today's facebook posting ...

"The reality is that it is 2 yrs 3 mos ... I still have not opened all the condolence cards & letters as it hurts too much ... I still have clothes in the closet that I just hold & smell ... how does one mend a very broken heart? Thank goodness breathing is a reflex".

End of posting.

Listening to Steely Dan on Spotify. It's been a while. It still works upon me as a musical balsam.

So, yes, it is still very much about the grief. I gave up several dedicated years of anti-depressants & anti-anxiety meds just in time for the holidays. Timing sucked but all my reading has made the distinction between grief and depression very, very clear. Grief cannot be treated with anti-ds.

If that was the case, why put my body through all the additional stress of processing unnecessary drugs?

Accupuncture has been working very nicely for my migraines. They are now less the norm than they were, a predictable and unwanted, painful presence just the turn of my head away.

Jon has been working on accupuncture detox points as well. Perhaps they are helping. I certainly did not go into full blown withdrawals, which was anticipated. Far from it, much to my doctor's great surprise. I will give 50% credit to Jon's healing needles & 50% to the power of my will.

Or won't. As in "I won't have a problem", "I won't give in".

It is hard enough to experience the death of a loved one, a spouse, but painful issues like single parenthood, financial insecurity, isolation, all becomes dominant players in the grieving process.

I know they are with me ...

Something about Vic's passing has overly sensitized me to people's pain & suffering, particularly the illness of cancer & all that it entails ...

Reading that Joe Paterno's family were making a decision about his ventilator threw me into a mini breakdown. It reminded me so vividly that my last decision made on Vic's behalf was not to put him on a ventilator as I was advised that once on it, he would never come off.

So to have him hooked up to a breathing machine, to feed him through a tube in his stomach ... not an option he would have wanted anymore as the quality of his life would have been completely compromised & he would have been helpless & dependent, two things that were unacceptable.

I miss him ...

Moving out

For the best part of the past two years, I spent my home time in my room with ventures into the kitchen for sustenance & into the den to keep the bills paid.

Actually, that has since changed as I finally discovered online banking! Now the den really serves as the custodian of the family paper trail, the bane of my organizational existence.

When Vic died, I made a couple of very subtle changes to the bedroom, a place where so much time was spent during his illness ... the changes included emptying out his bedside table drawers, moving my "stuff" over to his drawers in the bathroom, strange things like that. I had given Shay & Angie a lot of his clothing immediately upon his death so I took over more closet space even though there remains a number of Vic's items that I cannot touch, move, look at still. I want them there, I just want them there.

My room has served as my womb room, the place I feel most connected, most protected, most safe, most detached from the world.

I have everything I personally need within a few feet of my bed, which serves as my hq. Comfortable beyond belief, totally inspired by the incredibly luxurious bedding in Miraval, my room is often referred to as my own hotel suite.

My room has nursed & nurtured all my emotions these past years have evoked. My billowy pillows are piled high, downy & soft. I have buried my face in them, the sheets over my head, more times that I care to admit, let alone share.

I have candles of all types everywhere, mainly inside an assortment of crystals, salt lights, etc. I have a lifetime of photos in multiple photo frames & I like to look at them.

Some people tell me I should not have them around. That's it is not good for me to keep looking at the past.

But I like it. It gives me great comfort. It reminds me of just how fleeting life is & how many wonderful moment we all shared.

Our living room is the central point of our house. A large, high ceiling, you walk through it to get to all rooms. It's a fabulous room, focal point being the fireplace that we all love.

But it is a room that I rarely frequent. It is the place where the Xbox was played, where football games and "Hillbilly Fishing" is watched. It is not a room that I use or have ever used, to be frank.

The only time I really come out of my room is to enjoy the fire but that was always quite short lived. For some reason, I always liked it most when everyone was sleeping & it was just me, the sound of the wood charring & the smell of oak burning.

Here it is winter again and the fire has been roaring away.

There have been small, almost imperceptible changes that have been insinuating themselves into my life.

One of them has been a very conscious effort on my part to spend more time in the living room, in the center of my home as opposed to sequestered in my "suite".

