It Doesn't Get Easier

So, now it has been eight weeks since I said the first goodbye to v.  It doesn't get easier.  We've gone through clothing, tools, and all the odds and ends that are left behind.  It doesn't get any easier.  There are crystal clear days with hardly a tear and there are moments when I can't gasp out a word.  Every week feels like a month, a year, a brief moment.  That soul filling presence just isn't there, no hands to hold, no rustle of the morning paper, no words of advice if something isn't right, no shared surprises.  The leaves are opening on the trees in the garden and not one ever met his eyes. How can that be?  It doesn't get easier.

In bocca al lupo.  m (no v)

Forward?

At least the leaves emerge.

In bocca al lupo.  m (no v)

Safe Harbor

A good place, right now, is v's shop/studio which I'm arranging for my own use.  Our carpenter friend, Hans, will be here next week to help me inventory all of v's tools.  I will then decide what to do with so many of them.  The tools he felt were most precious will be cleaned, oiled, and stored in the loft.  Right now I find it comforting to sit with my coffee and watch out the window as the birds come to feed.  On a chilly morning I can light a fire in the wood stove, as I did this morning.

The space is a safe harbor and a good place to work.  It is so well lit I can come out in the middle of the night to work if I wished.  Or, like this morning, I can sit comfortably in the old rocker and listen to music or an audiobook.

I can make plans for the garden while I watch the birds, sip my coffee, stoke the fire, listen to a story being read to me, and miss v with all of my heart.

















In bocca al lupo.  m (no v)

It's the First Day of Spring

Last fall v took several packs of Bachelors' Buttons seeds, mixed them in sand and spread them over the surface of one of our garden boxes.  The boxes are generally reserved for vegetables, but he wanted more flowers this year.

For years v had nurtured this apricot seedling, an offspring from our ancient apricot tree which lost a branch full of ripe apricots one summer afternoon.  Many little seedlings emerged the following year and he collected a couple to raise as replacements. This one has been a success with its first blossoms having just faded. My friend, who's eyesight is better than mine, has spied a few tiny fruits beginning. The parent tree is already full of pistachio sized apricot babies.

This is my grief journal now. 

I am on a precipice and sorrow and despair spread out before me like a bottomless sea.  I can't escape into sleep, I am sleepless...well, nearly.  I have so many good and supportive friends surrounding me. But I am lost, I am confused, I forget.  I have no compass, I have no air...

In bocca al lupo.  m (no v)

Sunshine and Shadow

Some days I am completely swallowed by grief and other days the sun comes shining on through.

In bocca al lupo.  m (no v)

A Short Shared Adventure

A year ago, a short, shared adventure...it was all a short shared adventure. And so bright.

In bocca al lupo.  m (no v)

Why I love Possums

For years v and I discussed getting a few chickens for our backyard garden.  They'd eat the snails, and v loved eggs, scrambled, boiled, poached, coddled, baked, fried...he loved eggs.  Not I, I'm afraid. Anyway, back to those discussions over breakfast, or dinner.  Chickens would take care of our snail problem.  What held us up was the chicken coop.  v was an exemplary woodworker. The workshop I've featured from time to time was built by him, alone.  But, where to put a coop?  The workshop took up a lot of space already.  So, for years we just talked about it.  Then, a few years ago, we realized that we no longer found any snails in our garden.  Earwigs had become scarce to non-existent as well.  This was a mystery.  Was it climate change?  Had someone spread copious amounts of snail bait in the neighborhood? Were snails endangered?

The answer came during a completely non-garden, non-snail conversation with one of our shift mates at the aquarium.  The fact that we had possums who visited of an evening came up and the first responding comment was "then you don't have snails".  I thought the woman was clairvoyant! Possums, as it turns out, eat snails like they were candy!  I have since encouraged those sweet marsupials.  They are omnivores and are welcome to any leftovers I may have.  I have had slug, snail, and earwig free lettuce, spinach, and chard ever since possums began to hang out on the back deck with our cats.  It's a peaceable kingdom...and slime free.

Oscar

In bocca al lupo.  m (no v)

Down. By the Seashore

Just sifting sand...

In bocca al lupo.  m (no v)

Movement

A long walk and working in the garden helped.  Then the tiniest shift of sunlight caused cracks in the façade.  You shared my memories, you supported my dreams, and we faced all the terrors together...now what?

In bocca al lupo.  m (no v)

Long Tall Shadows

I miss casting two shadows. When we were tall!

In bocca al lupo.  m (no v)

m (no v)

I worried so much over how I would handle the beginning of the shift that the end caught me by surprise.  And there were the white lilacs blooming to welcome me home and making me sadder still.  All this beauty but only when it's shared.  It's kind of like that tree falling in the forest...

In bocca al lupo.  m (no v)

3-3-14

The future, the present, the now...it all feels like an unscalable wall. Moving forward? Forward? I'm tethered to such a weight of grief.  Sometimes each step is pulled from the sucking quicksand that is reality.

In bocca al lupo. m (no v)

Forget-Me-Not

One month of sorrows and Forget-me-nots are growing within v's nasturtiums. Although I had planted them over a dozen years ago, they hadn't made an appearance for several years, until now. Do tears bring them back?
(I like to think you're speaking to me through the flowers)

In bocca al lupo.  m (no v)

No Words

In bocca al lupo.  m