I am quickly approaching the two-year mark of Tony’s passing. In a way, I just want to get past the 20th of this month so I can put that date in my rearview window, versus watching for its head on approach.
The grief is different now than it was in the beginning. I no longer count weeks and months at a time, I now count the years. While I still miss him every day, we have grown accustomed to our daily lives without him. I don’t hear the garage door open at 4pm anymore thinking it’s him. The kids and I work to keep the house picked up together. Our oldest mows the grass now with little fanfare. I lean on Instacart for grocery delivery to free up weekend time. The youngest catches rides to baseball practice when he can. We’d all give anything to have Tony back with us, but over the last two years we’ve learned to adapt in our own ways.
I’ve tried on different things over the last 2 years to see what fits now. I started getting regular manicures almost immediately after he passed, the bright pops of nail color make me happy. Writing this every week to express my emotions. For a while, I joined a few Meet-Up groups to put myself out there socially but found they were almost too time consuming. I became a season ticket holder for our Broadway musical theatre. The kids and I have become regular travelers, never saying no to a good trip in order to see the world together. Lately, I’ve been going to a workout class to focus on my health. I try things on for size, sometimes they fit, sometimes they don’t.
Now, I find it’s the quiet moments where I sometimes forget he’s not here. The space between wakefulness and sleep where I can conjure him lying next to me, filling the space that is cold without him to warm it. This is a place where I feel his loss deeply. As I settle down after a long day of balancing whatever needed doing that day; work, parenting, socializing, me time, etc. That’s the place where I whisper goodnight and tell the void that I love him. I shared him in all the other spaces of our lives. The bedroom was where we started and ended each day together. In the peace of the evening after the kids have gone to bed, I miss him bookending my days.
