IS IT A MEMORY? WAS IT A DREAM?

 

When I think about my husband, who died last year, I sometimes wonder, did I dream our life together? And so, I have been pondering this:  Is there a difference between the memory of someone who has died and a dream?  

Well, yes, there is an obvious difference.  I have proof of the life that Bill and I shared – there are photos and objects and words he wrote to me. I also remain connected to his family; I trust they would vouch for our life together.  There is, by contrast, no proof of a dream once we have dreamed it.

Still, physical proof notwithstanding, my life with Bill has no more substance than a dream now that he is gone.   

I suppose this is true of any memory of past events.  They may live on in our hearts and minds, but we can’t step back into them, can’t touch them. 

And there’s this.  We know memories to be unreliable. Apparently, each time we revisit a memory, it changes as we recontruct and reassemble it.

 

Yet, imperfect as our memories may be, they ground us and give our lives substance and meaning. I treasure memories of Bll, of my daughters as young children, of adventures and events in the past.

 

We are encouraged to live in the present moment, and some of us strive, with more or less success, to do so, but without our memories, we would be quite adrift, floating in an endless present, untethered to past events or future plans.

 

Of course, very young children live in an endless present, but this only works for them because they have caretakers to handle the details. We adults, by contrast, would live in a state of constant bafflement were we not grounded in time (as demonstrated by persons with dementia).

 

I do step out of time occasionally – often while writing; sometimes while playing with grandchildren. Anyone totally focused on an activity recognizes this state.  It is sometimes called flow.

 

 But the world we live in requires us to step back into time in order to  think about what we’re going to have for dinner and remember what’s in the refrigerator.  If we step out of time entirely, we step out of life --at least as long as we are on this plane.

I like to think that after we die, there is no time, not because everything has ended, but because we have left the dimension where time has meaning.  And I like to think I will meet Bill in the great mystery, where we will dwell in the light and love of the eternal present. 

For now, I will keep moving forward, curious to learn what time has in store for me, and preserving Bill's memory--along with memories of others who have been important to me, as well as I can.  

               Photo by Илья Мельниченко on Unsplash

 

 

ALL YOU NEED IS LOVE

You shall love your neighbor as yourself.

 

                                                Matthew 22:39

 

And now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love.

                                                I Corinthians, 13

 

 

I think this is the first time I have quoted from the New Testament in my blog. These words, learned decades ago, came to me as I was thinking about love - not romantic love, but another broader, unsentimental kind of love. The above-quoted words had meaning for me when I was a child, and they continue to challenge me today.  (While I have issues with institutional Christianity, the words of Jesus still resonate.) 

 

I have been thinking about love a lot lately. Perhaps, in part, because I recently participated in a book study group, where we read Love Is the Way by Bishop Michael Curry.  Bishop Curry writes of a love that can bind a community, a radical love that might bring about social justice. I believe this is the same love Martin Luther King, Jr. was referencing when he said. “Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that." It is, I think, the love the Beatles were singing about in the song from which I took the title of this post.   

 

Of course, it is all well and good to set forth quotes about this kind of radical love, but how, I find myself asking, are we to cultivate and embody such love in a world so filled with hate and violence? I don’t know about you, but I am not making a lot of progress in loving certain of my neighbors.  And I am not referring here to the people in my immediate neighborhood, but to some of the people I see and hear in the news. People who spew hate. People lacking in compassion.

 

You get the idea.

 

One way I try to cultivate love, with varying degrees of success, is through the Buddhist loving kindness meditation.  Some of you are, no doubt, familiar with this meditation.  It is quite simple, although there are multiple versions.  Here is the one I like:

 

May I have an open heart.

May I be free from suffering.

May I be happy.

May I be at peace. 

 

After reciting these lines, the next step is to substitute someone you love, as in “May (name your loved one) have an open heart, etc.” After reciting the lines for as many loved ones as you like, the lines are recited for a person or persons about whom you feel neutral – e.g., the person who checks out your groceries.  

