Shepherd me, please!

I wake this morning with the 23^rd Psalm on my mind as I awake feeling nauseous and sick of thinking about my house. I am feeling trapped and I could literally throw up my house issues of moving furniture, packing boxes, selling the house, moving away, whenever that may be. I need to visit home for a couple of weeks to just get away from here for a minute. The Lord is removing me from the bush I have found myself wrapped in and is insisting I rest my soul and wants me to lie down in some green pastures. He really is leading me through this shadow of my life and caring for me as only a shepherd/daddy can. I know he is leading me despite my own desperate attempts to bolt and control my life, and has gently brought me back to center and clear thinking several times. I am wounded and it is in my best interest to allow the expert to lead me.

Panic wells up in me as I think of my need to sell my house quickly so I can start to save money and not deplete what little funds I have.  At first I wanted to stay here so I don’t have to ruin my credit by leaving my house, giving me some breathing room. I was so excited about the restructuring of my loan for all of this and I sign papers soon on that, but suddenly I just got the urge to run. What is wrong with me? I trust God to sell my house in his time, he has worked out the details, so why do I now want things on my time again? Fear has entered and is trying to take hold of me and its shadow is casting darkness over me. As I write and realize this I see the Lord walking beside me covering me with his cloak, hiding me from the tall shadows of fear and panic.  Soothing me with whispers and the same loving words I spoke to my children in the night time when they woke from a horrible nightmare. It is only a dream and it can’t hurt you, I am here to protect you. I will not let anything harm you. Rest, go back to sleep and rest my darling, I will sit with you.

Yes I will go home, rest for a bit and start fresh in the New Year after the long night of 2010 passes and my daddy sits with me through it. I look forward to the attempt of not thinking even though I will be thinking, but I won’t be moving boxes or anything around. I am in the phase of house buying where you have found your perfect new house, but have to sell the old one first. Not that I have a new house to move into I will be with my parents for a time, but I will have a new life with new surroundings. Actually it will be a new house since Katrina took my childhood home and my parents are relocated to another one in another part of town. So yes, things will be new and different, if I can only sell this house. There I go putting I in there, Lord until you sell this house, I will live here. I admit, I am impatient and want to move forward quicker than you would have me to move. You are my shepherd and are leading me on the straight paths, to greener pastures.

I hear sheep are dumb creatures, duh, can I relate. I am not really dumb, just inexperienced and naïve. I need someone to guide me along and my spiritual head of my house has been taken. So Lord, lead on, I am not dumb, just a trusting sheep who really needs to be told right now when to eat, when to lie down and where to do all of these things. This grass I have forced myself to eat is awful, I want to throw up, I will allow you to make me sit in a holding pen, until this night is over and I feel better. I surrender the ropes again to you.

I think I am getting anxious to move back to my old home town. I have been away a long time and look forward to living near my siblings and mom and dad again. I never got to see them enough living away all these year so it should be a loving place to get my legs under me again. It is hard to believe I left so many years ago, wanting to leave and see the world. The world is a big place and I never saw as much as I wanted to, but I saw what I needed to. I started dating Steve in Guam and if I hadn't left my home town, I may not have the five wonderful kids I have. I was so blessed in all those years away, I truly left father and mother, and cleaved to my husband and had a wonderful life despite my homesickness for more interaction with my extended family back home.

My urge to leave was strong and necessary to my growth, just like the urge to go back is.I am just another prodical daughter going home. I hope I am wiser, I am stronger and have a smidge more understanding but I feel like I have an odor right now from my wounds. They are still tender and I hope not to offend anyone over the holidays by any melancholy. Holidays are holy days, sacred times to spend with loved ones, celebrating family, love and life. I do celebrate Steve's new life and his celebration in Heaven, but I feel left out and it really is hard to get happy about missing someone. I don't want to be the one to ruin it by the odor of grief on me. Lord do you have one of those pine tree car deodorizers to hang around my neck so I can blend in? I may need a box of them along with some tissues. How bout some pine scented tissues? Just kidding of course. I just remembered the sweet odor of you about my shoulders will be enough to mask any odor I may have. Baaa, baaa lead on Shepherd, I smell a banquet.

