Darkness comes so fast outside my window. The nights so long. I’m trying to stock up on my winter “cozy” things…puzzles, candles, knitting project, music, books, hot drinks, blankets, sweaters, wool socks…but they are all just poor substitutes for Jason to snuggle up to. How I miss just sitting next to him on the couch…cold toes tucked under his thighs or on his lap. I would be knitting or reading. He would be watching a tv show or movie. Not necessarily doing anything together, but just being together…enjoying each other’s company. So many evenings spent like that. Now even when I’m immersed in a book…I’m lonely.
On the good days I can get one of the kids to hang out with me for a little bit. Anna was home this past weekend. We spent a lot of time puzzling and puttering with plants. Seth was busy working and Levi was busy with Homecoming and working. I think they like it when Anna is home because they know she’s taking care of me. She always seems to know when I’m having an exceptionally bad time.
Go First
If you’re lucky
You will go
First
Your Love by your side
As you leave
Earth
And your Love will grieve
Till his last
Day
But he won’t have too long
Till he’s on his
Way
Or you could be me
And he goes
First
And he’s way too young
When he leaves
Earth
And you will grieve for years
Struggle day after
Day
Because without his love
You have lost your
Way
Not sleeping again tonight. Blech. Life feels really, really dark right now. Like I was working on clawing myself out of a hole…and then somehow ended up sliding down further than I have been before…and now I’m clinging to the side of the hole…but I’m so damned tired that my whole body is shaking….and I just want a break…and to not do it anymore
But there isn’t a break from this reality. Wherever I go…whatever I do…my husband is still dead. I am still alone. I am still tired.
So how do I survive this reality? I don’t know
Midnight
Midnight
No sleep
Again
Darkness transformed
My window
Into a mirror
I gaze out into
My yard
And Grief looks back
Her hair a tangled mess
From tossing and turning
On my pillow
Her eyes dark voids
All the sparkle
Stolen
She is forced
Into hiding
During the day
But She is
Getting
Stronger
Taking control of my thoughts
Influencing my actions
When She is in control
She’s violent
And angry
Sometimes
And other times
She is terrified
And weak
She hates how
Sad
We are
She wishes she
Could rest
Inside
Never gone
Just
Peaceful
Levi’s girlfriend was over a few weeks ago…nothing unusual. Out of the blue she asks me “Marie, what do you do at your job?” Her parents are both elementary school principals. Pretty straightforward what they do. “Tennis Coordinator” is pretty nebulous. And I tried to explain “stuff” to her. And then she asked “Well, if you could do anything…what would it be?” And I replied with one word…write.
Well, guess what I haven’t been doing much of recently? Writing. Why??? It’s a complex question and has a simple answer…kinda. The simple answer is “Because I haven’t been taking the time for it”. The more complex answer is “Because my feelings suck. My life sucks. I hate them. I don’t want to write about them”.
Emily Dickinson. Even if you “don’t like poetry” you’ve heard of her…right?? One of my favorite quotes from her “and I am out with lanterns, looking for myself”. Writing is my lantern. So, now, in this time when I feel so effing lost all the time I am realizing that I need to keep writing. Even when it sucks…and it hurts…and I hate how I feel. It’s maybe how life will start feeling….well…like life.
So I shook things up a bit today. Rearranged my room solely so I could move my desk in the corner…where two windows meet. Rededicated that space to writing.
And then I had a pleasant surprise. I have a hard time sleeping…really surprising right? So I sat down at my desk and opened up my tablet and found poems that I had written in the middle of the night that I had forgotten about. Guess I haven’t been “not writing” as much as I thought. If you like reading my poetry I added those poems to my Poetry Page. Read at your own risk…
And then the other reason why I have a hard time writing. So many distractions!! My dogs were exceptionally needy today. Levi’s friend came over…which was great…but I chatted with him for a little bit. I can’t write on my laptop…you might notice it closed on the table next to the desk….too many “other things” on there. I also need to put my phone “elsewhere”. And just write on my Remarkable tablet or my Freewrite. The Remarkable is just like writing with a pencil on paper…except it saves all your work…and can do other fancy things…like translate your handwriting to text…but I think my handwriting is too messy…lol. The Freewrite is basically a portable word-processor. I like it because it has the satisfaction of pushing down the keys. Both work better for me than trying to be creative on my laptop. Although I do always edit on my laptop.
So all of those distractions got me thinking about some time alone soon…a little writing retreat somewhere by myself. Hole up in a cabin with some wine and frozen pizzas.
