Widow's Voice

Inadequate Words from my Uncertain Self~

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I don’t know what to write this week. The world is too much, and has been for some time.

I’m not one to hide from the truths of widowed life…the emotional/mental/physical aspects of it and how long it takes to just frickin’ stand up on a regular basis.

I definitely don’t believe in the cult of positivity our culture seems to love.

Nor do I want to discourage newly widowed people by baldly stating how frickin’ impossible life is, even now.

The word healing is meaningless to me.

I shy away from the word hope.

I do believe in grit and grace and determination and the power of Love.

I don’t believe in Love because I think it makes everything ok or alright.

The Love that I talk about, the Love that I believe in since Chuck’s death 7 years ago, is a Love that I fucking must believe in. Or lose what’s left of my mind.

Chuck’s left behind Love in no way replaces the Love that was alive and active and filled with energy when he was with me.

It isn’t enough.

It’s just that it has to be enough.

I’ve done, and will continue doing, all that I can to keep myself busy. Create a life for myself.

It’s lovely and beautiful and colorful and dynamic.

My pink car…my pink trailer…my Odyssey of Love…is as real as the the impossibly painful life I live without him.

With the daily upheaval and uncertainty that is ongoing in our country, my anxiety levels have skyrocketed, reminding me of the early years following Chuck’s death, and I desperately wish him back with me. He was retired military and had an understanding of events that I don’t have. His presence was reassuring, in good times and bad and everything in between. Any sense of safety and security that I’ve fought to regain since his death is gone, gone, gone. Mostly I feel fatalistic.

I miss him. Is there a mountain high enough that I can stand on so that I can scream this to the world?

I miss you. I miss you. I miss you. I need you. I need you. I need you.

Where are you, my beloved? Where the fuck are you and why aren’t you here with me?

I miss you. I miss you. I miss you.

God, I fucking miss you~

 

About Alison Miller

My beloved husband Chuck died while we were full timing on the road. We’d rented a condo for our stay in southern CA, and I had to leave 3 weeks after his death. All I knew at that time was that I had to find a way to continue traveling on my own, because settling down without him made me break into a cold sweat. I knew that the only place I’d find any connection to Chuck again was out on the roads we’d been traveling for our last 4 years together. I knew nobody out on the road, I knew grief was a great isolator, and I knew I had to change the way I traveled without him, to make it more emotionally bearable for me. So I bought a new car, had a shade of pink customized for it, bought a tiny trailer and painted the trim in pink, learned how to tow and camp, and set out alone. My anxiety was through the roof, and all I knew to trust was the Love that Chuck left behind for me. I found Soaring Spirits early on, thank god, and the connections I made through SS helped ground me to some extent. I needed to know that other widow/ers were out there in my world, because I felt so disoriented and dislocated. Through Soaring Spirits, as the miles added up, my rig taking me north, south, east and west, I found community. I found sanity…or at least I learned that if I was bat shit crazy, I was in good company, and realizing that ultimately saved my sanity. PinkMagic, my rig, is covered with hundreds of names of loved ones sent to me by my widowed community, and I know it isn’t visible to the naked eye, but I’ll let you in on a secret…she actually illuminates Love as I drive down the many roads in our country, and I can see it through my side view mirror. Love does, indeed, live on~

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