I wrote this post on my personal blog back in April of 2012, but it was ringing in my ears this week, as I was trying to remember details and was getting frustrated about the pieces I couldn’t recover. I had a horrifying experience this week: I couldn’t remember.It started with a drive to meet my sister-in-law in Canada. The drive was a…
widow
I’m A Professional…
…… Griever. No kidding. It seems that I can reach into someone’s deep, dark and cold grief and speak to them. I can tell them what I see in that blackness, which is really telling them what I see. Or more precisely, what I saw. I know that I’m not the only one who can do this. I’ve seen, and read, many of you doing it for others, too.
Dear Dave
Dear Dave, I just finished looking through our pictures again. Sometimes, fearing I’ve imagined my former life, I need proof that it all really happened. Italy, our house rehab, Hawaii, Yellowstone, the hundreds of pics you took of your beloved students scrolled before my eyes. I sobbed and sobbed, scaring the cat with the sounds of my heart…
Fear Didn’t Win
Yesterday we hosted the fourth annual Share the Road Ride. This is the only Soaring Spirits event that is dedicated to my Phil in any obvious way. Banners, flyers, t-shirts all bear his name. Friends from all areas of our shared lives come together, volunteers donate their time to support our Share the Road message, and Phil’s love for a good, long…
What if I Forget?
What If I Forget …. His smell. His funny lips and the way they turned up at the corner. His skin. His dry skin that always needed chapstick, and his back that always needed to be scratched. What If I forget … Those piercing blue eyes that became someone else’s eyes when he donated them to the eye bank. The way they looked at me. Through me.
I Promise
“Don’t be too late tonight, I really want to spend some time with you.” “I won’t. It’ll be an early hunt. I’ll be back before the kids go to bed. I promise.” I promise. Right before we exchanged I love you’s, this was one of the last things I heard Jeremy say to me. I’ve played it out so many times in my head, it gets very muddled now,…
Progress
“The way of progress is neither swift nor easy.” -Marie Curie …… is not a word I would’ve used to describe any part of my “After” in the first few years. Hell, I was trying too hard to just keep breathing, to just stay alive when I’d really rather not. Progress? Who gave a damn about progress …… I was using most of my…
Looking After Me
There’s someone I’ve been neglecting for the past 3.5 years. She is strong, but has infrequent, spectacular meltdowns due to the ….(there is no word to describe this but widows know the feeling) …. of it all. She loves hard, but falls hard. She picks herself back up again, dusts herself off and keeps going. She takes every sling and…
They Were There
“Why don’t you reread your Widow’s Voice posts from the beginning and see what kind of progress you’ve made.” My smart smart dude’s advice the other day when I talked to him about the possibility of identifying so much with widowhood that it was keeping me stuck in some ways. So I tried it. I didn’t expect to discover what I did. The overall…
Silver Lining
I made the mistake of going through mine and Seth’s old emails. He was in school full time. I worked a desk job. So we both sat in front of a computer all day.. and emailed each other during slow times. I have a million emails between us. Which can be a good thing and a bad thing. I came a crossed an email that reminded me of right…
Go, don’t follow the flow
I’m a pretty laid back cat. Put me in a room with great music, good company and a cold beer and I’m set. But that’s all external. Those are creature comforts. When it comes to the internal…. The decisions I make that will determine my life at that current moment. I’ve learned that the one thing you can’t be is laid back. You must be vigilant. A…
Turn It Down
Today is my birthday. Sort of. This blog will post on Friday, and so by the time you read this, it will no longer be my birthday. But right now, this minute, Thursday, September 26th, at almost midnight, it is the end of my birthday. This year, I am 42. This is the 3rd birthday without my husband. My first birthday without him was so awful, I don’t…