Just 2.23.2016 Just 17 days

So….Here it is…--the first of...

A friend asked my tonight when my next blog will be.  I said “By this weekend.”  But, if I have learned anything from …well, don’t wait…just DO.

If you are stumbling across this blog, you should know that I type whatever I choose.  Tonight, I will type the whatever of tonight, of the last 17 days…The last 17 days after I lost my husband.

Tim…was a thousand smiles, and in my next blog, I might share the speech I made at his funeral…a speech, a talk, words…in his memory

…  I will never regret speaking, but I would have regretted not speaking…not sharing a tiny piece of who he was.  And though many said they could not have done that—the truth is (as the famous quote says), “You never know how strong you are until strong is the only option.”  Strong was my only option. 

Strong was my only option because I was not only speaking for Tim, but for his entire family…and quite frankly, the community of Powhatan.   He was so proud of his roots, and I knew I had to respect and honor his hometown and the people who lived there—and HIM. 

So, I decided very early into this HELL—and I will call it HELL because that is where my emotions are…(I wrote in previous blogs that I do not believe in “choosing happy,” and for crying out loud—what the F is happy about this???  What is a choice of an emotion when someone dies?  Really??)  So, I decided that I wanted to blog my journey…so if you will join me, I will take you through my year.  My blog is called “A Year In and Of The Life.”  So…here we go.

My husband was killed in a car accident on 2.6.2016.  I spoke and texted with him past midnight on the 5^th, so I know this happened on the 6^th.  I chose, and I will forever choose NOT to know the details.  I know him.  I know that he was with his “boys” doing what they had done since they were 14.  I will never blame anyone, but I will curse his fucking ass over and over….for leaving us.  Us, meaning me and his 4 year old daughter.  Damn him for leaving us----for leaving HER.

In the moments before I knew, I drove fast/furious to his hometown.  I drove thinking he would be in a hospital with months of physical therapy ahead of him.  I drove with silent and vehement prayers.

But when I arrived in his hometown, my worst fears were true.  How dare he leave me, but hell…how dare he leave the apple of his eye—the one about whom he said over and over, “I love her to pieces.”  I screamed and yelled.  I cried.  It’s not funny, but in the days that followed, I tried to be my jovial self by saying that I trumped Sally Field in Steel Magnolias.  Oh I did.   

I am grateful for the community of Powhatan.  People were instantly at my side, as we cried, for not only Tim, but for 2 other men of this town.  These 3 men were not only residents….they were a legacy of their own families that spanned generations.  These men were MEN.  They were the kind of men that people speak of when they say, “He was a good man.”  They were.  They were great men…They will always be great men.  I had a great man…a man of integrity and “that smile.” He will live on…in the smiles of his girl….our incredible miracle, Maris. 

The days that followed…all I can say is that…my friends and family saved me.  I may choose to write more of this, but tonight, I simply want to share that this community was not sad, not devastated, not numb, not angry, not in denial, not any of these words.  They were, as I was…a word that does not encompass how we felt.  Tears weren’t enough.  Yelling was not enough.  Staying silent was not enough.  Pretending was not enough.  Cursing the hell out of them was not enough.  The word…to describe our emotions does not exist.  It simply does not. 

Tonight, I simply will write this….We are not too busy.  We are not that pissed or angry at those who have “wronged” us.  We are not really ready to shut the door on those whom at one time might have been our closest friends for some “reason.”  We are not that damn fucking bitter.  We are not better than others.  We are not really “loners” thay don’t need anyone.   We are not …we are not more than those who surround us, uplift us, make us smile, get us a coffee, make us laugh, hug us no matter what the situation is, laugh with us, cry with us, let us lie on their laps while they pet our hair, and say I love you.  Screw all that. 

We are all going to die.  What are you waiting for…what????  You can’t connect when you are gone.  You can’t pour a glass of wine with your friends, and watch bad TV when you are gone.  You can’t go hiking, go to happy hour (even with a kid), to the park, to listen to jazz, to eat food truck food, to sing songs in the car at the top of your lungs, to go sledding, to build sand castles, to drink beer in a little glass, to watch reality TV, and to hug, to love, to hold each other…when you are gone.  YOU CAN’T!!!!  You simply can dream it, wish it, but you can’t do it.  …Not when you are gone…when a person from your walks of life are GONE.   

GO DO IT.  Hold each other, eat the cake, pour the wine, play in the grass, and hug, and hug, and hug, and hug…Just take a moment to hold on…

Maybe this post seemed like a ramble, but that is where I am on day 17. 

*** a quick side note of gratitude to you (you know who you are…the close and not close—the friends and those who are just reaching out)….thank you.  Thank you. 

Just hold them close.  Call that person you are at odds with…Make a new friend.  Smile.  Smile.  Smile.  That is what he did.  Smile. 

