Kowalski: Listen, do you want to go back or do you want to stay here? I get it. It's nice up here. You can just shut down all the systems, turn out all the lights, and just close your eyes and tune out everybody. There's nobody up here that can hurt you. It's safe. I mean, what's the point of going
on? What's the point of living? Your [husband] died. Doesn't get any rougher than that. But still, it's a matter of what you do now. If you decide to go, then you gotta just get on with it. Sit back, enjoy the ride. You gotta plant both your feet on the ground and start livin' life.
Stone: How did you get here?
Kowlaski: I'm telling you, it's a hell of a story. Hey, Ryan?
Stone: What?
Kowlaski: It's time to go home.
- Gravity
Showing posts with label New Love / Old Love. Show all posts
Showing posts with label New Love / Old Love. Show all posts
Wednesday, September 10, 2014
Friday, September 5, 2014
Tuesday, July 15, 2014
4 Years
...4 things I need to tell you...
I never expected to date again, let alone get married.
I know you would want this new life and new love for me. I would want it for you if I had been the one to die, leaving you behind and alone. We even spoke about it on several occasions. Doesn't stop me from feeling like I've cheated on you.
Most days I'm happy in my new life.
No.
Every day I'm happy in my new life.
Some days, though, I imagine living in a parallel universe where you're still alive, we're still together, and I've never met this amazing man who loves me even while I still love you. Maybe loves me because I still love you.
He's an amazing man, Stephen. I think you'd have been great friends.
2.) I have two beautiful children.
They are smart, funny, amazing, mischievous, talented, imaginative, loving, kind, giving, brash, loud, quiet, shy, outgoing, girls that I adore with every ounce of my being. They fill my days and nights with chaos and joy, with running dialogs about purple monkeys flying at midnight and unicorns farting rainbows, with subtle winks that are anything but subtle, tears of pain and frustration, tears of joy and accomplishment, giggles and laughter that bounce around rooms, and smiles. Smiles that can teach Times Square a thing or two about lighting up a space.
You and I wanted children. We wanted six because we were insane like that. After eight years of trying, we finally gave up on that dream and chose a different dream. That last dream we shared died when you died. So much of me died when you died. I did, eventually, create a new dream. And I've been lucky enough to have this dream include these two wonderful girls that I look forward to watching grow into fabulous women.
I wish we had the opportunity to raise children together. I still think we'd have made beautiful and talented, but blind as bat, children. I believe you would have been a marvelous father. Somehow, though, I feel you smile over my shoulder when I watch the girls play, when I watch them succeed at something they've worked hard to master. As if you know, as if you watch over them during the times I can't.
3.) I've kept our house but I don't live there anymore.
I've moved to the suburbs. In an HOA. Remember how I used to rail against HOA's? Turns out, it's not so bad. I've met a lot of mother's of kids the girls are friends with in the neighborhood. We've become a mommy-network, relying on each other when some unexpected occurrence happens. In the process, I've made some truly amazing friends. I really would have hated it here without kids, though. In that much, I was correct.
Our house suffered some damage in a storm about three years ago. As a result I removed the old deck we had been trying to destroy for years. I replaced it with an extension of the roof for a covered porch. Ran electricity out for an overhead fan. It's gorgeous. Then I moved out. Still haven't redone the kitchen. The one room we always wanted to tackle but something else would pop up. I'll remodel the kitchen before I move back. Once the kids move out for college, Doug and I plan to sell his house and move back there. For the time being, it's difficult for me to even walk through it. Even with someone else's furniture filling the rooms, I still expect to see you walk around a corner. Eventually, I expect, that will wear off. Four years hasn't been long enough, though.
4.) I think about you every day.
It doesn't always hurt anymore. Frequently I still get that quick stab through the heart, my breath will catch for a moment, then my heart rate and breathing return to normal. But more and more the thought of you rises, passes through me, and nestles back into my very marrow. Memories of you are a part of me that flow and ebb, pumping through my veins, bouncing along with white and red blood cells. Missing you has become less of an assault. It is more familiar. At four years, it should be more familiar.
I think about how absolutely hilarious you'd find me now. Mother of two, living in suburbia, president of the summer swim team, driving my white Camry with red racing stripes, music always blaring. Same girl, different woman. Same woman, different girl.
