Friday, April 9, 2010:
I am mourning the death of my husband, Dave, who died just a little over two weeks ago after cancer took him away from me. Some days I find that I can handle it okay and other days I feel like I am going to die myself. I read some stuff about grief recently and keeping a journal was one of the ways that was suggested to deal with the emotions that come at these times.
I think that it might help because I have already begun to write things about my life with Dave and have been sharing them with others. That helps me a lot because I don't want ANY of my memories of him to fade even a shade. And so I have begun this blog for the purpose of chronicling those memories. In 20 years, I want to look back and still see his beautiful, handsome face as clearly as I do today, not gaunt and ravaged by the cancer, but vibrant and so full of love and life that he made my heart sing every time I looked at him. He was an extraordinary man and I was blessed beyond words to have been loved by him and to have spent 16 years with him. My only regret about our life together - the only regret - is that I didn't find him sooner in my life, that way I could have had some more time with him.
Today I am not having a very good day. Yesterday, I was shopping at the market with my mom and suddenly it hit me that I don't have anybody to cook for now. Nobody to be the tester (or maybe victim would be a better choice of titles) for my kitchen experiments anymore. We have been organic farmers for the last 10 years and so food has been a tremendous part of our life (when you sell veggies to people, you have to be able to tell them what to do with them...) and now there is nobody to share that with me.
I am finding that my grief comes at me from the most unexpected things. Dirty socks in the hamper, a favorite shirt, a song on the radio. I feel paralyzed sometimes because I am afraid of what might trigger a meltdown and so I just sit in a chair, hugging my knees to my chest and cry. Why is this happening to me, why did Dave have to be the one to die so young, why did he leave me all alone? Questions, questions, questions and not an answer in sight. Maybe writing my feelings down here will give me answers or at least let me understand a bit.
Dave and I believed strongly in the natural order of things. What could be more natural than to have completed the circle of life? As soon as we are born, we are on the path to our death...it is inevitable and it comes to us all. Dave understood that circle far better than I and he was not afraid of his passing. When he was close to the end of his life and he knew it, he spent an entire day talking to me about how much he loved me, that he had never loved anyone or anything as much as he loved me and I told him the same things. It was incredibly beautiful and it broke my heart because I knew that he was telling me those things because he knew he wouldn't be able to in a short while. I am very grateful for that day and that we was able to say all those things to each other one last time.
“You must live in the present, launch yourself on every wave, find your eternity in each moment. Fools stand on their island of opportunities and look toward another land. There is no other land; there is no other life but this.”