In Recovery

Ok I can’t be a gloomy Gus forever, I have to get on with it. I really am not so gloomy although the last few blogs may have appeared that way. I am just figuring stuff out, working it out on paper much like some pastor’s do from the pulpit. I am in no way a pastor though, but a person, in a bind, depending on God to pull me out and along. I have too many blessings to really be down, but sometimes you just gotta ride those waves, it is healing right? Pain is part of healing just ask a surgeon. He has to cut into you to remove the part that is broken. It doesn’t feel too good to be cut, but fortunately there is anesthetic for that. But in recovery, there is pain. Medicine will lessen it but never remove it, only time does that. That will be my new term for grief, I am in recovery.

It is 8 weeks since my Steve has died and I am still marking time in weeks.  I should say it has been 2 months, but 8 weeks seems to make it seem like it was a shorter time for me and it is much more precise I think. I will say the pain is less because it is not constant anymore, but it is sporadic and right under the surface. If I move a certain way, or allow my mind to dwell on memories of the past, or what could have been our future, there is pain. I am tearing up, then swallowing it back and pushing through. I have a friend who is adamant about me reading 3 grief books which helped him. I don’t want to read anything right now, maybe something that will cause me more pain, but I may humor him nonetheless. I actually can’t find the time to sit and read, well I could but I would much rather chase my tail, it keeps me reeling. How about that for honesty? I would rather be running from it.

The more I think about it the more it makes sense this new term recovery. After the procedure people are all your room visiting, uncomfortably lingering and feeling helpless. You are on the bed, the center of attention and you hardly remember who was there but you remember there was lots of noise. You receive flowers and cards and lots of love and medicine.  After a few days, the visiting slows up and you are alright with it because now you can get some rest and you don’t feel like you have to entertain and swallow back the pain. The quiet soothes you but then it gets too loud sometimes and you want the distraction of company again. The difficult process of rehabilitating your body begins. In my case it is my mind getting restored and perhaps my heart too. Recovery is always different for every patient. I am recovering at the pace my body allows according to the trauma I received.  I want to believe I was in good health before the procedure so I should recover nicely and rebound quicker. Everyone worries about me not following the doctor orders but I do. No one sees me during my alone time doing my crying exercises at great pain to my body. Trust me, I live with my doctor and he is on call 24/7.

Some days I want to say make me a bird Lord so I can fly far, far away. Didn’t Jesus say take this cup from me? Well I guess if that couldn’t happen for him, it definitely won’t happen for me. Who am I to think I am better than the most innocent? Some of my pain is self inflicted, I will embrace it and own up to it, some of it is just life and living on earth, I can embrace that too, but I know I can’t carry it all. I have to unload on someone, or something so I blog and I pray, then it gets released. Is this healing? It is for me, I am not crumpled up in a corner crying all day. People are worried I am not dealing with my grief correctly; may I ask what is correct. If we are all unique individuals, I am quite sure we don’t all have the exact same coping measures either. Trust me when I say I think I am doing okay.  I am supposed to have bad days, heck I had bad days when Steve was here. We all have days like that.  Please don’t wish bad days on me by thinking I am showing too good a face right now and expecting me to crack at any moment.

I am not all that fragile or dainty. I am a woman with five children. I have seen adversity, I have been through different kinds of pain, but pain is still spelled the same way and hurts no matter what. I come to this battle prepared and well seasoned. I loved Ma Ingalls on Little House on the Prairie. I read all those books and I loved her unbreakable spirit. She didn’t have grief books to get her through the hard times, she had what I have, God. He is the best counselor I know and he wrote the best book on grief and healing too. I am leaning on Him and depending on him to get me through all of this. He will pull through for me but I am an impatient child and want it all done now. I don’t want pain. I don’t want to do the hard work, I want to be at the end looking back but I have to go through because I am not a bird and I can’t fly far, far away. I am human and I walk and I trip and I fall. I am in recovery and I can’t run yet. It is frustrating, but it is a fact of my life. I know I will run again and that keeps me healing and doing what I need to do to get there. I could lie down and give up, but who would chase after my beautiful grandkids and tickle them silly.

I recognize some people may need grief books go for it. I am sure they are wonderful and very helpful please don’t think I am discounting their contributions to the healing process. Maybe I will be one of those people to write a book someday you never know, but I feel healthier screaming it out on paper, to my friends, or through the night, alone. It is not a bad thing to do some of this recovery thing alone and important that I do it this way. I need to learn to be independent because in the end it is only me. Does this seem selfish, not allowing others to help me do this? Maybe, but certain things only I can do and feel comfortable doing. I accept God giving me the distractions of family and friends because they are the goodies I need to make recovery fun and joyous.  These are the people who bring you a burger instead of the terrible hospital food and bring a sense of normalcy into your recovery room. I love my accountability friends and family who bring me back to earth and catch me up on what has happened in the world since I checked out.  They also make me get off my bottom and leave my house and go into the world and socialize.