 

And then comes the hard part – reciting the lines for a person or persons about whom you have negative feelings.  I struggle with this.  Can I do this for those I believe are destroying the institutions in our country or preying on fellow citizens or starting an unnecessary war?  

 

When I try the meditation with these people in mind, I find myself reciting the words through gritted teeth.  And so, I often change the words to something like this:

 

May (the person I struggle to like, let alone love) have an open heart.

May they find compassion.

May they find empathy.

May they find humility.

 

Not perfect love, but the best I can do at the moment.

 

And what actions can we take to drive out hate with love? Perhaps we can take baby steps. In the words of the Dalai Lama, "Not all of us can do great things. But we can do small things with great love.”  Maybe this would look like supporting our local food bank, protesting cruelty and injustice, smiling at strangers, picking up litter, helping a friend.

 

And what of faith and hope?

 

I have faith, against all evidence to the contrary, that our lives are undergirded by love.  I do not know where this faith comes from.  Maybe from my childhood religion.  Maybe from reading about near-death experiences. Persons having had such experiences routinely report experiencing, and being surrounded by, an indescribable love, a love beside which any love experienced during our lifetimes pales to a mere shadow of that encountered during the NDE.

 

As for hope, I have hope that people of good will, working together can bring about a kinder, gentler world.  Without this hope (which I sometimes struggle to hold onto), despair will surely drown out both faith and love. 

 

I will leave you with this thought:

 

“Even practicing loving-kindness for the time it takes to snap the fingers is beneficial. Each drop of practice is significant and, as the Buddha said,‘with dripping drops of water, the water jug is filled.’”

-       from insightmeditationcenter.org

May we each, in our own way, contribute to filling the jug. 

 

              Photo by Jon Tyson on Unsplash

 

 

 

OF LOVE, LONELINESS, AND AN ANNIVERSARY

I have been thinking about the varieties of loneliness I have experienced in my life.  I was lonely as a child.  I had playmates, but my main companions were books.  As a teenager, I had friends, but longed for a boyfriend.  (I was a late bloomer - no boyfriend until I was 18).  As the years went by, I found that I did not know how to be alone, and that I was lonely whenever I was not in love.  This made for some dark days.  Happily, as I wrote about in an old post, I eventually learned to enjoy my own company, and to treasure time alone.  

I rarely knew loneliness in midlife.  This was not just because I had a partner.  I remember years ago reading a quote from the actress Jessica Lange to the effect that she had never felt lonely since having children.  I did not understand.  I, who was both partnerless and childless at the time, could not fathom a life without loneliness.  

 

But Jessica was right.  I have never felt lonely since having children, even after my daughters were fully grown and launched. I do not look to them to fill my days--although their children, my grandchildren, do plenty of that, but there is something about having this net of family that has kept loneliness at bay.

 

At least, that was the case until six months ago when my husband died. I am now experiencing a new kind of lonely.  I do not want for people with whom to spend time. My life is filled to the brim with beloved family and friends.  I do not wish for another life partner. The loneliness I am feeling now is the loneliness that comes of missing a particular person. 

 

I am delighted to spend time with my friends and family. There is, however, a Bill-sized hole in my heart that no one else can fill. Evenings are the most challenging time, especially the long, dark evenings at this time of year. Evenings, I look for him in the funky old chair where he always sat.  Evenings, I am sad.

Today Bill and I would have celebrated 21 years of marriage, and although I had the joy of spending most of the day with precious granddaughters, there is a loneliness that comes of not being able to share the day with him.  

 

In the mid-century novel Love Story, a character famously says, "Love means never having to say you're sorry."  That's a crock.  I wish I could tell Bill I am sorry for the times I was impatient or an otherwise less-than-ideal wife.  I do tell him these things.  I believe he knew and knows how much I love him.  Love means many things, including the possibility of loss and grief.  If not for the love that Bill and I shared, I would not be feeling the loneliness of missing him. 

 

I am grateful for that love.  It was worth the loss and loneliness. And in honor of that love, I will treasure my memories and seek to make the most of the years that are left to me.  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

THE BED'S TOO BIG/THE FRYING PAN'S TOO WIDE

But when he’s gone

Me and them lonesome blues collide

The bed’s too big

The frying pan’s too wide.