Those friends who come over all "get" why we always end up in my room. It has a really, really good, soothing vibe.

However, the seguaying into the living room is quite symbolic for me.

It represents a part of me that is getting ready to come back into the world ... it is a very slow process for me.

I have finally made the distinction between being depressed and the state of grief.

I am very jealous of those people for whom the grief process was a one, two, three event. I am more curious than envious about those people who became widowed who are right there, wham bam, back in the game.

I am questioning as to when I go from being "widowed" to being "single" ... being widowed still makes me feel connected to the relationship, as in we didn't want it to end. Being single seems overwhelming to me as I really never expected I would be that again. Even as we learned the true nature of Vic's illness ... death was not an option for him & we operated from that mind set ALL THE TIME.

I am thinking that the word "solo" does not present me with such angst, like I am "out there" ...

So there it is.

No rush. No pressure. No hurry.

And ...

Moving out of the bedroom into the living room.

Moving out of widowed into solo thinking.

From my heart to G-d's ears ...

Le roi est mort ...

Vive le roi. "Le roi" being the old.

"The (olde) year is dead. Long live the year".

I gave up on resolutions many lifetimes ago. They just set me up for failure as I simply put too ridiculously much on myself.

Now, decades later, I am happy to say that I have simply resolved to keep moving forward.

That's it. Just keep moving onwards.

The past couple of months, although at times
rocky, have all brought me to what I am perceiving as a new state. A new stage of my life.

One of my favorite Van Morrison songs ended with the haunting line, "the best is yet to come".

May it be so.

Standing in a store ...

while my dad was sitting on a bench outside, a song which I have heard so many times before began to play on the radio. Suddenly the lyrics just jumped out at me. Not a huge fan of Celine Dion but I swear, SWEAR, this was directed right to me.

I have been fumbling for the right words to describe the place Vic had in my life, what he meant to me, how I felt when I was with him ... our relationship had MORE than it's fair and unfair share of ups and downs. I am not waxing lyrical on a life of perfect bliss.

Not at all. There are not many people whose relationship went from the alpha to the omega of life ... million dollar lifestyle to crushing bankruptcy, repleven, repos, eviction, and the list keeps going.

However, through all of it, Vic did lift me up, he did give me hope (even through his illness) and he told me every single day that we were together that I was the highlight of his life ...

I am working so very hard to move on. I am not stuck in wishing him back - I am not that far gone. I just wish that I could be happy as he would have wished.

I was watching one of my/our favorite movies, "Something's gotta give.". Diane Keaton, mid-fifties, divorced ergo "single" and her sister makes the following remark:

"A man in his fifties who is (still) single, is called "elusive", "hard to get", a "catch". A single woman in the same demographic is about as fucked as it gets".

Oy vey.

Very encouraging!

Anyway, onward into 2012 I go, the past slipping gently into precious memories with a hope for the future.

"For all those times you stood by me
For all the truth that you made me see
For all the joy you brought to my life
For all the wrong that you made right
For every dream you made come true
For all the love I found in you
I'll be forever thankful baby
You're the one who held me up
And never let me fall
You're the one who saw me through, through it all

You were my strength when I was weak
You were my voice when I couldn't speak
You were my eyes when I couldn't see
You saw the best there was in me
Lifted me up when I couldn't reach
You gave me faith 'cause you believed
I'm everything I am
Because you loved me

You gave me wings and made me fly
You touched my hand I could touch the sky
I lost my faith, you gave it back to me
You said no star was out of reach
You stood by me and I stood tall
I had your love I had it all
I'm grateful for each day you gave me
Maybe I don't know that much
But I know this much is true
I was blessed because I was loved by you

You were my strength when I was weak
You were my voice when I couldn't speak
You were my eyes when I couldn't see
You saw the best there was in me
Lifted me up when I couldn't reach
You gave me faith 'cause you believed
I'm everything I am
Because you loved me

You were always there for me
The tender wind that carried me
The light in the dark shining your love into my life
You've been my inspiration
Through the lies you were the truth
My world is a better place because of you

You were my strength when I was weak
You were my voice when I couldn't speak
You were my eyes when I couldn't see
You saw the best there was in me
Lifted me up when I couldn't reach
You gave me faith 'cause you believed
I'm everything I am
Because you loved me

You were my strength when I was weak
You were my voice when I couldn't speak
You were my eyes when I couldn't see
You saw the best there was in me
Lifted me up when I couldn't reach
You gave me faith 'cause you believed
I'm everything I am
Because you loved me

I'm everything I am
Because you loved me."