So when asked “How am I doing” I will say I am recovering and no truer words can be spoken from me right now. By the sheer grace of God I am making a full recovery and will be stronger and better than before. I don’t want bad days, but they will be a part of this, I don’t want a setback either so I will take my medicine and do what the doctor orders. Recovery is just the right word for me now.

Bookmark Me

I think better when I am alone, without distraction, and I am more creative too. I thought I was called to the one thing in life, being a wife and mother and I had fulfilled that purpose. I also believe somewhere in that I lost myself and the dreams I had as a teenager. I have been a creative person more or less and have used that talent by creatively stretching a meal, making costumes and props for the kids etc. Since the kids have left the nest, the house has been quieter and I had begun a discovery process on me. I needed an outlet and needed to reconnect with my earlier dreams in life. Steve pushed me to think about my dreams and he wanted me to write them down and put them in a box on his dresser. It took a long time to write one down, because I had pushed them out of my mind for so long, I gave up on them. Now I have been thrown into life again, and I will have to put a bookmark in my life again. 

My process began after Hurricane Katrina. I had helped my parents go through their house to salvage what could be salvaged. I ended up with some water stained pictures which looked to be trash. During my prayer time one morning I saw something new in those nasty photos and ran with the idea that I had found some beautiful art in that mess.  I had been in process over these last years trying to get those photos out to be seen by the world. I found them to be fascinating and beautiful and thought perhaps others might too. I called them Marsh Manna. I created a website, began to have them framed so I could display them somewhere if an opportunity presented itself. As with so many things in our life, money was an issue in getting those to where I wanted them and it was a slow process. I won’t blame it all on that, my inexperience and fear of rejection played a major roll too. Who am I to start a business? Was God setting me up to start me out? I was the failure, not God on that. I fear I may have dragged my feet too long and missed some opportunities there, but I hope others will crop up. I haven’t given up on Marsh Manna yet, I just put it on the back burner for now because I have to get a real job now.

Steve was so supportive of me once he understood and saw what I had seen in those pictures. He constantly threw money at me because he wanted me to succeed at being a business woman and doing something creative. I didn't like the marketing part of it because I am afraid of rejection.  I am against anything that has numbers or math related jargon so my feet tended to drag a bit on the business part of it. I just enjoyed the creative part. Steve encouraged me and tried to motivate(rush) me but I second guessed myself the whole time and self protected with excuses as to why it took so long. I don't think I was confident or knowledgeable enough to take Marsh Manna to the next level fast enough for Steve. My marsh manna revelation came after his heart attack and during his recovery time. He was in his "borrowed time" frame of mind, where life needed to be more accelerated. He felt like everyone moved in slow motion and there was no time for it. I felt I had disappointed him by taking so long to get it to a place to be seen by others and he didn't realize how inexperienced I was. Right now I don’t trust myself or have the self confidence to try something new and risky in the situation I am in so it will sit on the back burner until I can get myself upright again. Besides, I lost my place in the whole forward progress of it so put another bookmark, please. 

I suppose the most disconcerting thing for me is thinking about myself and what I need or want to make ends meet. Steve was our breadwinner, I just cooked it and now my mad momma skills are outdated and useless to helping me find a job. Sure I could babysit or clean houses again but will that cover all my bills? At least I don't have to worry about feeding my army, or clothing them  school supplies, or gas to and from sports fields etc. I can live small, it is only me and Millie. This is a hard adjustment for me to make. I no longer have to put the heat up high to keep others warm at night, now I can turn it down lower so I can sleep more comfortably. I am no longer thinking on Family time, it is now Single Widow time and that is a big adjustment to my way of thinking. I won't stop thinking of my kids totally, but they are adults now and they are standing on their own so now it is my turn to stand.

