6 Years, 9 Months - Stepchildren

I am feeling very lonely tonight. My stepdaughter came to pick up her dad’s yearbooks. Her husband stayed in the car. She moved to this area with her mom so she could be by her dad. Her mom still lives her too. I only see my daughter a few times a year. She comes over, never sits down, and picks up things of her dads and then leaves. I have not seen her sister in years. The last time I saw her was at a family funeral and we never even made eye contact. She stayed in the living room and front yard and I stayed in the kitchen and backyard. It is not that I do not want to see her. She does not want to look at my face. She cancelled going to the family get-together the following day because I would be there. All the losses weigh on me tonight. Losing a spouse enviably means losing most of his family too. You just do not know this at the time. The morning after his service, half of the large tree in our front yard severed and fell and his family drove away.
I think of my mom. She told me when she was dieing that I only saw her a few times a year for an afternoon, a few phone calls a year, and a random holiday. My life mirrors hers now just like my face.

4 Years, 9 Months - Your Death

It is the fourth season of Christmas since the last time I watched his chest lower, heard the last beep of the heart monitor, felt his energy crash into my chest, filing the space between my back and front ribs and once fully contained rushing with force up my spinal cord and shooting out the top of my head.
I knew without looking at the monitor, I had kept reminding myself not to watch just be with him, that the line was flat. He was gone now. I knew with finality. Then I looked and watched the flat line move across the black screen eating the mountains. The line moved fast erasing all that was left of his life. When the line devoured the hills and the mountains and conquered the screen, I looked away. I saw his older brother holding his left hand. The world was still. I heard his mother say we should get him ready. I replaced the head that had been my husbands away from my bosom back onto the hospital pillow and turned to look at his mother who held his right hand in both of hers. She told me to close his eyes. I knew how to do it from training by books and movies. I ran my fingers over his eyes bringing the eyelids to rest before brushing my palm against his cheek stubble. Why had I not shaved him when he asked? He never let me shave him even when I had asked in the shower. Because after that moment was gone, he no longer wanted to be groomed. I took the wet towels away. We had used towels to prop his head straight on the pillow when he no longer had the strength to keep it from falling forward. He would make the sign for rain to tell me to pour a pitcher of ice water on his head. We had not been able to replace the towels after the last rain. I tried to close his mouth but it would not close. It was set open in a gruesome tilted manner. I was sorry that his daughters would have to see it this way.

2 Years - Second Anniversary of Death

Today is two years and the rain is pouring all our tears. The white lilies, death flowers, are blooming.
When I got in the car, Elton John was playing for me ‘Someone save my life tonight.’ Elton John was special because only you knew I liked him. If you were channel surfing you always stopped for Elton John, turned to me and smiled. Then I would sing for you. Only for you, otherwise I only sang alone in my car.
When your daughter and I checked into the hotel, she found a watch on top of the folded towels. I said we should turn it in to Lost and Found. She said it was a gift from you. Who else would leave something in our room on this day? A watch with white, your favorite color on me, and an orange stripe, my favorite color, that matched the shoes I was wearing, with a silver tone square face, because I only wear silver or platinum and I like squares, and four rhinestones. Four, 04-04-04, the day you died.
I got in my car. The tears fell in a solid stream on the outside corners of my eyes. I held my head in my hands. I rested my elbows on the steering wheel and I wailed. Slowly, then deeper, the wailing mounted, injured, hurt, sadness from deep inside.
Only one of my oldest friends called today. Your daughter and I mourned. We left a rubber duck under a small tree overlooking the end of the Grand Canyon, on top of the highest rock on the ledge, off trail at Canyonlands National Park. We left it at the Grand Canyon because the first time both of us saw it was with you. We left it at the end of the deep canyon because what was deepest in us had ended. We left one of your rubber ducks because we wanted to be there with you. Because it still hurts.

5 Years, 7 Months - The Holidays

The holidays suck. I just talked to a friend that is a young widow without kids. She was expecting dinner at the in-laws as usual. However, her phone calls were ignored and then she finally got a cold reception when the sister answered. She now realizes she is spending Thanksgiving alone.

Losing a spouse usually means losing more people as well. Who are the in-laws and the stepchildren after death? Legally they are not related to you any longer. Not only have you lost the person that touches every aspect of your life but an entire branch of your family tree is severed. My brother-in-law called yesterday. I was expecting an invite as well but it was just a message to say 'Have a nice Thanksgiving'.
Sure, I have made plans for the past holidays. I don't just wait to be invited. I went to Mexico and ate lobster with two widows in their 20s the first year. I have hosted several holiday dinners and went to a friend's house one year. Nevertheless, there remains the void. You are now family-less. You are no longer married. Basically you are single. Your in-laws remain family at will. Your extended family spends the time with their immediate family - children, in-laws, and spouse. Another holiday season and I will be alone. This year will be Thanksgiving dinner take-out again. I do eat in restaurants alone all the time now. Yet to go out to dinner alone on Thanksgiving or even cook for one is too pathetic. Better yet to pretend it is just another day. Some years are better than others. It is not a straight line forward.
Tomorrow is the anniversary of the day he proposed.