As I sit here thinking about what I want to write, I am struck by the fact that I don’t really want to write about Ben specifically. That’s a first. I had a pretty good week overall, and despite going it alone I was still able to find some joy.
Last weekend was the start of several busy days in a row which left little time for grief to rear it’s ugly-yet-somewhat-comfortable head. My sister and niece came over from Vancouver Island and together with my mom, my eldest daughter and my other sister we all spent the day in a tattoo parlour. (It was my mom’s idea. She’s 73, by the way). By the time we left at the end of the day my mom was sporting her very first tattoo – a small tulip on her ankle. She’s been talking about it for years and now it’s done. Way to go Mom!
The rest of us also left sporting brand new tattoos of our favourite flowers. Jaime and I chose the daffodil which is the flower of March (Ben’s birth month) and of course it is the symbol of hope for finding a cure for cancer.
I had the artist place my daffodil around a pre-existing tattoo which, ironically, was a line from a song that a friend of mine used for inspiration while she was undergoing cancer treatment a few years back.
I went back to work on Tuesday as per usual, and I was actually feeling pretty good despite running late and being pressed for time. I was pleased with my resourcefulness and quick thinking when I discovered at the last minute that the shirt I planned on wearing was too long for my outfit. Instead of panicking and causing myself to run later than I already was, I grabbed some scissors, cut about 5 inches off the bottom of my shirt, tucked it in and dashed to the office. After all, who would know that I had just hacked the crap out of my shirt since it was tucked into my pants, right?
Unfortunately for me, when I sat down at my desk my zipper burst wide open. (Brand new pants, I might add. And they weren’t cheap, and they were not too small!) Normally the solution would have been to simply untuck my shirt to cover the broken zipper, but that wasn’t possible since the bottom of my shirt looked like it had been run through a wood chipper.
Off I went (holding my purse in front of me) on a quest for a safety pin, which I found at the desk of a friend. She’s on the 7th floor, I’m on the 3rd. I picked up the safety pin and made a beeline for the bathroom where I pinned my pants together, and then I made my way back to the elevator so I could get back to my office before anyone noticed I was missing. Unfortunately, in my haste to find a safety pin I had rushed out of my office without the tag I needed to access any other floors in the building. So I was stuck.
By now I was starting to get very stressed which made me start sweating, and all I wanted to do was get to my desk and sit in front of my fan before I looked like a drowned rat for the rest of the day. The only solution was to take the stairs, and I had just made it to my fan when my alarm went off. I had forgotten that I had an appointment for my flu shot on the first floor of the building, which meant I did not have time to chill out and dry my dripping brow.
Off I went again, hoping to get back quickly, but instead I discovered a tiny room packed with people who had received their immunizations but were required to wait 15 minutes before leaving. Which meant I was also going to have to sit there in my sweat for an additional 15 minutes, which would undoubtedly cause me to become so sufficiently soaked that my hair would not recover and my day would be a bust. I got my immunization standing up (I was scared the safety pin would burst) and was told to sit and wait, but instead I made a mad dash for the elevator and prayed no one would chase me down for breaking their safety rules. I made it back to my office unscathed, sat down in front of my fan … and realized I had to use the bathroom. Which meant reworking the whole safety pin situation. Sigh.
The week got better from there because one of my closest friends flew in from Alberta and we had three blissful days together doing pretty much nothing but drinking wine. It was lovely.
That’s it for me this week. One of the duller weeks I’ve had in the last two years even with the whole “cut-shirt-safety-pinned-pants-and-sweaty-hair” episode. I’ll take it.
Have a lovely week, fellow widows. Warrior on.