Widow's Voice

What Time Means. And Doesn’t

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http://widowsvoice.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/IMG_1990.jpgToday marks 18 months since my husband died.  One and a half years.  Forever.

He was in the Air Force and often went TDY (temporary duty) in our first years together and mostly I didn’t know where he was during those times and would watch the news to maybe figure it out.  But he was never gone for more than a few weeks at a time and then he’d be home safe with me and we’d carry on our love affair of a marriage.

This is the longest we’ve ever been apart.  And, presumably, given my mostly young (ish) age, I’ll spend many years without him.  None of that is alright, in any way.

But how many more ways are there to say how much I miss him?  Language fails me.  18 months seems like such a long time and I know that there is no timeline for grief but after a while it feels like life really has gone on without him and yet I’m standing still.  Not literally-I’ve been striving to create the life I must create without him but my heart and mind and soul are still very much with him and grieving his absence from me.  There are no words left.

It’s discouraging to read about women who have been widowed and their experiences with men after their loved one’s death and how awful it is “out there”.  My heart is open to loving again and I know Chuck wanted that for me but the very idea of it feels un-natural and I think how on earth is it possible, (especially given the general consensus of the lack of decent men) for me to find anyone that could possibly measure up to my standards?  I was shocked that Chuck and I found each other in the first place and maybe I’ve had my love story already and need to be content with that.

But, 18 months in, I crave the feel of a man’s arms around me.  A man to hold me in a way only a man is able.  The energy.  The yin/yang of masculine/feminine.  A gentleman.  A romantic.  A lover.  A man who will have my back.  Someone who knows me.  Someone who cherishes me.  Chuck did all of those things and more and I miss it, and him, so godawful much I could die except I haven’t and so I must go on.  And it sucks the big one in ways that sear me into my bones.

I just want him back.  And I can’t have him back.  And so…now what?

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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