Anyway…I did manage to write a little bit today…
New Perspective
Rearranged my room today
That used to be ours
Need a new perspective
My desk in the corner
A new view
Outside
And I sit
Mug in my hand
Looking out the window
Through the steam
Rising
Distorting the view
Wool socks on my toes
Cardigan wrapped tight
Poor substitute
For your arms
Around me
Snug
Light a candle
Watch the flame dance
With the air
Releasing
Sweet perfume
Mesmerizing
Cold, black nose
Nudges me out of my reverie
Begging for attention
Scratches under his chin
Or rump
Simple pleasures
I wish my life were
That simple
Like it
Used to be
With
You
Now I’m watching
Darkness fall
And my tea has turned
To wine
And my heart
Still hurts
The new perspective feels the same.
Jason should have turned 46 yesterday. We should have been joking about how he caught up with me again…I’m a couple weeks older. We probably would have spent the day outside. It was so nice out. He would have made a comment or two about having to take advantage of this weather to do yard work because you never know when it might be “the last nice weekend”. There probably would have been some outside tennis. His “Annie” would be home from school and he would have loved hearing about all that she has going on.
Well, none of that happened, but I did have a good day. Baby Girl came home from school Saturday evening. We spent time putting together three plant stands…rearranging house plants…bringing a few in from outside that I’m going to try to keep alive. My kitchen and dining room are now Plantopeia. Seth asked me if I really need all those plants. I told him that they help keep me going during the winter. He understood.
The boys mowed the lawn yesterday morning while Anna and I met Jackie at the Minnesota Landscape Arboretum. It was the perfect fall day for walking around…getting a little bit “lost-ish” and chatting.
Anna and I puttered in the afternoon and then the kids and I went out to dinner. And that’s when my mood flipped from “it’s nice outside…I’m enjoying good company…I’m doing okay” to the all-too familiar “I miss my husband…life sucks…I don’t want to do this anymore”.
So today I took a “mental health day off” from work. And I’m trying my best to give myself some grace and a little self-care. Lighting candles…wrapping myself up in a sweater…writing…drinking coffee. I think I’m going to rearrange my bedroom. Put my desk by a different window for awhile. Try to change my viewpoint on life
Yesterday was my 46th birthday. Thank you to everyone who sent cards, texted, called, posted on Facebook, or even thought of me. My birthday is another one of those “emotional quagmire” kind of days. Some people don’t like their birthday, or don’t care about it much…not me…I have always LOVED my birthday. So, even though Jason was one of those “don’t care very much about my birthday” kind of guys, he knew how much I loved mine and would do whatever he could to make my day special for me. Take the day off work to hike with me…plan dinner…go out for a drink after a day filled with kids’ activities. He never failed to make me smile and feel loved and special. I still want that from him for ALL my birthdays.
I had a rough week last week leading up to my birthday…lots of teary evenings…but I did end up having a great weekend. The weather was beautiful yesterday for an exploration of Downtown Northfield. I had no idea there was such a hidden gem a mere 30 minutes away. Had a great time walking around Market Fest and then exploring the shops Downtown. Perfectly relaxing day. Then we went out to dinner in the evening. It was really, really good.
Today Seth and I went and got tattoos! He and I decided about a month and a half ago that we wanted to get matching memorial tattoos for Jason…something tennis related of course. We didn’t have a lot of luck finding anything that we really liked when we were searching for ideas, but we went into Aloha Monkey today and spoke with the artist about what we were thinking and he came back with an awesome design that Seth and I both love. We’re very happy with how they turned out. We both got them on the same spot on our right forearms.
Last time I posted it was the two year anniversary of Jason’s death…now we are coming up on our 23rd Wedding Anniversary…Aug 26th. I still count it. In my heart we’re still married. He’s my husband. I’m his wife. Always will be. Aug 26th is also Levi’s birthday. He turns 16 this year (yikes!). Saturday my happy face will be firmly in place for him, but I’m definitely having harder than usual moments this week.
A friend commented to me on Aug 8th that I have “made a lot of progress” the past two years. I wish the words that people use sometimes wouldn’t stick with me so much, but I think being the “word geek” that I am means that words hold a lot of weight with me. They always have. “Made a lot of progress”…implies that there’s some sort of destination…some end point… I just keep tumbling those words over and over in my head “made a lot of progress”.
Have I changed over the past two years? Absolutely yes. My core being is still devastatingly sad…always. I miss my husband…my life partner…my soul mate…my forever. I miss the life we had built together. The social shenanigans with other couples. The safety and security I always felt in him. The knowing I was absolutely, positively loved by him and could be my most complete self with him.
But I have also learned to live a little more “around” that. I can have fun times with family or friends and be happy in those moments. It sucks complete and total a$$ when I come home and all I want to do is tell Jason about everything…and he isn’t here…and sometimes that crash and burn doesn’t feel completely worth the happy moments…but I’m working on it. I guess one could call that “progress” towards something.
