phone call, asking her if she's coming home soon. But she knows that phone call will never come.
"It is just so surreal," she says, her voice breaking. "I never, never thought that I would be a 36-year-old widow with young children. ... It was not supposed to be this way. We were supposed to grow old together."
Her husband, Craig Simon, and his friend John H. Robinson Jr. drowned June 12 when they went diving in the underwater caves at Eagle's Nest in the Bayport area. While the road to Eagle's Nest is temporarily closed to vehicular traffic, the Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission said the underground caves are still open to divers.
Craig Simon, a Bronx native, had been scuba diving for 22 years but discovered cave diving 21/2 years ago.
Beth-Ann knew that whenever he went diving, her husband always called her when he resurfaced. So on that Saturday afternoon when the call didn't come, she called him and left a message. She figured he couldn't reach her because of a bad cell phone connection. At first, she wasn't too concerned.
By 7 p.m. Beth-Ann knew in her heart that something terrible had happened. She called the Hernando County Sheriff's Office, but it wasn't until about 8:30 p.m. when they told her that her husband never resurfaced. Then she began the long vigil for them to recover Craig's body.
Robinson's body was recovered the following day, but it took expert divers until Monday evening to find Craig's body and another day to recover it.
Beth-Ann thought she would have closure by then. But she doesn't.
"I never got to see him, to hold him and tell him I loved him," she cried.
Instead, she finds herself trying to decide on a tombstone for her husband's grave, and handling unfinished paperwork at the funeral home. Then there are the children, who are scared and confused and don't want to leave her side.
To help the Simons, Lorie and Dave Hubbard, owners of Legends Pub on Mariner Boulevard will hold a fundraiser from 6 p.m. to 2 a.m. Sunday. All profits from the event will be donated to the family.
"We just wanted to help in any way we can," said Lorie Hubbard, who has been friends with the Simons for about 11 years. "Even if we can help make a couple of mortgage payments, that would be great. Money should be one of the last things on her mind right now."
During the fundraiser, they will be raffling gift certificates donated from area businesses, and T-shirts and other promotional items from Budweiser, Miller and others.
"I've thought about what would happen if it was my family this happened to," Hubbard said. "It's just terrible. And those children are so young."
Those who can't attend but would like to make donations can stop by an area Compass Bank, where an account is set up for the Simon children.
Beth-Ann works at a local supermarket but is taking an extended leave to care for her two children. Her husband used to run a lawn care business. The family had minimal life insurance, which Beth-Ann said didn't even cover funeral expenses.
Beth-Ann Simon said all their friends and the community have been wonderful and supportive. "They have helped tremendously," she said.
But at the same time, there's an emptiness, a hole in her heart that none of her friends can understand. She still thinks about what went wrong, the "what if's."
Beth-Ann met Craig 11 years ago and they married three years later. They took family vacations, including a recent trip to New York where they took their two sons, Kobe,4, and Nico, 2, to a ballgame at Yankee Stadium.
They looked forward to when CJ, 19, Craig's son from a previous marriage, would accomplish his dream of entering medical school, and to see his daughter, Christina, 17, enjoy her senior year of high school, filled with homecoming, prom and graduation. And they were really excited about Kobe's first day of school this fall.
Since her husband's death, Beth-Ann finds herself awake until 2 or 3 a.m., talking and crying with CJ, who can't understand why his father was taken. Christina, who lives with her mother, also feels cheated, Beth-Ann said.
Beth-Ann finds it even more difficult with the younger boys. It took her several days to find the courage to tell Kobe about the accident.
Beth-Ann said she's trying to stay strong for her children.
"The hardest thing right now is not being a wife who lost her husband, but being a mother," she wept. "My boys don't have their father. All I have left to give them are memories."
