My personal growth, as well as dedication to the American Widow Project, has brought me more healing than I could have ever fathomed. I still attend each event hoping to get as much out of it as a widow who RSVPed, and continuously I am not disappointed. This evening though, I received a call that meant so very much to me.
I rarely hear or ask what the organization means to others, but today I received a call that made the organization, and the work and dedication come full circle.
A fellow widow and friend rang me up. She spoke about her new engagement and asked if I would be a part of her wedding, as she could not envision being where she is in life had it not been for the AWP. It blew me away and left me speechless, to say the least.
You see, all I hope for myself and my fellow widows is for each to find their own place of happiness. A place they will end up spending more time in than their grief. A place that they know is unique to them, and them alone. All I’ve hoped for is for others to find this place and embrace it to the fullest, as it is the true guiding light to all that is amazing and yet to be explored in the lives still left before us.
I’m honored to have been even a small part of someone finding their place and am even more grateful to celebrate it with them, as I celebrate mine.
I have few words else to put into what this conversation meant, other than that I am happy, I am grateful, I am blessed. And I find myself to be so grateful to be among the ranks of military widows.
Congratulations my friend, and I can’t wait to stand there on your special day.
“It isn’t what you have, or who you are, or where you are, or what you are doing that makes you happy or unhappy. It is what you think about.”
-Dale Carnegie