I saw a movie this year, Eat, Pray, Love. I thought I didn’t like it because I would never do things the way she did, but as I reflect on it, I am in that situation now. I am grieving and looking for my way in life too but I am unable to fly to all the exotic places she did, so I will sit here and surf the internet. My mom had an interesting reaction to that movie because she could not understand how anyone could feel so lost and unsure. I did understand those thoughts in the movie and they are with me now for sure. I won’t eat more but may taste more. I will pray more to God, because I know He exists and I don’t have a problem there. I hope to love more (not the promiscuous way) and who knows, maybe end up writing a book in reverse called I Love to Pray and Eat. Stranger things have happened, the pet rock, need I say more? I have been looking for my niche for a while now and I need to find it quick. Time is not on my side anymore.  Lord show me where you want me and train me in the ways I am to go. Remove the bookmark, I want to finish this book.

Down in the Mouth

I honestly tried to blog yesterday, after everyone left from our beautiful ThanksChristmas weekend, but I really didn’t have anything in me to lift a finger to type. I was emotionally drained and the effort to type too strenuous a task at the time.  I sat at the computer, checked a few emails and Face book until my computer went down again and I even tried to watch television, nothing worked so I went to bed very early. For two weekends in a row I was revved up with a list of projects to attend to and now, my sense of purpose and urgency is over. Maybe I will relax more, perhaps think more, the quiet seems much louder now than it did a few months ago.

I began this year having to have surgery on my upper lip, a basal cell decided to take up residence there. The blessing being while attending to that the doctor found a melanoma on my arm and that was removed before anything bad could happen. The first part of the year, I was very aware of the scar on my upper lip, but it wasn’t the scar as much as the new dead sensation there. Part of my lip and face was numb and I felt like after you come back from a numbing at the dentist pretty slobbery and silly. I felt like I was drooling and drooping when I ate or smiled and wondered if I would ever smile like usual again. Oh yes, I smiled, but it was not the same smile, it had a scar and a droop. I kept indoors and to myself a bit while I tried to get a grip on this situation. I wasn’t as self conscience of the scar but mostly it was about the functionality of my lip whether it was up or down when I smiled. I consider the scar a battle wound and move on. I am happy to report my smile is functional and more in control now.

The second attack on my mouth occurred the week of Steve’s funeral. I got the most hideous painful sores in my mouth which eventually poured out onto my bottom lip causing it to act like a fever blister. It cracked and bled if I smiled. Talk about an attack on my mouth this year and my smile. This year was especially hard on my smile and I seemed to focus on it a lot. I also took note that it was an attack on my mouth, not necessarily my voice, but the mouthpiece it comes out of. Trust me spiritual people out there, there was no angel, no burning coal placed on this mouth, but it does make me wonder why now when I am blogging instead of talking, I battle my internet service almost daily. My service goes down more now than it ever has, so much so that I have them programmed into my house phone so I don’t have to keep looking up their number. It has been fine all year until the week of the funeral and up until this very morning. I was on the phone with them again. I guess I have something important to say and don’t realize it.

I am just a bit sad and lonely today. I am grateful I can smile, though and will smile my way through this whole crazy situation. It will be like all the family photos ever taken, say cheese and a forced smile will appear on my face today. Okay what is the deal with saying cheese? Cheese does not even make me smile. My mouth doesn't even form a smile for cheese and I don't like it enough to smile about it. I don't feel like talking to anyone today, but I must go to the bank and do some errands and I will need to smile politely. I will think of Hannah, my beautiful granddaughter, and smile my little heart away. It is not their fault I don't feel like smiling so Hannah will be my cheese today. You can't see it, but I just smiled.

Millie

The kidscame in last night in shifts but Kyle came a day early. I had my prayer dog Millie outside as a menacing presence to keep some people from coming to my house to talk to me about their religion. You know who I mean, I won’t say anymore but I didn’t feel like being interrupted yesterday morning so Millie kept them away with her barking.  I heard that familiar bark of hers which told me someone I love is here. Mille is the best greeter ever and if God greets me half as well (just kidding God) I know I am in heaven. She truly heralds your arrival home and she does the same for my yard youngun’s as well. They get the official family greeting too since they are part of our family. They all marvel at her memory and the full effect of the greeting. Not only do they get the high pitched deep bark, but they are treated to a dash around the yard, sometimes into the field next door as she brags to the neighborhood my family is here. Then she stays right up under you for a long time to get all the petting she can from you to catch up on all she hadn’t gotten since last you left.