           

              -   Joni Mitchell

  

In the post I wrote a week after my husband's passing, I confessed that I wasn’t ready to say much about being a widow.  It still feels raw and new, but now that a month has passed, I feel ready to share a bit about my experience of widowhood so far.  Once again, I write to sort and process my thoughts. I appreciate your patience with my ramblings – I intend to turn to other subjects soon.

Often, when I awake, I step outside, where I spend some time in the peace of my garden.  One morning, after I had done some watering and weeding, I looked down at my grubby clothes and thought, These are my morning clothes. I quickly noted the pun.  They were, in fact, my mourning clothes.

I continue to suffer from “widow’s brain.”  One day, I stood staring into a cupboard for a long time, before pulling out a mug and making myself a cup of tea.  After carrying it to kitchen table, I discovered the cup that I had already made.  Another day, I broke a glass while putting it in the dishwasher, a simple task that had never confounded me before.  A few days ago, I bought a bag of cat food and left it in the cart when I loaded my other groceries into the car. And then there was the day when I found myself stymied by the thought of preparing food for myself.  I had to call a couple of friends to ask what I should keep on hand in order to make simple meals.

I am having dreams about getting lost on complex staircases or losing my way in the city – my psyche must be attempting to figure out the path ahead.

I am discovering that grief is physical. The night after Bill died, I slept like a rock and woke up exhausted and feeling as if I had been beaten about the head and neck with a two-by-four. Of course, there was exhaustion after the intensity and physical and emotional toll of his final few weeks, but the fatigue has lingered. The nights of good sleep ended after about a week, and now I sleep poorly more-often-than-not. It doesn’t matter how I sleep, though.  Even after a good night, I wake up tired. 

There was relief at first.  Relief that he had left his weary body behind.  Relief that his sons and I would no longer be getting up in the night to administer medications.  Relief that the limbo of the dying process was over. In truth, the life I had been living with Bill had become more memory than reality over the months before his death, as he slept more and more hours each day and had less and less energy for interaction.

So, for a while, I thought I was doing pretty well.  I had some crying jags, but not too many. I started in on the mounds of paperwork attendant to a death.  I spent time with friends and family. I told myself I was OK.

And then, maybe three weeks in, my days became a lot more challenging. Here’s the thing -- I like spending time alone. When Bill would occasionally go away for a few days, I would relish having the house to myself.  But, after two or three days, I would be ready for him to come home.  Now, as time passes, it is becoming more and more real to me that he will not be coming home.  He hasn’t gone to the store.  He hasn’t taken a short trip.  I am repeatedly startled to realize that this is my life now, that I will be moving forward without him. Again, it's not that I mind being alone; it’s that I miss him in all of his particularity. I miss the man he was and the life we shared before his illness took over. 

My tears are flowing more freely now, as I look around and find:

He’s not here to hold me.

He's not here to talk with me.

He's not here to comfort me when I'm upset.

He’s not here to read my writing drafts. (I very nearly got up from my desk to ask him to read over his obituary.)

He’s not here to tell me I am pretty, that I look nice.  (Yes, after twenty years of marriage, he said such things to me almost daily.)

He’s not here to read to the grandkids.

He’s not here to work in the garden with me. 

He’s not here to eat dinner with me. 

He’s not here to hold my hand while we watch TV.

He’s not here to take out the garbage.

He’s not here to answer my phone calls and texts when I’m out.  

He’s not here to drive me crazy.  

Are you surprised by that last one?  Look, he was a gentle, steady, generous guy, but just because he has died, doesn’t mean I have to pretend he was perfect.  He was not.  And neither am I.  So, like most marriages, ours wasn’t perfect.  My speedy Jersey ways would bump up against his midwestern deliberation. I am impatient.  (He was patient with my impatience, bless him.) He was a pack rat. Getting rid of things makes me feel lighter; it made him feel anxious. Still, through it all, whatever our challenges, we loved each other deeply and shared a long-lasting attraction, as well as values and an ever-widening family. We chose each other and were never tempted to quit one other.  