I sit here sipping on a little bit of bourbon because he always wished I would order one “neat.”  Here you go, honeykin.  I am pissed at hell, but I love you endlessly.  Through all of the almost 16 years of marriage…I have loved you each day.  I miss you. I miss you.

What if-Happy New Year 2016

Ahh the New Year...

I have to liken the old year somewhat to the schoolyard chatter of “take it back.”

It seems that so often we want a sort of “do over.”  You know, like in 6^th grade when someone said you were stupid, or you wanted to have your turn again in Chinese jump rope because you stepped on the rope.  We look backward and say that the coming year, we will “do better,” “be better,” “act better.”….a sort of “take it back” from the previous year-the “do over.”  Yet, is there really a “take it back?”

                                        NO. 

BUT… there is something…

So, in this New Year blog, I want to …well, just read it...

My point is NOT to be passive aggressive (geesh, can we eliminate that obnoxiousness on social media—!!!) about some shit that I am trying to get out to people in my life or whatever.   The message is “within” my story-about my life-I couldn’t stop thinking about it on a much bigger level.  I couldn’t stop thinking about how this (one sentence) moment in my life might translate/integrate/relate into someone else’s story.

…because bitterness is like a trend these days (#me).

My reasoning for these words is to maybe give a pause for thought (for lack of a better phrase), not just to the words “take it back,” but to the

Notion… of “take it back,” to the “it’s ok,” to the “I know,” to the “I know you are sorry, and we are more than this moment or those moments, and I love you.”

                 I mean…who the hell can’t relate to this??

I recently reached out to a friend to tell her Happy New Year.  I have been friends with her for 12 years.  In that 12 years, we have been aquaintances, friendly, close, closer, and recently, somewhat distant.  A few days before NYE, I reached out to many of my friends—some close-some distant- to wish them a Happy New Year because I love each of them, individually, particularly for the memories and more importantly, the moments in time—you know the ones that will connect you with someone forever (like a song on the radio that instantly creates time travel)… –to grow and to reconnect that very connection.

OK, and yes honestly, to some, to say, behind the cover of “Happy New Year:”  can I get a “take it back?”  Can I get a “do over.” 

My view:

                       A friend is someone who loves

                            …and is compassionate and empathetic   

                                         …but does not forget

                   that the connection is what binds.

So, back to this friend. 

After I texted her…she texted back the next day.  She wished me a Happy New Year.  She shared with me a few things about her holiday break, asked me some advice, and then she said these words;

                                  “I don’t want to lose our friendship.” 

I instantly cried and cried.

As we move into this new year…oh 2016, you are here…

Just-

Think about what might happen if you reached out to someone part of your past-and maybe, your present-the now-, your memory bank, a piece of who you were, who you are now.  Think about what might happen if you both said: 

                “I take it back.”  Let’s have a “do over.”

Life is short.  We hear it all the time.  But, if life is short, then why not share the short time we have with the people we not only love…but why don’t we share that time with the connections to make us who we are? 

So, with that, my decision in 2016 is a combination of the last few years:  a “take it back,” a “do over:”

Do or do not…there is no try

Read

Play

Write

And …second (or 3^rd or 4^th) …

OK, OK …NEW chances.

                             Happy New Year!!!!  2016.

Yes, it’s ok that you called me stupid…you can take it back.

Yeah, you can have a do over on the zig zag on the Chinese jump rope.

Absolutely.

  

Finally "40"...good grief! 11.29.2015

Sitting on the couch in the quiet except for the words of the new Adele song, "Hello," rolling off of my iTunes. 

The first time I heard this, all I could hear was her powerful voice.  Without coincidence, as I believe, my husband texted me within an hour of hearing it on XM to tell me about the new Adele song.  He had just heard it on Good Day Columbus, and he said it was sure to be a hit…and he was right.  We heard it for the first time within an hour of one another.  Love this.

At work, I played it over and over on YouTube in my classroom during my planning time (sorry to my neighbors).  The raw sound of her voice and the intensity of regret in the lyrics struck me, grabbed me, sunk into me, and then slapped me.

But, later, I read an article about the song.  She said that it wasn’t about anything in particular—that all of the “love gone wrong” angst of her last CD was in the past. 

I thought about that for a long time.  Each time after reading this dialogue, and I listened to this song, I could hear her say it wasn’t about anything-anyone in particular. 

And she is right…at least for me.  Haven’t we all broken hearts?  Haven’t we all hurt our friends, our families…even those people we barely know?  From the mere age of 6, I can recall hurting others, being unkind, and I can recall being around others who treated me the same.

How silly it is that I can vividly recall that in 1^st grade, no one would trade me shoes because I had the flat sandals with the plastic rainbow stripes, and all of the other girls had the white ones with the cork wedges….I still can see me standing by the monkey bars while the other girls—traded in front of me.

