I haven’t visited Mary’s resting place in a couple years. Some of it was not feeling welcome by the church that houses her cremains. Some of it was not needing that place to connect with her spirit and memory.
For Mother’s Day, my sons wanted to stop by and I was also ready to return.
The courtyard was unkempt and I had a vague feeling that this place no longer held its previous significance.
There is melancholy in that. I’m notoriously rootless and I crave special places and rituals to ground me. There is also freedom. I have taught myself how to engage with Mary’s spirit wherever I am called to it.
Through all these thoughts I turned my eyes skyward and found a remarkable rainbow above us. Although I no longer need this place, it was the right place at the right time.
I have almost everything wrapped and the stockings are ready. I’m not going to know what to with myself Christmas Eve night!
There will be another first this Christmas Eve and morning, at least a first in four years. I won’t be the lone adult in my house.
Kristen will spend the weekend with us and her daughter will join us Christmas afternoon.
It will be the most full Christmas my home has seen since we lost our Mary. I’ve been proud of the last few years and taking on single fatherhood. The excited energy of holidays has been counterbalanced with quiet loneliness.
I’m blessed with a partner who wants to be an integrated part of our lives. Kristen isn’t afraid of our loss or my enduring love for my late wife. She doesn’t want to replace, doesn’t ask me to forget, and always welcomes my memories and tears.
Christmas was Mary’s favorite. I can hardly sort through all her decorations and photos each year, much less put them all to use. I think she would be proud of our scrappy little displays, less scrappy with each year.
It’s a special time in our lives to share her with the wonderful, loving people who surround us.
September 15th, 2022, would have been my 15th wedding anniversary. I wasn’t anxious leading up to the day. I’m in a positive place with my grief right now.
I went to yoga that morning and all was chill. The ladies in the class were talking about dying their hair and I was content to silently prepare myself for practice.
Then the teacher told a story about her husband cutting his own hair in horrible fashion weeks before their wedding. I chimed in, “Oh, I have a funny story like that. Wow. Today’s my wedding anniversary.” Maybe one of them knew I was a widower, but I was not up for repeating that part of the story.
On the morning of my wedding I was nervous and wanted to do an extra special job on my beard. I used the electric trimmer closer than usual and took a line of hair out of one sideburn. I was sick. I just ruined our photos and Mary would have to stare at this foolishness during our vows.
It turned out that no one noticed and you can’t see the mistake in the photos.
Back to yoga and a few laughs over the story. Time for practice. Before I could settle into my first pose, tears flowed down my face. A quiet, hot crying, highly preferable to heaving sobbing.
I didn’t sit too long in the sadness. We had ten years of marriage and it struck me that I’m halfway to ten years without it. It feels like distance from something I love. Not “loved,” but a life I care deeply for in the present.
I recently heard Joseph Campbell talk about how grief gives us an intimation of the everlasting. It allows us to imagine life after death, to see how we could live forever.
I was fortunate to experience a glimpse of forever this week.
Beastie Boys, Rage Against the Machine, Citizen Cope, The Crow soundtrack, Red Hot Chili Peppers, and Carolina Chocolate Drops have been blasting from my sons’ room.
We’ve been rearranging things and my 13-year-old discovered his mom’s CD stash a few days ago. Today I let him at the music I’ve been collecting for 30 years.
Mary laughed everytime I said, “Passepartout,” and it strikes me that Westen just this week discovered an interest in French that was unexpected. Although, he says, he may switch to Spanish.
I always try to remind parents interested in home education that they’ve been doing it for years. No child between the ages of 1 and 5 needs school to learn a vast amount of skills and knowledge. No one needs any school after that either. We’ve been conditioned to accept school as a universal, yet we are born to learn. The home education community is growing exponentially and the examples of children thriving without school are plentiful.
I don’t even know how long I’ve been lonely. I haven’t allowed myself to feel it most times.
This past weekend I took my sons to camp with home education friends. It was the type of gathering that Mary loved so much, with tons of food, fun, adventure, and laughter. I had her favorite camp chair, coffee mug, and the tent we decided to buy, but didn’t receive until after she passed away. Camping always brings out Mary stories and every campfire is like going home with her.
I’ve lived these four years without her as a prideful single dad. I’ve been setting up and breaking down camps with little adult help and I’ve felt strong. That’s changing as I see I have a romantic partner who I can lean on and trust with tasks I assumed were my responsibility. She wasn’t with me this weekend, but my friends were generous with their help. I’ve grown a better practice of accepting help, but I still felt weakness. As I drove home (on schedule, thanks to my friends), I was overwhelmed by feelings of inadequacy. Triggered by wet tarps and sandy bike tires, it ran right down to not being the type of husband who could protect his wife’s life.
That’s one of the shittiest things about grief. It’ll take new feelings and tie them up with the past or some impossible present. I’m a better man than the one who lost Mary. What if I had been better for her? What would my life look like now? Then comes the guilt of not appreciating the wonderful people and things in my life now. Then none of it makes sense and I’m just crying behind the wheel of a 19-foot RV as I make my way to play soccer.
At least I know how this goes. I keep the truck on the road, let the tears do their thing, and feel a whole lot better, if a little drained.
I performed well in the game, but the emotional toll weakened me enough to bring on a nagging blueness complete with brain fog and body aches. The next day I learned that I had missed a dedication ceremony for Mary. The storm of emotions has held my recovery in slow motion. Three days later, this morning, I finally received the answer about my loneliness. I had been hiding from it. I didn’t want to admit that I was counting on anyone for anything. I’m now accepting my loneliness and being honest with myself about who I can lean on and who I cannot.
Some of it is clear and some not, but I needed to return to this space and start a new chapter of healing. That’s the greatest thing about the shittiest thing about grief: if you are lucky enough to turn the pain into healing, you will forever have a source of improved spiritual, mental, and physical health.