Last Christmas, instead of exchanging gifts, we each wrote a letter to the other.  I keep re-reading his.  He closed it with these words:  “You are the pole against which I lean and I love you dearly.”  And, of course, he was the pole against which I leaned. To mix metaphors a bit, I feel untethered, like I might just float away.  Or to employ yet another metaphor, I have lost my tap root.  Of course, I am fortunate that I have family and friends to tether and root me, to keep me from floating away.  Still, I miss my main tether, my tap root, and expect I always will.

                                    Photo by Allison Saeng for Unsplash

(I cannot close this post without expressing my gratitude for the kindness I have experienced. The friends who have spent time with me.  The friends and family who have called and sent notes and cards.  The friend who helped me to clear out an entire room. The one who carted off medical supplies when I could not think through where to donate them and the one who took away a pile of rags that I didn't want to toss in the garbage -- she even found somewhere to donate those. My daughters and a son-in-law, who moved furniture for me.  Bill's sons and a son-in-law who have kept the lawn mowed. The dear fellow whom I occasionally hire to help with the garden, who refused to let me pay him for the work he did soon after Bill died. The manager of Bill's dentist's office, who, when I called to report Bill's death, told me she had seen his obituary and had written off the balance on his account.  I am sure there is more that I am forgetting.  Recounting all of this moves me to tears.)

 

 

 

 

 

 

  

  

WIDOW FOR A WEEK

It is one week since my husband of twenty years died.  I am not in my right mind.  When I stumbled into the funeral place a few days ago to finalize the paperwork for his cremation, I kept making mistakes. The woman who was was helping me called it “widow’s brain.”

 

I looked at her blankly.  Am I really a widow?  

 

I suppose I am. But I’m not ready to claim the appellation. Bill's passing doesn’t feel real. I keep expecting to see him reading in his chair.  He was always reading.  Besides, I picture a widow as an old lady, wearing a black veil. Sure, maybe the first part of that description fits, but I am not wearing a veil, either real or figurative. 

 

In truth, I don’t know much about being a widow yet, so other than reporting that I am exhausted and heartbroken, I am not ready to write about it. If widowhood were a garment, it would be lying lightly across my back; I am hesitating to pull it over my shoulders.  

 

I will, therefore, save the discussion of widowhood for a future post, and will today report on the experience of accompanying Bill during his final weeks and days.** This will not be eloquent, because, you know, widow’s brain.

 

The back story: 

 

Bill was diagnosed with stage IV lung cancer in October of 2022.  We were told there was no cure, but treatment could buy him time.  He tolerated chemo pretty well, apart from fatigue, and eventually enjoyed a few months of remission, during which chemo was paused, and we enjoyed relative normalcy. Last November, a scan showed that the cancer was active again. Two different kinds of chemo were unsuccessful, and maybe four months ago, his fatigue and weakness began to increase dramatically, and a month ago, he took an even more rapid downturn.  

 

He started home hospice on May 17, and his sons and my daughters rallied around us.  The girls came over to support me whenever they were able leave their very young children. They brought food and called me every day.  

 

Those who followed Bill’s Caring Bridge site know that his out-of-state son, Andrew, flew in with his son, Joe, just days before Joe’s wedding. They brought love and attention and memories while Bill was still able to sit up and interact with them.  He was surprised and delighted by their visit.

 

Bill’s local sons, Doug and Marty, saw us through. They took turns spending the night with us, until the final few days, when they both stayed with us. They were kindness and patience itself with their father, and they kept me afloat until Bill’s passing on June 5.  

 

Some random observations: 

Bill’s final days were peaceful.  He faced his death with grace and acceptance.  He expressed gratitude for family and friends and the extra time his treatment brought him.  

