AKA "The Writing Woman"
I want to keep you alive I look around me and I see that there’s no way to keep you here, but I’m trying. Life shouts at me, Move on. Move on. Move on…but I don’t want to if that means leaving you behind. I know I can’t bring you back. I hate that I…
I’m sitting alone in the booth at the Coney restaurant. I thought I was used to it by now. I thought nearly nine months without you had inured me to eating alone, sleeping alone, existing alone. But perhaps not. I miss so much about you and our time together, but I miss chatting with you…
Since Rick died, every time I look at the ugly blue chair, it elicits a different emotion: regret at the arguments we had about it, sadness that he’s gone, and a longing to see him sitting in it again. The blue chair was a significant piece of our history – good and bad. Rick first…
I’m pleased to announce that I’ve been invited to be a contributing blogger on the Hope for Widows Foundation website. I’ve found solace in writing as I work my way through the grief after Rick’s death. I hope my writing brings comfort and hope to my widowed sisters, as their support has meant a great…
I can’t hang onto you, I know that. But I’m trying. I’m working so hard to move on, when everything inside me screams – hang on, hang on, hang on to every scrap, every piece of him, As your life is being dismantled. I want to keep every aspect of your life untouched, in place….
Who am I? It’s been nine days since I left Michigan to go on my first solo drive to Florida, and I’m now on the way back home. As the trip progressed, I started to feel more like myself, but also like a new person. There are things about traveling alone that I liked intermingled…
Dear Rick, I have missed so much about you since you’ve been gone. I miss your love. I miss your touch. I miss your intelligence and wit and quirky sense of humor. I miss your huge strong body, and your muscles and your hugs. I miss your unequaled and nonjudgmental acceptance of all that I…
Dear Rick, I don’t feel the grief all the time anymore. In the beginning, it was like a giant fog, like a veil over my face and head, over my life. I thought about you constantly. I couldn’t stop. Everything was a memory. When I was alone, all I could do was immerse myself in…
In memorium. I keep making decisions in memory of Rick. He would have liked this or that. He and I picked out this furniture so I will buy it in his memory. I just thought about the gazebo outside. There was freezing rain this morning and it’s snowing now. I’ll need to go out and…
Now that I’ve been in mourning for more than 4 months, I think this grief thing is pretty predictable: I’ll wake up each morning and immediately notice your absence. I’ll either bury the thought and jump out of bed, or – on the weekends – I’ll bury myself deeper under the covers and begin remembering…