And after feeling that awful feeling that can only be described as rejection…a mere 2 years later, it was so easy to make fun of one of my longest friends at a slumber party because… everyone else was--—sorry EM.

While slightly funny and anecdotal now, I can still recall feeling “ugly” way back in 1985 being called “bucky beaver” because I had a huge overbite (thank you Erkis and Kristal for fixing this!!!).  Kids can be really mean, you know. 

Kids are mean, even when they aren’t “kids” anymore.  The high school Michelle gossiped and found fault in others because I felt so insecure about myself-because I wanted to belong, wanted “the” boy, wanted the pretty clothes and the shoes.  I came off strong and assertive, but it wasn’t real…and it became a character flaw that would transcend for a long, long while.

In college, I dated a lot—hopping around-yet running back trying to “fix it”, and yet, I kept one foot out of the door, just in case.  I think I hurt “them” as often as they hurt me.

And I have no doubt that in my various jobs before I became a teacher, there were many “digs” to me and from me…

           oh, please, honestly,…

           the words were like a torrent rainfall-

           falling and falling

-each drop of bitch shredding the next

—the 20’s really are a time when you just “do” without much caution of thinking before your speak, thinking before you do—and I paid the price in a myriad of ways, in my family, in my friends, in college, all leaving me with an unfilled “quest.”

And, interestingly, the reflection of the rear view mirror blinds me glaringly now…because I prided myself for so long for being this person who was a “good” friend/big sister-surrounded by many.  Yet, in that glare, I found that, maybe, I am not that friend-that maybe I have an ego bigger than my heart on every third Wednesday…

It’s just that as those moments and memories of the past might fade for some (or maybe they learned how to put them in a box or seal them in an envelope)-it seems in my own life, my swirl of memories-in my swirl, they stay.  They stay.  Right here.  As my daughter says, "Owie Owie."

In my life now, I have learned those hard and painful lessons (and dozens of others), and I as sit here listening to the words of this song, I think about how Adele apologizes for hurting, for walking away, for misunderstanding and miscommunication. 

Who hasn’t been through this—in some walk of life?   And, despite all the lessons learned from all the mistakes we make, is it written anywhere that those lessons that gave us a grade of “C” or "D" won’t reveal an “F” the next time, even though we were hoping for at least an improvement to an 80%?

I, for one, still believe in second chances-for the “old college try” and at least a 77%.

…and most of the time (and I still don’t know exactly what this means about me), I am a person who gives a third and fourth chance before I am ready to be on the “other side-the outside.”  

It’s puzzling and oh-so-revealing to me that while I began this blog at 40 to chronicle this ***“amazing a-ha”*** (one I thought I finally achieved before 41--)  that was supposed to appear and blaze like the Northern Lights or something… would fizzle into a flicker—and finally showing itself to me, to sink in…

3 ½ years later.

And Adele is “write.”  The a-ha is finally that I, me, Michelle, the “40-come lately” can say with ABSOLUTE affirmation and conviction (not the presumably-“I’m older, I know better” motto of my “wiser age”) …

"at least I can say I tried, to say I’m sorry.”

  Sorry to me, sorry to my family, my friends, and to the people who didn’t even know I owed them one.  And sorry to ME.  And maybe…I am finally and at last “getting” what others seemed to have gotten long ago.  I believe in me.  For the doubts and faults that I can’t let go of, I am ready to give ME the 3^rd and 4^th chance.  I am my own comeback.

  

And, as I write this, my sincere hope is that others might give themselves their own 3^rd and 4^th chances—to create their own pages of the comeback.

…to write the words that will matter to themselves first…

and for me:   

at long last, 43 ½  is opening a new chapter. 

A grateful Friday :) 7.31.2015

Happy Friday…

It’s a beautiful Friday.   I have a day filled with fun plans…a breakfast, farmer’s market, a hike.   I was lying on the couch thinking about the past few weeks.  I was thinking about the moments that build and build, one morsel at a time, into the minutes and hours and days that make up our lives. 

Looking over the past few weeks, there have been some hard moments.   And, of course, isn’t that part of life? 

               The hard moments that reveal the soft ones?

Today, on this beautiful day, I feel overwhelmingly grateful for these revelations.   In just a matter of a few short weeks, those morsels have been building into those moments of life.  I have been shown those soft moments right here in my front yard…and my back yard. 

Anyone who knows me knows that for me-

           Life isn’t happenstance. 

           Life isn’t coincidence.

           Life isn’t maybe. 

For me-

         Life is a chain of connections …

          and for every link of disconnect, there is a link of reconnect. 

While I feel a sadness for the disconnects, I feel immensely grateful for the reconnects—those links that have been holding my hand, listening to my words, and for my new connections, the links who have appeared into my life right when I needed them…right when my family needed this new chain.  

When you put it out there…

Here it is. 

Grateful…

Happy Friday.  J