A New Year

It is about 12:15a.m. New Year’s Day 2011 and I am starting my first New Year’s alone since 1979. Steve you are not here to call me, kiss me or to say I love you. We will not share our hopes for this year, lie about our new year’s resolutions, or just sit quietly and listen to the revelers outside. It is a new year, a new place a new beginning for me and I feel a bit out of sorts. I start this year out as a widow, not a wife and changing this status is pretty scary. Mom’s dog is panting at all the noise outside and I guess I know how she feels, very apprehensive about all the noise going on around us right now. It sounds like a war zone outside and feels like I am living in one some days or at least living in the aftermath of one.

I am not as sad as I was on Christmas, just pensive and a bit curious about what a new year will bring other than the excitement of the events in my children’s lives. I wonder will I have excitement too, will I adjust to my new status in life and will I be able to do this? My sadness is not as deep as it has been and perhaps a corner really has been turned. I hope so because I have so much to do and as I type this there is Steve’s face in my mind again. Is guilt nagging at me a bit because I am trying to move on quicker? Maybe, but I have to move on to survive and can’t allow sadness to paralyze me, that is not who I am. I adapt and move forward. Do I feel guilt about adapting and moving forward? Yes I do and I don’t think it will help me move on quicker by dwelling on it.

I felt a twinge of guilt today enjoying the company of friends and I felt guilt about enjoying the company of my family. Now I know guilt is not a good emotion but I think it is somewhere in that darn book on grieving. Is this a step or am I blazing a new trail, but who really cares, right? I wanted to do this alone with God as my guide and I believe He is here with me. Erase this guilt Lord, so I can have some fun without guilt, like you do to my chocolate when you remove those pesky calories? Well I suppose a certain amount of guilt makes for a good conscience, but the guilt I bear is survivor’s guilt. It is hard to believe I am alive without Steve and hard to understand the why behind it. Why did he get to go first, or why did God think I am strong enough to handle this right now in my life? I am a survivor, but am unused to doing this alone.  Did I learn all I needed to do this?

All my fun times seems bittersweet now. I am able to feel better for brief periods of time and then I wake from the joy of it into the reality of it. The good news is I am feeling better about things and think perhaps some of the woeful times may be lessening. The bad news is the guilt associated with letting Steve go and releasing more and more sorrow into the arms of my Father in Heaven.

 I don’t want to have the attention of a gnat and move onto the next thing in my life without honoring Steve by not mourning him properly. My mind is clearer now than it has been since October 19^th. I am able to read and can have a thought and carry it through. I can watch a program on television and follow it so I am recovering well. Then there is the thought that pops into my head, Steve is having a great time and not mourning me at all. So there it is, he has released me so thoroughly that he doesn’t give me a thought and here I am grieving him so. I look forward to eternity where I won’t have this daily drama of emotion, well at least I hope it is that way.

So guilt, guilt go away don’t come back another day, Renee really wants to go out and play. Please note play really means I want to move on and be happy without guilt and I need to move on. I will never forget my 29 years with Steve, they were great times but I have to live out the rest of my life without his counsel and experience. I have to learn to do new things and take care of myself financially and this means some hard work ahead of me so guilt, go away. I really won’t be playing after all. I need to work and get my act together. That may mean having some fun times learning new things and reconnecting with old friends and meeting new ones. I have no place in my life for you guilt, so please let me be. Happy New Eternity, Steve I am sure your celebration was better than mine but that is alright we will see each other soon enough.