It was cute when Steve would come in late at night sometimes and he would try to hush her out in the yard so as not to disturb the neighbors. She did her greet and run, and then she couldn’t help it a small yippy, whiny bark would come out. It was fun watching her try to please her master but she couldn’t contain her joy, something was coming out of her mouth. It is funny how human dogs can be sometimes. She whined and rolled over and ran about the house jumping on the bed waiting for Steve’s hands on her body. She wanted her master’s touch so bad she was crazy for it. Steve always got the best greeting out of all the family and I enjoyed watching her.

She has given her first greeting  of the weekend already and will be rested up for the big meet and greet tonight when the rest come in. Due to her extreme greetings she will be exhausted and probably a bit sore; she is an old lady of eleven years after all. I only wish I could give half the greeting she does, it is loud but wonderful all at the same time. It truly makes you know you were missed and you definitely know you are loved. I wonder if she will be looking for Steve at all. After the funeral, she acted depressed but I am unsure if she picked up on my emotions. I am so glad to have her with me right now, I need her presence after the house quiets on Monday, and it will be hard. I am pretty sure she will have to listen to me cry again. But that is what she is paid for right? She knows everything and can’t tell anyone.

I said how funny how like human’s dogs are, but even funnier is how like God they are. My Millie is the most faithful person I know. She loves me unconditionally even when I get mad at her, she tries to wriggle under my hand to get my love and attention back. Not that God should ever bow to me, but He would. He loves me enough to lead me to forgiveness, to love again and release my anger, just like my dog does for me. She is the first to greet me in the morning and she wakes with me in the middle of the night and sits quietly with me until I go back to sleep. I call her my prayer dog because she sits with me in my prayer time and being alone I can’t have a prayer partner all the time so I use her. She is created by God too and she has brought comfort to me just by her near presence.  God has taught me much about His characteristics by Millie’s example. Other than her extreme, jealous love, she is faithful to her family, she listens well, and she is attuned to me. When I think she is sleeping, I notice she is looking for my next move trying to anticipate where I am going or what I am doing. Sure some of it probably is food related too, but I choose to believe she wants to please me.

There are the times she drives me crazy like when she goes out later in the evening on a cool crisp night and doesn’t knock on the door until 2:00a.m. I trudge to the door only to see her run off into the night again. She just wanted to see if I would answer the door and if I would still respond. Then I try to outsmart her and teach her a lesson by not answering when she knocks again in about twenty minutes. I lie in my bed and think she will stop and just settle down and fall to sleep outside on the porch, I will let her in when I awake in the morning. This never happens, and I don’t know why I keep thinking it will ever work. Millie keeps knocking, and knocking then pounding until I get up and let her in. Talk about your Hound from Heaven do you get the connection here? She loves me and our home enough to protect it and want to be inside it with me too. She stands watch over us and keeps vigil sometimes into the wee hours. I am grateful for her but sometimes inconvenienced by her. I am the old dog learning new tricks here, not the other way around.

So the testimony of Millie is by example. She never preaches a word to me, she just is and does and ever shall be my faithful companion until death. I will mourn her death when it happens too , she is so much a part of our family. Right now she is laying here on my bed sneezing and I say God bless you to her. God does bless her and me through her and I am so glad to say, he has taught this old dog a new trick or two. I want to learn more as I am sure I have so much more to learn.

The Last Present

I will never sell or pack away the last present I ever got from Steve. We celebrated my 50^th birthday this year (yes I am not afraid to admit that) by going to Gatlinburg. It sounds much more exotic than it was. Steve wasn’t too into it because he had to drive. He was a driver for a living and when he was off the road, he wanted to flop at the house, mostly. Maybe then he was starting to show signs of more health issues, or maybe it was him warding off depression again, I just knew something was off. Steve was not enjoying my birthday as much as I wanted him to. I felt guilty and miserable, like I forced him to be somewhere he didn’t want to be.  I lied to everyone and told them it was great. I just tried to make the best of it  and backed off wanting more scenic adventures and just enjoyed our time together at the cabin mostly. We had some good moments, but Steve wasn’t hitting on too much and this made me uncomfortable.

We wandered into some cute craft shops looking for presents for the kids. At the pottery place I saw many nice things and could have taken them all home with me. Steve told me to pick out something for my birthday present to remember it by. So my frugal self goes to the most inexpensive things first and he wouldn’t have it. He was trying to direct me to the bigger items and I wouldn’t have that. So the Goldilocks in me settled on a hurricane lamp in the middle price range to add to my collection  and it was just right. He thought I should have gone higher, I knew I shouldn’t so I was just right on that too.  So just recently I have taken the opportunity to use it and will use it through our weekend. This is the last gift he ever gave to me and I will cherish it forever. it is my new ThankChristmas tradition.