I always wear at least once piece of jewelry you gave me. Sometime I still wear your wedding ring around my neck. It makes me feel closer to you when I feel small and insignificant. The baby blanket of the adult widow.
I talk about you. To Doug and the girls. Our youngest decided long ago that you are her guardian angel. If you can guard us, I know you'll watch out for the girls. You know where my heart always leads. And they are my heart now.
I miss you still. I always will. But the missing of you has changed. As I have changed. I love you. That will never change. I will always love you.
Sunday, May 4, 2014
Monday, April 28, 2014
#Blessed
I have the most amazing in-laws who still love & celebrate with me after the death of our Steve. #Blessed pic.twitter.com/in2r15nwch
— Kiki Marcus (@KikiMarcus) April 28, 2014
Monday, February 3, 2014
Interview
Some tattoos have deep meaning. Read more, and hear @KikiMarcus share the story behind her memorial tattoo here. http://t.co/xl6dRuVr6T
— Brittany Keeperman (@BodyModChicago) February 4, 2014
Tuesday, January 21, 2014
Love Don't Die - The Fray
If I know one thing, that's true
It ain't what you say, it's what you do
And you don't say much, yeah, that's true
But I listen when you do
A thousand years go by
But love don't die
If I know one thing, that's true
It's that I'm never leaving you
And you don't say much, yeah, that's true
But I lose it when you do
Don't let them tell no lie
Love don't die
No matter where we go
Or even if we don't
And even if they try
They'll never take my body from your side
Love don't die
If there is one thing, that's true
It's not what I say, it's what I do
And I say too much, yeah, that's true
So just listen to what I do
A thousand years go by
But love don't die
No matter where we go
Or even if we don't
And even if they try
They'll never take my body from your side
Love don't die
She can break it up
She can burn it down
You can box it in
Bury it in the ground
You can close it off
And turn it away
Try to keep it down,
Six feet in the ground
But love don't die
No matter where we go
Or even if we don't
And even if they try
They'll never take my body from your side
Love don't die
No matter where we go
Or even if we don't
I’d like to watch them try
They'll never take my body from your side
Love don't die
It ain't what you say, it's what you do
And you don't say much, yeah, that's true
But I listen when you do
A thousand years go by
But love don't die
If I know one thing, that's true
It's that I'm never leaving you
And you don't say much, yeah, that's true
But I lose it when you do
Don't let them tell no lie
Love don't die
No matter where we go
Or even if we don't
And even if they try
They'll never take my body from your side
Love don't die
If there is one thing, that's true
It's not what I say, it's what I do
And I say too much, yeah, that's true
So just listen to what I do
A thousand years go by
But love don't die
No matter where we go
Or even if we don't
And even if they try
They'll never take my body from your side
Love don't die
She can break it up
She can burn it down
You can box it in
Bury it in the ground
You can close it off
And turn it away
Try to keep it down,
Six feet in the ground
But love don't die
No matter where we go
Or even if we don't
And even if they try
They'll never take my body from your side
Love don't die
No matter where we go
Or even if we don't
I’d like to watch them try
They'll never take my body from your side
Love don't die
Saturday, October 12, 2013
On Writing
“You try to tell yourself that you’ve been lucky, most incredibly lucky, and usually that works because it’s true. Sometimes it doesn’t work, that’s all. Then you cry.”— On Writing - Stephen King
Monday, September 16, 2013
4 birthdays, 51 Years, and Thousands of Miles
Maggie: He's dead and I'm alive.
Jim: That's what I'd keep in mind.
- "Election Night, Part 2" - The Newsroom
Steve's first birthday after his death, I went to Venice, Italy. It was the last vacation Steve and I had planned, with hotel and plane tickets already booked and bought. His birthday was a mere two months after his death. Terrified if I stayed home I would harm myself, knowing Steve would want me to enjoy life and move forward, believing I needed to at least try and move forward even if I was still widow-fogged most days - I changed his ticket over to a friend and away we went anyway.
That trip I can only see in my memory as snapshots through a haze. I know I was hysterical. Not always in the funny sense but in the "unmanageable emotional excess" sense. Everything was, emotionally, to the extreme. I laughed inappropriately, I cried unstoppably, I fell down stairs, I forgot things, I couldn't figure out how to get into buildings. I sat in quiet moments trying to imagine what we'd have been doing at that moment in that place then I tried to go do all those things. I failed. It wasn't the success or failure that was important, and I knew it. It was the trying that mattered. But I didn't do it alone and we muddled through, hysterical laughter and all. In the end, going to Venice was the best decision I could have made. I'm proud of myself for having braved moving forward through my pain.