I’m taking an Introduction to Poetry class right now. There are 5 of us in the class and it amazes me every week how much life experience plays into how a person reads and interprets poetry. My lens of sadness and grief give every poem we read a slightly more morose tone. Literally, one poem we read I was like “obviously the guy wants to die” and all my classmates were like “no, he just wants to go to his cabin by the lake”. Huh…really?? I spose.
Our instructor has been giving us different prompts to spur our own poetry writing. This poem was the result of one of those prompts…
Pillowtalk
Drifting away to sleep
Bodies tangled
Familiar mixup of limbs
Comfortable and safe
His voice whispers
In the still night
“I can’t remember if I told you today
But I love you”
And with those last words
He relaxes into sleep
While she lies awake
Squeezing her eyes shut tight
Trying to capture that moment
Like a snapshot in her heart
That she can keep in a box
And look at whenever she wants
When he’s not there
When the beast living in his brain
Devouring him little by little
Finally consumes him
And all that she’s left with is the
Ghost of pillowtalk
I took the top all the way down on my Bronco yesterday and got myself lost for most of the day. And that was everything I needed. I blasted my music…sang along at the top of my lungs… and just did me. Went down to Red Wing. To the top of Memorial Bluff. Got out and sat there for a long time. Reminisced about the first time I was in Red Wing. It was over the winter break when Jason and I were in college. I had yet to meet his parents and I think he convinced them to let me stay for a week or two. Red Wing has changed a lot since then!
Red Wing
On the two year anniversary of your death
I find myself in the city of your birth
Called here
To the top of a bluff
Looking down at the city below
The hustle and bustle
The river in the background
The sickly sweet smell of the granary
Last time I was here was with you
It was Fall
I don’t remember looking out
All I could see was you
All I could ever see was you
Now I search for you everywhere
I wanted to just drive down the river from Red Wing…but Road Construction…so I crossed the river and drove down to Wabasha on the WI side. And then ran into lots of road construction in Downtown Wabasha. Stumbled upon Slipperys by accident…the bar/restaurant where Grumpy Old Men was filmed…and had lunch there. This was the the hardest part of my road trip…getting a table for one…and then sitting there amidst all the other families…couples…friend groups. Ugh. Teary-eyed in the bathroom before I left.
I got home about 3’oclock and realized that next time I take a topless road trip I need to apply sunscreen…ouch! I was feeling much more centered and much more able to be present for our kids. Levi and I decided to make bread pudding…Jason’s favorite dessert. We went to the grocery store together to buy the ingredients and then made it together. The four of us ordered Thai food…and played games together. There was a lot of laughter…and some tears…but having adult kids is so fun. I loved every minute. I will readily admit that I drank too many Old Fashioneds…and am feeling the effects just a bit today…but we all had a good time together and that’s what counts. Jason would have loved it…and nursed me through my hangover this morning…lol
Thank you to everyone who has taken the time to reach out this past week. “Hospice Week” will always be very difficult for me.
Two days until two years. I’m not okay and am starting to panic. I’ve only made it two years alone and it feels like there are way too many empty years to go. 43 years old was way too young for Jason to die…and way too young to become a widow.
I’m trying to figure out who I am…again. Find some joy in life…again. I bought a Ford Bronco 10 days ago. A move some applauded, some judged, some implied I was crazy…mid-life crises…whatever…whatever. Truth of the matter is that I fell in love with driving with the wind in my hair years ago when Jason surprised me by renting a Mustang convertible when we were in California for one of his Nationals tournaments. I don’t think he even got to drive it…I was having too much fun. Convertibles in MN are not the most practical, so my dream quickly became to get a Jeep Wrangler. But then I was talking to a friend and he got me thinking about a Bronco. Levi and did research…test drove one….fell in love. Thought I was a Jeep Girl…nope…Bronco Babe. The fact of the matter is that I don’t have to defend my choice to anyone….but my Bronco helps me feel a little badass…less trampled by life…and makes me excited to get out and about. Those things are worth it to me.
I also decided to stop just thinking about taking a poetry class and actually do it. So last week I starting a 6 week long Introduction to Poetry class through The Loft. It is online every Monday from 6-8pm. I love it so much. It is a beginner class…so more talking about poetic form and structure than writing poetry…but it is exercising parts of my brain that have gone stagnant. It is so amazing to discover what really gifted poets can do with their poetry. How they can convey such emotion with such simple words. It’s very inspiring…and humbling.