Steve surprised me many times with his presents, some more hideous than others. I say this because once he brought a paperweight, (maybe?) home to me. It was a block of clear acrylic with a shrimp in it. When he gave it to me he was so proud, he honestly thought it would make me happy and think of Louisiana. Really? I tried to give that thing away and he got so hurt. It was about the silliest gift he ever brought home from the road. Once when he came home he jumped out of the truck with a huge box of Hershey’s chocolate bars with almonds. These were the king sized bars straight from Hershey and I was so thrilled. This was medicinal so it was a gift I could use. Then he brought out from behind his seat a beautiful bouquet of a dozen long stemmed yellow roses. They were the most fragrant yellow roses I ever smelled and were so healthy and lovely. He said he got them a few miles up the road from a place he stops at to fuel up. I was so excited by my beautiful gifts one for the senses, one for the soul. Then he told me to wait there he had to get the rest of his stuff from his truck. He proceeded to pull out 7 more bouquets of roses each as lovely as the next all different colors. I had red, pink, blue, peach, and even multicolored roses and the weight of them in my arms was too much for me. Steve had to carry them in the house while I carried the chocolate and that first bouquet of yellow roses. I had never had so many flowers at one time before or since and it does one good to be surrounded at least once in life with roses. The house smelled wonderful and my spirits were lifted at the pleasant reminders of his love for me.

He could still surprise me. Many of the things he bought on the road for his mobile home (as we called the truck sometimes) proved useful. I am using a thermometer that was sent with part of his belongings at this moment to check the air temperature in my house. My heat pump is not doing right and I think I may have to call a repair man. He had numerous flashlights and blankets and I can’t tell you how many reading glasses and towels. The man had so many towels and these are another one of those stupid things we fussed about. I said to him, “Darling, we have over sixty extra towels in this house, what on earth can we do with all of them” And he always replied “Don’t you sell my towels in another yard sale. I better have all my towels in the house when I go to check on them” I had made around sixty dollars at a friends yard sale just selling them at a dollar a piece. Steve was not too happy about me selling his hoard of towels. I had quite a few to sell last weekend as I removed them from the space bag I had to store them in. I think I snickered a time or two while selling them. Sorry darling, but seriously, what do we possibly need with so many towels?

Idiosyncrasies, I suppose we all have them. Mine was my craft room and the constant need to add more stuff to it. When the bedrooms emptied out after the kids left, he accused me of making all of those rooms craft rooms. He would start to look for something and would ask which craft room was it in. I want you to know, I did spread out after the kids left, but not to every bedroom with the crafts stuff. Steve loved to tease me and give me a hard time like I did with his towel collection. Once again, I understood my need for new and different craft things because you never knew what I may pick up to do. His need for more blue towels I never understood, what on earth, unless he was planning on starting a public bath facility that I didn’t know about?

The presents you gave to me were wonderful Steve, and I cherish them all, except for the shrimp of course. This Christmas will be hard for me. It will be our first one without presents to each other. I am very sad about that. I don’t want to think on it too long but I will be lighting the hurricane lamp and I will be thinking of you and the wonderful "presence" you will have this Christmas. I am glad you are having the best Christmas ever. Mine will sure be different and I hope to make the most of it. I am grateful for the gift of you for 29 years and your "presence" will be missed this year.

Fresh Linens

I will tell you that I didn’t wash my sheets for awhile after Steve passed away. I can’t tell you why but it felt like I was clinging  to him until I couldn't deal with dirty sheets anymore. Another piece of him has left me like the closet space when I removed his clothes and used that space. Well technically I haven’t taken over the hanging part yet, it is still his sacred space with my minor encroachment still intact. In preparation for the ThanksChristmas sleeping arrangements, I have thrown, stuff in there to prepare for this weekend. After the weekend I will clear it all out, my clothes included. 

 I panicked yesterday I took my wedding rings off to put on some hand lotion. I got sidetracked by the doorbell and didn’t put them back on. I went into town without my rings on and felt as if I betrayed Steve. I want you to know that forgetting my rings is a normal thing for me to do. I have gone a few days before realizing I hadn’t put my rings back on but to do this now seems much worse, like I am glad he is gone. I want to have my rings on now more than ever as proof maybe that I am still married and I didn’t give up on us. I don’t know, I may need some couch time on this issue.