The following year I wanted to leave the country again. It felt right in my soul, to travel back to Italy. And, honestly, I couldn't think of anywhere else to spend the time. So I asked my remaining friends if they'd like to go but the time away and expense made it impossible. My father had died that summer and as Steve's birthday approached, I felt trapped in a pressure cooker. Only in a total panic, a month before Steve's birthday, was I able to make the commando decision to travel alone when I booked my trip to Florence, Italy.
I had never gone on vacation alone before, let alone in a foreign country. But I gave myself over to the experience and enjoyed my travels in ways I could never have imagined. I walked the city streets from 8 am to well after midnight. I explored museums, estates, and gardens the like that are only available in Europe. I drank copious amounts of red wine, ate miles of fresh pasta, learned to drink cappuccino only in the mornings and espresso only after dinner. In Florence, I found my strength again. And, being Florence, I found beauty again. The pure joy of finding strength and beauty refreshed my soul.
The third time his birthday rolled around Steve would have been fifty, a landmark year. A month later would have been our tenth wedding anniversary. I chose to move my annual Steve's-dead-travel-to-Italy-trip back a month, and booked myself to visit Rome. This time I was able to book months ahead and, though would have enjoyed traveling with a companion, didn't flinch at the idea of traveling alone.
But a complication arose between booking the trip and leaving. I met the Piper. And though I was constantly battling feelings that I was a adulteress whore for "cheating" on my dead husband, it was becoming clear to me I was in love. My trip was marked by visiting Roman ruins, and running back to the hotel to Skype. Visiting the Vatican, and running back to the hotel to Skype. Drinking from the aqueducts, eating gelato, visiting museums, resisting the urge to jump into Trevi Fountain, and running back to the hotel to Skype.
I went to dinner the night of my wedding anniversary, looking over Rome's city lights, and came to peace with removing my wedding band from my hand. And when I returned home from my trip, I had someone special waiting for me. I was ready.
This is the fourth birthday of Steve's since his death. I'm not in Italy. I'm not going to Italy next month. I'm not traveling again until my honeymoon in May, when I'll be traveling with the Piper. We'll be traveling to Spain when we go.
But last night, because the night before an event is when I'm at my weakest, my Piper did something beautiful. After we tucked the girls in bed, he turned down the lights and presented me with a cupcake lit with a birthday candle. He suggested I make a wish for Steve, blow, and then share a special Steve memory. One of my favorites. And that's what we did. Together. I spoke of Steve, our life and love. And my piper sat with a smile absorbing every word.
I'm not in Italy this year. And instead of eating alone at a fancy restaurant, I'll be running kids to swim practice and fitting meals in between trips. I'll be checking homework and reminding everyone to do their chores. I will be yelling at dogs to quit chewing each other's faces off and trying to fold laundry. It will be pure mayhem. And I will love very minute of it.
Today my husband would have been fifty-one. Today I am thirty-nine. Today is so completely different than yesterday.
Happy birthday, my love.
Jim: That's what I'd keep in mind.
- "Election Night, Part 2" - The Newsroom
Steve's first birthday after his death, I went to Venice, Italy. It was the last vacation Steve and I had planned, with hotel and plane tickets already booked and bought. His birthday was a mere two months after his death. Terrified if I stayed home I would harm myself, knowing Steve would want me to enjoy life and move forward, believing I needed to at least try and move forward even if I was still widow-fogged most days - I changed his ticket over to a friend and away we went anyway.
That trip I can only see in my memory as snapshots through a haze. I know I was hysterical. Not always in the funny sense but in the "unmanageable emotional excess" sense. Everything was, emotionally, to the extreme. I laughed inappropriately, I cried unstoppably, I fell down stairs, I forgot things, I couldn't figure out how to get into buildings. I sat in quiet moments trying to imagine what we'd have been doing at that moment in that place then I tried to go do all those things. I failed. It wasn't the success or failure that was important, and I knew it. It was the trying that mattered. But I didn't do it alone and we muddled through, hysterical laughter and all. In the end, going to Venice was the best decision I could have made. I'm proud of myself for having braved moving forward through my pain.
