I know you are expecting me to talk about some kind of emotional journey right now. But this time I mean the band Journey. Eighties sensation; soundtrack to many of the moments of my youth; authors of some of the best love songs ever…THAT Journey!My son Johnny turned 17 on August 5th. Life has been so crazy lately (widow conference anyone??) that…
Widowed Memories
Making New Footprints
This weekend would have been my 17th wedding anniversary. Hard to believe this is the fourth one I will celebrate without him. Inconceivable really, and yet here it is. Another year passed. Our last anniversary together, lucky number 13, we went to dinner at our favorite restaurant (the Little Texas Bistro, damn I miss that place). The last three…
Filterless
Tomorrow is the last full day of my vacation with Son #2 and #3. I knew this vacation would be “different” …. since it was our first one without Jim. But I really had no clue as to how very different it would be.It has been difficult, to say the least. I expected waves ….. but I didn’t expect quite so many. I expected tough times, but I…
Teens Taking up the Slack – Sweet Sixteen.
It is Anneke’s ‘Sweet Sixteen’ today. On the one hand, I can’t really believe this day has arrived and her father is still gone. Like somehow, at some point he should have walked in the front door and with little fanfare saying “I’m back.” It has been 8 plus years. She has been without him longer than she had him. I should know better…
An Opportunity to be…
Grayson and I watched the movie “Evan Almighty” this weekend. I’ve seen it once before, but a certain scene really struck me this time. Morgan Freeman, as God, is explaining to a woman how prayers work. “If you pray for patience, God does not GIVE you patience, but gives you the OPPORTUNITY to be patient.” I went to bed with thoughts of my own…
Celebrating Moms
Sports practices, music lessons, school meetings, homework, school projects, dinner every night, getting multiple children to different locations at the same start time, crying for daddy, asking where he went, consoling, advising, figuring out what the best solution to the problem is when you only have one opinion to consider….any of this sound…
Why We Relay
This weekend was the Central Austin Relay for Life. This is the fourth year that Team Dippel has competed, and the fourth year that we have been in the top five fund raising teams on the day of the relay. Our team is made up of family and friends, all of whom have been touched by cancer, most of us in more than just one way. The question of the…
If You’re Not Having a Good Time….
We had the annual “Mardi-Craw” this past Saturday. I think about my husband Daniel every day, in lots of different situations, but our annual crawfish boil is one particular day I think about him all day long and cuss him for not being there. I have to admit that for the past four crawfish boils since he died….we’ve had SPECTACULAR weather,…
Celebration
Celebration of life has become a popular description for funerals over the past few years. And while I agree with the concept, the reality of celebrating my husband’s life while trying to grasp the idea that he was not coming home, ever, was hard for me to do at his funeral. While the services we planned to commemorate Phil’s’ life were truly…
Question Number Seventeen
After your husband’s death, did you sleep in the same bed you shared with him? Phil died at 6:33PM on Wednesday, August 31, 2005. At the end of that horrific day, I stood in the doorway of our bedroom and faced our empty bed. My mom came to stand beside me as I contemplated what to do…go in? stay out? sleep in our room? sleep on the couch? sleep…