I can only tell you I am more careful and clingy with my rings, and to any little memento I find. I had to let go of so much in the sale last weekend that it pains me maybe to let go of anything else. This is why I guess I cried so much the other night. I was mourning losing his stuff too. Pieces of Steve are leaving our house and I know it is a good thing to detach and downsize but right now I am trying to get my hands on anything he touched. I actually wanted to have his pillow from the truck and his blanket that he slept under more than our own bedding at home, but that stuff never got back to us. It is okay I guess because I think my daughter and I were going to fight over his blanket.

Why can’t I just be satisfied having one thing like just his wedding ring, why am I feeling and obsession coming on to want all his things?  I certainly didn't want all of them while he was still alive. I was constantly trying to reposition them out of my sight or out of my house because I couldn't understand why he wanted to keep some of his junk. Psychologists everywhere are probably screaming right now saying “Because you are trying to piece him back together and trying to get your old life back”. So why does it hurt to get rid of something? It is just a thing. I am not married to a thing.

I am looking at a picture of him right now, the skinny young man I met a few short years ago. I see a very healthy young Marine and  remember the dreams I had of being old with him in rocking chairs with our grandkids. Of course I never saw him with that old beard he tormented me with in these latter years. He just had white hair, with the same twinkle in his beautiful blue eyes and was smiling with contentment while holding his grandchild. It was when he grew that beard and I questioned him about his attachments to  the ugly thing, he said it was in his dreams of us rocking our grandkids and they were tugging at his beard. I guess both of our dreams were wrong. We can't plan our lives.

It is amazing how blind love can be. I never saw it, or knew how to define it, but Steve suffered with serious depression during our first years of marriage. It wasn’t until we were married twelve years we found out the cause of his depression. It was a hard time for me and the kids. Steve was crazy about me, I knew that, but couldn't ever understand why he didn't want to be with me as much as I wanted to be with him. I didn't realize he was escaping, much like I have set up barriers in my mind now to avoid thinking about reality. Steve had much bigger issues to push out of his mind and he couldn't do it awake. He went to sleep so he didn't have to think. I am very grateful he didn't turn to anything worse like drugs or alcohol but it was still an addiction. It made him feel good not to battle the enemy of his mind. I can’t say it was an easy battle, but it was a struggle for him, but he did start engaging in life with us eventually and over time it got better.

Those were the bed war days; I hated our bed because Steve spent more time with it than with us. We had many an argument about that bed, and I never understood why the fascination to stay in it when daylight was burning away. It is funny, over these past few years since Mary has gone off to college, our roles have reversed a bit. When he was at home, he would get upset if I was still in the bed at 7:00 a.m. He had the nerve to accuse me of lazing in the bed. I believe he felt like I was exacting my revenge on him, paying him back for those miserable years he spent in bed. It was actually me just staying up later than when the kids were younger and staying in bed until I was done. I must confess, sometimes I let him think that way because he harped on me much like I harped on him. I told you I'm not a saint and I have since asked forgiveness for the few times I said "Good now you know what you put me through". Steve didn't understand eight hours of sleep and I am done no matter what. He was ready to play now and I wasn't. The roles were reversed, but I wasn't escaping, I had just become more worn out playing eggshell walking games for so many years.

After his first heart attack, it hurt him to sleep on his side anymore so he spent most of his time on his back. He complained that the new bed was uncomfortable, while I thought it was wonderful. This new bed was more mine than his now since I spent more time in it than he did. I think the bed rejected him but then again, I can pretty much sleep anywhere. It hurt me when he said his truck bed was more comfortable to him than our new pillow top mattress. I would still be in our waterbed if he didn't tsunami me so much through the night when he was home. I seriously thought this bed would be better for him. It was much higher and would help him getting in and out of it easier and it had a firmer mattress.  It is interesting that battle of the bed was never won by either of us.

 I will be getting rid of this big old bed before I leave here, it is too comfortable and way too big for me now. We had the stupidest things to argue about and the bed was something we argued most about. Because of this, I will be glad to be rid of it and just keep the lingering memories. I am glad to have fresh linens once again. It feels like a fresh start to a new release of his life. I guess I have released the sheets to be cleaned, and with this blog now it is my turn to wash up. Cleanliness is next to godliness.