The following year I wanted to leave the country again. It felt right in my soul, to travel back to Italy. And, honestly, I couldn't think of anywhere else to spend the time. So I asked my remaining friends if they'd like to go but the time away and expense made it impossible. My father had died that summer and as Steve's birthday approached, I felt trapped in a pressure cooker. Only in a total panic, a month before Steve's birthday, was I able to make the commando decision to travel alone when I booked my trip to Florence, Italy.
I had never gone on vacation alone before, let alone in a foreign country. But I gave myself over to the experience and enjoyed my travels in ways I could never have imagined. I walked the city streets from 8 am to well after midnight. I explored museums, estates, and gardens the like that are only available in Europe. I drank copious amounts of red wine, ate miles of fresh pasta, learned to drink cappuccino only in the mornings and espresso only after dinner. In Florence, I found my strength again. And, being Florence, I found beauty again. The pure joy of finding strength and beauty refreshed my soul.
The third time his birthday rolled around Steve would have been fifty, a landmark year. A month later would have been our tenth wedding anniversary. I chose to move my annual Steve's-dead-travel-to-Italy-trip back a month, and booked myself to visit Rome. This time I was able to book months ahead and, though would have enjoyed traveling with a companion, didn't flinch at the idea of traveling alone.
But a complication arose between booking the trip and leaving. I met the Piper. And though I was constantly battling feelings that I was a adulteress whore for "cheating" on my dead husband, it was becoming clear to me I was in love. My trip was marked by visiting Roman ruins, and running back to the hotel to Skype. Visiting the Vatican, and running back to the hotel to Skype. Drinking from the aqueducts, eating gelato, visiting museums, resisting the urge to jump into Trevi Fountain, and running back to the hotel to Skype.
I went to dinner the night of my wedding anniversary, looking over Rome's city lights, and came to peace with removing my wedding band from my hand. And when I returned home from my trip, I had someone special waiting for me. I was ready.
This is the fourth birthday of Steve's since his death. I'm not in Italy. I'm not going to Italy next month. I'm not traveling again until my honeymoon in May, when I'll be traveling with the Piper. We'll be traveling to Spain when we go.
But last night, because the night before an event is when I'm at my weakest, my Piper did something beautiful. After we tucked the girls in bed, he turned down the lights and presented me with a cupcake lit with a birthday candle. He suggested I make a wish for Steve, blow, and then share a special Steve memory. One of my favorites. And that's what we did. Together. I spoke of Steve, our life and love. And my piper sat with a smile absorbing every word.
I'm not in Italy this year. And instead of eating alone at a fancy restaurant, I'll be running kids to swim practice and fitting meals in between trips. I'll be checking homework and reminding everyone to do their chores. I will be yelling at dogs to quit chewing each other's faces off and trying to fold laundry. It will be pure mayhem. And I will love very minute of it.
Today my husband would have been fifty-one. Today I am thirty-nine. Today is so completely different than yesterday.
Happy birthday, my love.
Thursday, August 1, 2013
Ghosts That We Knew - Mumford & Sons
So give me hope in the darkness that I will see the light
'Cause oh that gave me such a fright
But I will hold as long as you like
Just promise me we'll be alright
Friday, April 19, 2013
All Those Precious Rings
When Steve asked me to marry him, he proudly put a one point something carat diamond on my left hand, kneeling in Rockefeller Center on Christmas Eve. I was facing away from Steve looking at the tree and the ice skaters when he got on bended knee. After he called my name and gently tugged on the corner of my coat, I turned to face him. I thought he had slipped and fallen. I started to kneel on that cold pavement to help him to his feet when I realized he hadn't fallen to his knee... he was on bended knee.
The only part I can remember of what he said that night was "I've waited for you my entire life..." After that all I hear in my memory is the inner dialog of "ohmygawd. ohmygawd. ohmygawd."
We chose simple, plain, gold wedding bands. I'd heard horror stories of wedding bands slipping off in the ocean, never to be seen again. If that ever happened to us I wanted to only mourn the emotional loss of the ring, not the financial.
I wore those rings up until about six months ago.
When Steve died, I put his pinky ring, which he received as a gift for his confirmation and wore every day of his life, along with his wedding band on a chain with a cross, which he also received for his confirmation and wore every day of his life. It was a rather large clump of metal to bang between my breasts. Kinda made my chest feel like some sort of jingly bongo drum set. After a week I took the cross off the necklace, along with the pinky ring, leaving just his wedding band to bounce over my heart.
