Terrible things happen to people every single day but not everyone experiences terrible things. Some get to float through life without fear, loss or a bigger view of the world. Lucky maybe? However, true gratitude often comes from true grief. There’s a mindset now that any inconvenience is a huge struggle and so many are […]
Widowed Community
Creating the Community I Crave
Image from Soaring Spirits – Gordon, Michelle and me – Camp Widow, Toronto, November 2018 Back in the early days of widowing, as I heard the likes of Megan Devine talk about the importance of community, my reaction was something along the lines of “Hrrrmph”. I didn’t get it. I didn’t quite see how hanging […]
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 […]
Flowering Unapologetically
Image on Unsplash by Roksolana Zasiadko I am a subscriber to Megan Devine’s weekly and monthly writing prompts. I always read them, even if I don’t often write into them. But this week I want to write into one of the prompts she sent out recently. Even if it made more sense to me last […]
Beautiful, Beautiful, Beautiful Widows
Images from the Soaring Spirits end of year card 2021 I got my first Christmas card two days ago. Not quite in November, but almost. It stunned me in myriad ways. Firstly, I am staggered I even receive Christmas cards anymore. I don’t send any. I used to, in the life before, but I don’t […]
Grief of Tsunamic Proportions
Image by David Cleverley on Unsplash I don’t know how to begin this piece. I don’t know what will be in the middle. And I don’t know how it will end. In truth, I usually don’t know the middle or end of a piece before I start writing. This will horrify any good teacher of […]
Mourning and Evening Glories
Main image by Erda Estremera on Unsplash A couple of weeks ago, on 3rd November, I felt moved to celebrate a different kind of anniversary. The three-year anniversary of my widbud group, the “Mourning Glories”, comprised of Charlotte, Gordon, Michelle, Pamela and me. We met in early November 2018 in Toronto at “Camp Widow”, organised […]
Widow Appreciation Post.
Until Boris died I did not realize how much it means for someone to be able to say, “me, too”. In the weeks and months following his death, I craved stories and relationships with people who had lost their person or lost someone they love to suicide. I wanted to only watch movies, read books, […]
Confessions
Hi Babe, It’s been 166 days, 22 hours, 32 minutes and 16 seconds since you left. The clock ticks on as I write, rendering the time estimate incorrect seconds after I type it. Confession seems warranted since I sometimes cannot remember if I’ve showered— and apparently I made a tribute tile for you but I […]
Community and Accountability
Main image by Hudson Hintze on Unsplash When I took up swimming again for the first time, when I was about 23, it was after an approximatively 10-year hiatus. Until the age of 13, swimming (in a pool) was one of the three main sports I did, along with ice-skating and orienteering. I enjoyed all […]
9/11 Memories, Appreciation and Honouring
Written on 11 September 2021 Main image by Jesper Blijdestein on Unsplash 9/11. Nine-Eleven trips off the tongue. It means September 11th 2001. Even to Brits, who would otherwise say 11th of September (and write 11/9), there’s no misunderstanding what 9/11 means. Anyone over a certain again remembers what they were doing on 11th September […]
Just how do we ever do this?
Image by Sarah Treanor on www.streanor.com This is my 104th piece of writing for Soaring Spirits International, which means I have been writing here for exactly 2 years. A piece a week. And sometimes I write more frequently on my own personal blogsite. I had been widowed for over two years, and had lost my […]