My Fractal Life 2
I’m going to talk about the pattern I’ve seen as I dealt with my wife’s death in August 2020 and how it came about. This isn’t a road map. This is my journey. One thing I decided early on was to say that she died. It was simple and straight forward. No euphemisms like passed away, departed, lost her battle. Also, for some reason, I embraced the old Victorian year long approach to mourning. I even bought a black baseball cap, and on the anniversary of her death last year, I took off my wedding ring and began cleaning out her closet. She was dead and we weren’t married. Death had done us part.
Midway through the first year, I joined a grief support group. That was nice and a big help. Friends also chipped in and started inviting me places and taking me on musical excursions. Somewhere along the way, and I don’t know precisely when, my thinking turned from sorrow over what I’d lost to the pleasure of what I’d gained in 50 years of marriage. Three children, four grandchildren, happy homes, travel memories, lots of friends, nights on the beach, the list goes on and on. Then, around Thanksgiving last year, I decided to have a party for the children I knew and their families to kick off the Christmas holidays. And I decorated the house, every inch of it. I guess I was piggybacking the rebirth of me on the birth of Christ. I doubt he minded.
As I approach the second anniversary of her death in August, I hesitate to say I’m out of the woods, because I have no idea how big these woods are, although I lost my mother when I was 21, so I have some idea. I guess as a family, we’ve always subscribed to the idea that death comes to us all, so remember the dead but celebrate living and the living. My grandmother and great-grandmother lost their husbands early, and my mother lost her parents early, before she was in her teens. They weren’t mopey women. Also, since my mom and dad and I were in the Navy’s medical corps, I knew you needed to keep moving otherwise your injury would stiffen right up. I still miss my wife, a lot, but nothing will bring her back. So, all I can do, really, is hold her memory dear and embrace the ones I love before death comes for me and it will surely come.
John W. Wilson is the author of The Long Goodbye: A Caregiver's Tale