And that's where it stayed until about seven months ago, when I started dating. Even after I started dating I wore it more often than not. Even now I'll still swing it over my neck for no apparent reason except I like the comfort of the weight.
For Christmas in 2011, my second set of holidays without Steve but my first set of holidays without my father, I had best gift I could have received. I was invited to New York to spend Christmas with my in-laws. I spent a few days alone in the city (and if you need to ask which city, get a life. There's only one city in New York referred to as THE city) visiting some of our favorite spots before heading up to join the family. I tried to take a picture or two of places that meant something to us. I stayed at the same hotel we stayed at during our last visit. I visited the house he grew up in, his cousin kept me company via text the entire time, dropped in on Sister Flora who has been such a God send to the family.
And I did a bit of shopping.
I stopped in to Tiffany & Co., where Steve bought my first piece of jewelry not related to our marriage. It was a Christmas gift that I still wear on my right hand thumb to this day. Now Steve gave me many sparkly jewels over the years, and each means something different to me. But there was something special about receiving that little blue box with the white bow. So on the 23rd of December in 2011, I walked into Tiffany's completely out of my mind thinking I'd be able to see anything, let alone buy something. And yet, the first counter I walked up to, I found exactly what I didn't even know I was looking for. It's two rings, one in yellow gold, one in white gold, intertwined so they can't be separated but still swing freely of each other. I knew I needed it for that day in future when I was ready to take my wedding band and engagement ring off, but didn't want an empty finger. I wanted a ring that would hold some meaning while I transitioned from married to widowed. A ring that I could, even later, move to another finger and still like it. What better than a ring that looks like two entwined wedding bands?
I know the exact day I took off my wedding band. I was in Rome for what would have been our tenth wedding anniversary. At dinner on our anniversary, overlooking the Forum Boarium, Steve's ring in my hand, letting the necklace slip through my fingers like flowing water, it occurred to me to place my band on the chain along with his. The rings naturally fell in together forming a smaller circle inside a larger circle. And all the sudden, it made sense to me. I slipped the necklace over my head, took my new double band ring I had been wearing on my right hand in the meanwhile, and placed it on my newly naked left ring finger. When I walked out of that restaurant I felt a little emptier. I felt a little lighter. I felt a little giddy. I was ready for something new.
By March of this year, I had moved that double band back to my right hand and was wearing a big chunky thing on the middle finger of my left hand. I even went back to New York to experience the city not immersed in memories but to help show them off, give vision to the words I'd been speaking. I even managed a picture, which says more than all these words put together can say.
Cause you see, a little over a week ago, I got a surprise parade just for me. An entire bagpipe band marched down my street. Two of the most amazing, heart-stealing, little girls held signs expressing love. My piper got on bended knee in my front yard and asked me to marry him.
And as Doug placed the one carat blue sapphire ring on my left ring finger... I replied with a resounding yes.
The only part I can remember of what he said that night was "I've waited for you my entire life..." After that all I hear in my memory is the inner dialog of "ohmygawd. ohmygawd. ohmygawd."
We chose simple, plain, gold wedding bands. I'd heard horror stories of wedding bands slipping off in the ocean, never to be seen again. If that ever happened to us I wanted to only mourn the emotional loss of the ring, not the financial.
I wore those rings up until about six months ago.
When Steve died, I put his pinky ring, which he received as a gift for his confirmation and wore every day of his life, along with his wedding band on a chain with a cross, which he also received for his confirmation and wore every day of his life. It was a rather large clump of metal to bang between my breasts. Kinda made my chest feel like some sort of jingly bongo drum set. After a week I took the cross off the necklace, along with the pinky ring, leaving just his wedding band to bounce over my heart.
And that's where it stayed until about seven months ago, when I started dating. Even after I started dating I wore it more often than not. Even now I'll still swing it over my neck for no apparent reason except I like the comfort of the weight.
For Christmas in 2011, my second set of holidays without Steve but my first set of holidays without my father, I had best gift I could have received. I was invited to New York to spend Christmas with my in-laws. I spent a few days alone in the city (and if you need to ask which city, get a life. There's only one city in New York referred to as THE city) visiting some of our favorite spots before heading up to join the family. I tried to take a picture or two of places that meant something to us. I stayed at the same hotel we stayed at during our last visit. I visited the house he grew up in, his cousin kept me company via text the entire time, dropped in on Sister Flora who has been such a God send to the family.