On shopping & the real reason for the season ...

I'm done! Hooray!

This year, I made it easy.

"Tell me 3 (reasonable) things that you want. I will take it from there."

Whoop! Happy Chanukah, Merry Christmas, Happy Kwanza!!!"

This year, I finally learned. I shopped smarter. I let my fingers do the clicking. It was good. Now it's up to the assorted shipping companies to deliver ... holla!

Always at the back of my mind I remind myself that it is NOT about the presents, the knocking yourself out figuring out how to top last year's gifts, fighting the crowds, killing yourself.

To me, what this time of the years has a simple meaning ... it's about family, a time of gratitude, a time to reach out to others less fortunate.

Kaelin has a part time job as a hostess at a nice, beachside restaurant steak house. She came home the other day, sad. The pecking order of payment is such that the busboys get paid last. Apparently, one of them is very young with a 3 year old son. Times being tough, he told Kaelin how he was so low on money that he might not be able to get his son a gift, let alone gifts.

Kaelin was deeply saddened by this. She could not stand the idea of the little boy waking up to an empty holiday. How can you teach someone to have empathy? Kaelin feels pain for suffering in the world. She wants to make it better.

She wants the child to be happy. She wants the child to have a present to unwrap. She wants to make a difference.

Nothing anyone can give me is more meaningful than to have a child who cares from the bottom of her heart and feels deeply.

Kaelin is a beautiful, deep, old, old soul who has a mission on life ...

I will remember this as the year that Kaelin "got" it!

Now, THAT is a beautiful gift.

On partying the season away ...

Oh boy. How do you turn a homebody into a party animal? Ok, forget the animal bit. How do you turn a homebody into a party person?

It is very hard to change but I am trying.

Not working too well. I much prefer the company of a few friends. More intimate. Not comfortable in the crowd of many. Particularly strangers.

I went out for dinner with some friends last night. Nice, cozy, easy.

Then I went onto the annual open house of a very dear friend of mine. I adore her - a soul sister from many lifetimes. She is such an amazing human being, so talented, so generous, so compassionate. I love her & really wanted to make the effort to show up.

I went. Lots of peeps, the house was overflowing with representation of all ages. The house was magnificent. Glorious. Linda has such an incredible sense of style. The garden was all illuminated, totally magnificent. Totally rivaled our local botanical gardens on Christmas display.

I really wanted to "belong" and luckily I saw a couple of my close friends.

For a few minutes, I felt safe, ok. They had to leave and there I was. Alone. Alone in the crowd.

Couples everywhere. Holding hands. Laughing. Hugging. Kissing.

I miss Vic so much. Who holds my hand? Who hugs me? Who kisses me?

It's two years and somehow, it is not getting easier.

I never, ever expected that Vic's passing would push me deep, deep underground.

I am still there, surfacing every so often but the world looks very formidable from my vantage view ...

Still giving it a good shot, even if I did slip away from Linda & Ron's fest quietly into the dark night ...

On people past ...

It's that time of the year again. Time to open up the bureau that belonged to my grandfather & grandmother. Time to get out my aging address books. Time to find the aging annual holiday card lists.

Time to write the holiday cards.

Little did I know as I opened up at "A", the first name dropped off the list.

My grandmother, Cecilia "Mimi" Abraham.

Gone.

That was the beginning.

Through "B", onto "C" - all the way through.

What a harsh realization it was. In some cases, both the husband & wife were gone.

I could not cross through the names. That seemed too harsh. I just left them all there, a timeline for the last 30 years of my life. People who live on in memories.

I shared this with a friend of mine. She said she did not cross out the names. Instead, she would simply write in the date they passed.

Maybe next year ...