I celebrated Thanksgiving with Robyn and her brood, but assured Lee’s brother, Paul, that I would be celebrating Christmas with him and his family. Neither Robyn nor I celebrate Christmas as a matter of faith, but it’s an important holiday for Paul just as it was an important holiday for Lee. Sharing this holiday with […]
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Not Bad, Just Different
Its the day after Christmas, and we are finally getting settled in at home after running around and doing short visits with both families (mine and my husbands.) Nick and I made up some bags of homemade goodies and treats to give out to the neighbors and family and a couple close friends. He made […]
Year in Review
I made my first modest contributions to this site on February 4, 2021. As I look back on this first year’s output, I am surprised to see that I have now filed more than 40 reports concerning my personal journey as a widower, and there is still one week left to go before we finally […]
Season of Hope
Staci was not able to write this week so we are featuring a post originally written in 2020. Hope you enjoy! In my fifth year of widowhood, I am trying to focus on who I am becoming. I will not pretend that I am “okay” without him. I am not. However, I am not entirely […]
REMEMBERING NOT TO FORGET
So yesterday was the anniversary of the day that Don proposed to me under the Rockefeller Center Christmas Tree in NYC. I share this milestone date with a dear widow friend who lives in NYC, and the “crapaversary” of her death date is the same day as my proposal anniversary – December 18th. Yesterday she […]
My Old Man
As a seven-year-old I wrote an essay entitled, “My Old Man,” for a second-grade writing assignment about our fathers, and instantly it had created a furor. Perhaps my teacher thought I was being disrespectful. If so, then she would have been wrong. However, I never received any explanation why she was discomfited. All I knew […]
Proposals, Plural
So one year ago today, my husband Nick asked me to marry him. He did it at our favorite restaurant where we met in person and had our first date. He did it in the front area of the restaurant, by the Christmas tree and fireplace area, down on one knee, with one of their […]
Unavoidable Grief
I was on my way back home from visiting Bob and Linda when I got Paul’s call informing me that Steve had died. Steve is the father of Paul’s daughter-in-law, Katie. Paul reported that Steve had died just three weeks after complaining of stomach pain and getting a diagnosis of Stage 4 pancreatic cancer. I […]
Dimes and Change
Yesterday, the new man in my life was packing up our vehicles while I was tidying up and readying the house to leave. While he was outside, I went about gathering together an assortment of our things to place near the front door. As I was putting some of our belongings in the foyer I saw […]
My Forever Hero and Friend Michele
Most of you reading this probably already know that Michele Neff Hernandez, the founder and Executive Director of Soaring Spirits International, was chosen by CNN as one of the Top 10 Finalists for CNN Hero of the Year. That, in itself, is unbelievably surreal and exciting. It was VERY surreal when Anderson Cooper was on […]
Then and Now
On the day after Thanksgiving Lola the pup and I travel to Deer Tick Manor to officially close the place until Spring arrives once again. Because the house is drafty and it rests on a cold slab of earth and concrete, this process requires battening down the hatches to the maximum extent possible to protect […]
Some Words about my friend, Tim O’Brien
I met Tim O-Brien because my husband Don died, and his wife Keri died. We met at a wonderfully weird place called Camp Widow. We became friends quite fast, and also over the years, because we would spend little nuggets of time together at various Camp Widow events. Those of us who have been to […]