 

I was warned by people in my caregiver support group that some friends and family members might disappear, unable to tolerate closeness to illness and death.  No one abandoned us.  Friends called and came by, brought us food, sat with me, walked with me.  One friend even cancelled a kayaking trip in order to be near at hand. Bill’s two brothers flew in from Indiana a week before he passed. His two sisters sent him lovely voice messages. So many people surrounded us with love. (After Bill died, Doug told me that Bill, while still alert, had given him the phone numbers of my closest friends, and asked him to make sure that they would surround me with love. I was sure my friends wouldn’t need any prompting, and I was right. Still, I was deeply touched by Bill’s concern for my well-being, even as he was leaving this life.)

 

Bill’s closing days were marked by both tears and laughter.  The sadness needs no explanation, but I didn’t expect the laughter.  Here are some examples:

 

Soon after Bill went on hospice, my daughter Mara asked him what – if he were able to come back to comfort us – he would appear as. I imagined she thought he might say a bird.  Instead, my Indianapolis-500-loving husband thought for a minute and said,  “A race car.”  

 

One day, while I was upstairs with Bill, a neighbor came over with her six-year-old daughter to bring us some flowers.  Bill’s son Marty answered the door, and the child looked at him, then asked her mother, “Is that her new husband?”

 

Two days before he died, when Bill was no longer speaking and not reacting to touch, my daughter Anne stood crying at his bedside, saying her farewells.  Tears were interrupted by laughter when she told Bill that Mara wanted to apologize to him for being a shithead teenager when he and I were first married. We laughed and Bill smiled.  I think that was his last obvious reaction to any words.

 

Being with Bill during his final days, I experienced both the sacred and the mundane.  I sat with him.  I lay in the hospital bed with him and whispered in his ear.  I played music for him.  His sons also talked to him and played music for him.  We tended to him. We accompanied him as far as we could.

 

There was sadness and overwhelm and punchiness from sleep deprivation.  And there was this:  Laundry had to be done.  Bills still had to be paid. The cat box wasn’t going to clean itself.  The garden had to be watered.  

Some things that happened while Bill was on hospice:  Our 2014 Prius refused to start.  A spider bit me, causing my ankle to swell up like a balloon. One of our cats puked. Twice.  And although my ankle hurt and $4500 for the car repair was momentarily startling, I had more pressing things worry about. I think it's called perspective.

 

The world does not stop for illness or hospice or death. I suppose it will ever be so. 

 

I am sad and I am grateful.  I am grateful for Bill. I am grateful that he chose me to make a life with. I am grateful that he didn’t suffer.  I am grateful for those who surrounded us, and are surrounding me, with love. 

Finally, words of wisdom from my 3-year-old granddaughter Frankie.  When her mother, my Anne, explained to Frankie and her sister that Bill was dying and would not be coming back, Frankie announced, "I'm going to be really sad and I'm going to be really mad."

And that sums up my feelings exactly.

Flowers by Frankie

** If you are wondering at my sitting down to write so soon, writing is how I process my experiences and emotions.  It is solace and catharsis. I can write and cry at the same time.

 

 

 

 

BREATHE IN; BREATHE OUT

We breathe.  In and out.  Most of the time we do this unconsciously.  I, for one, don't often stop to think about what a miracle this is -- what a marvel of design or invention or accident.   

 

But today I have been thinking about this and the other miracles that keep us alive. Blood circulates through no effort on our part.  Our nervous systems pass messages throughout our bodies.  Again, no volition is involved.

 

We stand up and ambulate.  We open our eyes and see.  We hear.  We taste. We smell.  Most of us take these wonders for granted--at least, that is, until one of these systems goes awry. What if we were to appreciate these miracles before they fail us?

 

What else do we take for granted much of the time?  How about:

 

Water--most especially hot, running water

Shelter

Grocery stores with food on the shelves.  

Love, all kinds of love. 

 

Gentle readers, if our bodies are working, if we have water and shelter and food and people who love us, we are so very fortunate.  Can we spend some time appreciating this?  

 

I have been living with a lot of fear and anxiety about current events.  I think I need to stop for a moment and breathe.  

 

Can we all stop and breathe.  In and out. 

Let's.

And then let's do whatever we can to repair this broken world. 

 

 

                                    Photo by Saad Chaudhry on Unsplash