I’m trying. I’m learning to be present in happy moments, even when I’m sad at my core. I was in Wausau this past weekend and had a really good time with my besties from high school and getting together with some family for my niece’s baptism. I was there. I truly enjoyed those things. And then I got home and was just DONE.
And now this week. 2 years ago this was “hospice week”. I feel like I am at war with myself. Like my mind wants to keep going back there, but my heart is in too much pain. And I just can’t deal. I tried to escape into a book tonight…and literally the first chapter of the book…the wife is by her husband’s bedside waiting for him to breathe his last breath. No. No. No.
Last night I didn’t sleep much. I think it was 2am and I was still awake…writing poetry
Without
He left me
Broke his vow
Forever
He left me
Still loved me
Couldn’t stay
He left me
Couldn’t fight it
Terminal
He left me
More each day
Unstoppable
He left me
Breath ceased
Heartbreak
He left me
Who am I?
Stranger
He left me
What remains?
Loneliness
Summer is kicking my butt. That’s how I started my conversation with my therapist today. I feel exhausted. I’m worn out. I’m stressed. I’m looking back at past summers…family vacations…relaxing, idyllic days and feeling like I can never have that again. I’m envious of other families and their “plans”. My yard is a mess…my plants all dried up and dead…except for the weeds…thistles and burdock are thriving. When I go in my yard I feel overwhelmed, so I spend more and more time inside. I’ve rearranged my furniture and my houseplants…trying to feel like I’m “doing” something.
I barely got Anna home from S. Africa and I moved her into her house in Eau Claire. I celebrated my Father-in-Laws’s 80th birthday with the Fregien crew. Then have been stressed when he had an accident that resulted in a traumatic brain injury (TBI)…worry over him and not a small amount of PTSD. Spent a night in Wausau with my family…not a stress-free endeavor by any means.
Finally gave up on getting a hold of the company that installed my gutters and contacted a different company to come fix them. Money I didn’t need to spend, but the gutters are back on the house…and bonus…won’t be growing maple trees out of them anymore. And did I mention that we are switching to a new program at work? One that has less functionality than the old one…but is somehow an “upgrade”.
I can’t remember the last time I slept through the night. I’ve even given up on tossing and turning. Been getting a lot of reading done between the hours of 2am-4am ish.
All the “dates” are looming…pressing on my shoulders like a ton of frikking bricks. Why do I let “dates” get to me so much? I don’t know….but they do. Seth’s 20th birthday is this weekend…Aug 4th coming shortly after that. 2 years already…how is that possible? And how will I make it more?? I have no idea. Right now I can’t even see how I’m gong to make it through the summer.
Is this truly what life is? Just making it to the next day? Do you ever have those moments when you are looking at the ones you love and you feel complete peace? And you think to yourself “Yup. This right here is it”. I had so many of those moments. When Jason and I were together…watching our kids play…or playing with them…watching their sports…going for a walk…ANYTHING. I would just look over at him and feel such overwhelming love and peace that it would almost physically hurt. And every night go to bed with him beside me…our feet tangled together…my fingers tucked in his waist band…just to be close…and know that everything was right in the world.
And now my brain knows those days are over…but my heart doesn’t want to believe it.
And I haven’t been writing. At all. Why? Maybe because I can feel that there are so many emotions still undiscovered…too painful to delve into yet… I do know that this “quiet” isn’t good for me. I’m escaping into fiction instead of “dealing” with my reality…but you know what? I don’t care right now. I’m just trying to survive.
I have been listening to a lot of Shinedown lately… “It’s amazing what the hard times can reveal. Like who shows up, who walks away, and who’s for real”. Word. And thanks to you that always make sure “I see the daylight”.
I went hiking this morning and it was exactly what I needed.
Hiking in the Rain
I lace my boots tight
Inaugural outing
Pack loaded up
Ready to buckle on again
Butterflies in my stomach
Excitement and nervousness
What if the woods don’t feel like home anymore either?
But the trees canopy over the trail
Like a big green doorway
And the tree branches wave hello
As the wind rustles their leaves
And Mother Nature welcomes me
As my boots crunch on the trail
My whole body sighs
Tuning in and tuning out
Every exhale
Distractions fade
Every inhale
Senses sharpen
All that is important surrounds me in this moment
The birds singing to each other
Hidden in the safety of the boughs
Little frogs hop on the trail
I’m mindful of each step
A doe startles in the long grass
Flicks her tail in irritation as she bounds off
Delicate flowers blossom on trail’s edge
Small delights to the observant few
It starts to rain
I tilt my face up to the sky
Raindrops mingle with tears
The thirsty earth and I soak up the rain together
And a million eyes witness my baptism
As I spin slowly feeling reborn
This is where I belong
Love, Tennis, and Cancer 