Ebb and Flow

The ebb and flow of life after death…is exhausting.

The ache is elongated…sporadic…and then drawn-out again.


There is no cadence to life.

Living is always a step off beat...and doesn't fall into place for very long.


Just as the sun rises…darkness begins to cast it's shadow.

As one shade of grief is conquered…another arrives.

This appears to be a journey with no ending…no destination...no arrival.

Unfortunately…the path is not steady.


So the question becomes...

Can you move forward with the rise and fall of the road?

Falling

Every so often...I feel like I'm falling.

It's similar to the sensation you have in deep sleep...when you unexpectedly take a misstep. Perhaps you were dreaming of some fantastic or even ordinary event...and everything was going smoothly.  But suddenly you foot lunges out...and drops.  And you're left reaching for a footing that is no longer there.

This sensation has begun happening to me lately.  But I'm awake...and it's not my foot that misses a step.  It's my heart that loses ground...and begins to plummet.

I could be making dinner and all is going well.  Then as I reach to open the refrigerator...my eyes suddenly meet hers in a picture hanging on the door.  And there it is...my unexpected misstep...my heart collapses.

All at once...I am abruptly reminded of Susan's death...not that I could ever forget.  But as time has passed...I have been forced to engage in life...because I am still here...and because my boys need me.  So I have been moving...finishing what needs to be done...and unwillingly playing the hand I have been dealt.

So now instead of living with her death draped over my every thought...I'm simply shot periodically in the chest by it.  Knocked off my feet...and forced to try and stand again after some unsuspecting item or experience reminds me of her absence.

I wonder when this sensation will stop...or if it will?

It's a strange condition

It's Time

It's time to change again...

It's time to grow again...

It's time to drop the facade again...

It's time to go it alone again...


There is no time to rest your mind...

     If you're going to find yourself again...


It's time to look inside again...

It's time to get in touch again...

It's time to discover who you are again...

It's time to find strength again...


There is no time to breathe a sigh of relief...

     If you are going to evolve again...


It's time to learn from the past again...

It's time to apply your knowledge again...

It's time to love yourself again...

It's time to emerge better again...

Forever Changed

I am forever changed by Susan's death...

But also by Susan's life...


In the end it is up to me...


I must make peace with where these two paths meet...

And decide how I will let them impact my life...


My choices and reactions...

Will surely define my future...


So now it is left for me to decide...


In what manner I will live my life...

And how I choose to meet each day...

And Now?

You miss your old life...

How could you not?


But here you are...

Faced with starting anew.


Where do you go from perfection?


How do you move ahead...

When you've been left behind?


So what happens next?


Your life was blessed...

And then cursed.


How do you live again...

Without the girl who gave you life?

Dragging Up Boxes

In November when people first started yammering about the local radio station finally flipping over to Christmas music...I wasn't anxious to seek it out.  I thought the first note would open the flood gates and bring back memories of Christmas with Sue.

But there's something comforting about Christmas music to me.  I'm talking about the old stuff...the stuff I grew up with...the stuff that filled my house as a kid...the stuff I continued to play alone in my apartment during my twenties before I was lucky enough to have someone to listen with by the fire.  

When I played Johnny Mathis, Frank Sinatra, Bing Crosby, or Nat King Cole...I wasn't shot back to Christmas with Susan...because the music represented a lifetime to me...my life.

So I played my favorites...edging myself closer to making the leap of bringing up the boxes. I was hoping that opening the Christmas boxes was going to be as simple as turning the radio dial and finding those comforting songs...but I knew better.  

I knew those boxes contained our life...our Christmases...our memories of the boys enjoying the wonder of the season.  And I was scared to look at our life...scared to stand there and stare at it all alone.

So I put it off.

I put it off longer than I probably should have...longer than I wanted to.  

I wanted to have myself a Merry Little Christmas...I wanted one for my boys.

They will only have so many Christmas Seasons in their lives where they are enveloped in the wonder and magic of believing.  And I wanted them to have as much of that as possible...they had already been robbed of enough childhood.

But each day...something stopped me from dragging up those boxes.  

I've learned that every first is painful...but it's also a nail in the coffin...so to speak.

As we have tackled each first as a family...we have moved further from when we were a family of four...instead of just three.  We have moved further from her being alive...and in our lives. Opening those boxes without her was going to be...in essence...closing the chapter on sharing Christmas with her.  

Not something I wanted to do...because I couldn't imagine Christmas without her.

But here it was...approaching more quickly each day.

What could I do?

So I dug down deep...got my game face on for the boys...and dragged up some boxes.

'Tis the Season?

I thought it would start on Halloween.  I had anticipated the worst.  But as the days went by...it really didn't seem so awful.  There was just enough down time between the 31st and Thanksgiving Day to fool me into believing I was going to be fine...I was going to be able to handle the season.

But this past week crashed down on me.

I'm never surprised...just never quite prepared.

Earlier in the month the boys and I celebrated Susan's Birthday as a way of remembering how much she had brought to our lives.  But trying to celebrate my Birthday yesterday was a reminder of how much I will be missing her in my life as each year passes...a reminder of what the boys will miss...a reminder of what she will never experience.

Last week brought a slew of memories...

Not just Holidays and celebrations...but reminders of how we tackled everything...together.

My School Conferences came and went...But the ease in which we got through those two days was gone.  The days and nights were hectic...difficult...and dreadful.  The boys didn't see me at all on Monday...they rose from bed to others and were put to bed by someone else.  Not what we planned...not what we struggled the last 12 years for...

Ben agonized through the week with strep throat...a cold...an allergic reaction to medicine...and pink eye.  With every minute I stayed up caring for him...through coughing, crying and fever...I was reminded of how Sue and I worked through the hard times together...with a touch of a smile and a wink of our eyes.

Even when life was hard...we had each other to lean on...to hold...to love.

As the air gets colder...and the nights get longer...I find myself struggling.  I want to live...live for her...live for the boys. I want to do this with every ounce of my body.  But all I can do is think of what lies ahead in the next few months...Christmas...New Year's Eve...Our Anniversary...Valentine's Day...and the day that will mark a year since she last held me.