And I did a bit of shopping.
I stopped in to Tiffany & Co., where Steve bought my first piece of jewelry not related to our marriage. It was a Christmas gift that I still wear on my right hand thumb to this day. Now Steve gave me many sparkly jewels over the years, and each means something different to me. But there was something special about receiving that little blue box with the white bow. So on the 23rd of December in 2011, I walked into Tiffany's completely out of my mind thinking I'd be able to see anything, let alone buy something. And yet, the first counter I walked up to, I found exactly what I didn't even know I was looking for. It's two rings, one in yellow gold, one in white gold, intertwined so they can't be separated but still swing freely of each other. I knew I needed it for that day in future when I was ready to take my wedding band and engagement ring off, but didn't want an empty finger. I wanted a ring that would hold some meaning while I transitioned from married to widowed. A ring that I could, even later, move to another finger and still like it. What better than a ring that looks like two entwined wedding bands?
I know the exact day I took off my wedding band. I was in Rome for what would have been our tenth wedding anniversary. At dinner on our anniversary, overlooking the Forum Boarium, Steve's ring in my hand, letting the necklace slip through my fingers like flowing water, it occurred to me to place my band on the chain along with his. The rings naturally fell in together forming a smaller circle inside a larger circle. And all the sudden, it made sense to me. I slipped the necklace over my head, took my new double band ring I had been wearing on my right hand in the meanwhile, and placed it on my newly naked left ring finger. When I walked out of that restaurant I felt a little emptier. I felt a little lighter. I felt a little giddy. I was ready for something new.
By March of this year, I had moved that double band back to my right hand and was wearing a big chunky thing on the middle finger of my left hand. I even went back to New York to experience the city not immersed in memories but to help show them off, give vision to the words I'd been speaking. I even managed a picture, which says more than all these words put together can say.
Cause you see, a little over a week ago, I got a surprise parade just for me. An entire bagpipe band marched down my street. Two of the most amazing, heart-stealing, little girls held signs expressing love. My piper got on bended knee in my front yard and asked me to marry him.
And as Doug placed the one carat blue sapphire ring on my left ring finger... I replied with a resounding yes.
Tuesday, April 2, 2013
Fate Can Eat Me
Fate, you fickle bitch, you made me fearless when you took everything from me... but we're good now.
Sunday, February 24, 2013
Life Is but a Dream
"There's no drum roll or trumpet that goes off when you make the biggest decisions in your life. Sometimes you don't even know that you've made 'em."- "Beyonce: Life Is but a Dream"
Wednesday, December 5, 2012
Holidaze
My first holidays without Steve started a mere four months after he died. My generous friends and family showed up for me in the ways they could, but I spent Thanksgiving pushed beyond my limits and Christmas day alone. What I remember is blurry and full of darkness. Along the way I was made to feel a failure because I couldn't manage to help cook in
my own house and because I kept slipping off to do my crying in private.
I was called selfish for wanting to spend Christmas at our home. I was told "he's dead, he isn't coming back, get over it," a week before Christmas. I was chastised and scolded for upsetting family with what I thought would be a welcome written message from Steve. Though I tried to focus on the positive, I look back and wonder how I ever managed to make it through. No wonder the following three months were the worst of my grieving.
My second set of holidays started off promising enough. Maybe I had a little Post Traumatic Stress from the holidays before, cause though I was invited out for Thanksgiving, my panic attacks grew worse and more frequent over the three days I was away from home. Watching a young family starting out in life, full of hopes and dreams and possibilities was beautiful. As I stood on a staircase landing listening to their plans for the future, I suddenly realized that my family's hope and dreams weren't going to be realized. We got the time we were meant to have and it was over. At thirty-seven I was a bit old to start over entirely, no young children for me, my life is half over already. In that moment I realized there are opportunities lost to me that I will never regain.
Christmas was better. I spent it back in New York, where it all began. I spent a few days in the city and then Christmas with his cousin, who we had stayed with exactly ten years earlier. Ten years prior when Steve asked me to marry him. Steve was born and raised in New York so every street corner held memories. I visited some of our old haunts, his old neighborhood, places we wanted to go together but never got around to visiting. Beautiful memories. And they kept me warm on those blustery winter streets.
Christmas with Steve's family was bittersweet. I kept expecting him to pop from around a corner at any moment. I saw how much the children had grown since we had last seen them. Marveled at his cousin's new house in Steve's place. Saw his twinkling eyes in his family's faces, heard his laughter emanate from his family's mouths, watched his gestures from his family's hands. And though he was rarely mentioned, we all acknowledged his presence. I felt as though I was there in his place; to see, and hear, and support those he loved most. That was my gift to Steve, my gift to his family, my gift to myself.
This is my third set of holidays since Steve died. There are a whole new set of complications this year. This year I'm spending the holidays with my boyfriend and his children. Two beautiful young girls who keep me laughing, and guessing, and completely in the moment. A man who makes me happy, worries about stepping on memories of Steve, never allows me to cry alone, and puts the biggest smile on my face when he walks into the room.
I spent the night before Thanksgiving looking around my house, imagining what it would look like if Steve were alive. What it looked like in years past as we prepared to host another feast. I thought about the past two Thanksgivings since Steve died. I wondered how I managed to survive this long without him when I never believed I could make it a day. And I got the crying out of my system. I spent Thanksgiving day navigating new traditions, navigating youthful meltdowns and jubilations, navigating the complications and the joys of a new life.
This is my third holiday season without Steve. Each year it hurts. Each year it hurts differently. But each year it gets a little easier. This year, it's finally getting to be a life. My life. My life after Steve.
My second set of holidays started off promising enough. Maybe I had a little Post Traumatic Stress from the holidays before, cause though I was invited out for Thanksgiving, my panic attacks grew worse and more frequent over the three days I was away from home. Watching a young family starting out in life, full of hopes and dreams and possibilities was beautiful. As I stood on a staircase landing listening to their plans for the future, I suddenly realized that my family's hope and dreams weren't going to be realized. We got the time we were meant to have and it was over. At thirty-seven I was a bit old to start over entirely, no young children for me, my life is half over already. In that moment I realized there are opportunities lost to me that I will never regain.
Christmas was better. I spent it back in New York, where it all began. I spent a few days in the city and then Christmas with his cousin, who we had stayed with exactly ten years earlier. Ten years prior when Steve asked me to marry him. Steve was born and raised in New York so every street corner held memories. I visited some of our old haunts, his old neighborhood, places we wanted to go together but never got around to visiting. Beautiful memories. And they kept me warm on those blustery winter streets.
Christmas with Steve's family was bittersweet. I kept expecting him to pop from around a corner at any moment. I saw how much the children had grown since we had last seen them. Marveled at his cousin's new house in Steve's place. Saw his twinkling eyes in his family's faces, heard his laughter emanate from his family's mouths, watched his gestures from his family's hands. And though he was rarely mentioned, we all acknowledged his presence. I felt as though I was there in his place; to see, and hear, and support those he loved most. That was my gift to Steve, my gift to his family, my gift to myself.
This is my third set of holidays since Steve died. There are a whole new set of complications this year. This year I'm spending the holidays with my boyfriend and his children. Two beautiful young girls who keep me laughing, and guessing, and completely in the moment. A man who makes me happy, worries about stepping on memories of Steve, never allows me to cry alone, and puts the biggest smile on my face when he walks into the room.
I spent the night before Thanksgiving looking around my house, imagining what it would look like if Steve were alive. What it looked like in years past as we prepared to host another feast. I thought about the past two Thanksgivings since Steve died. I wondered how I managed to survive this long without him when I never believed I could make it a day. And I got the crying out of my system. I spent Thanksgiving day navigating new traditions, navigating youthful meltdowns and jubilations, navigating the complications and the joys of a new life.
This is my third holiday season without Steve. Each year it hurts. Each year it hurts differently. But each year it gets a little easier. This year, it's finally getting to be a life. My life. My life after Steve.
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Today's post is part of a monthly blog-hop (first Wednesday of each
month). It's a way to find other widow/er bloggers to read, interact
with, discuss, and follow. Feel free to leave comments, send e-mails,
share and interact. The following links are to other blogs participating
in this month's hop. Hope you find someone and something new that helps
you.
Wednesday, November 14, 2012
Tuesday, November 13, 2012
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