Thank you!

The missing is profound recently.

As I sit at my Al's gravesite today,

I can hear in the distance

the names and ranks of the men and women

who gave their lives in service to the United States of America.

I think of my own grief and loss and longing

and I think of those other widows and widower.

     the sons and daughters,

          the mothers and fathers,

               the brothers and sisters

who sit at a gravesite today

     profoundly missing

and I am deeply grateful!

Laughter through tears is my favorite emotion...

I have done some things the last couple days

that are completely out of character for me.

My dreams the last several nights have been...

...disturbing.

I am not sleeping well tonight.

I should be, I'm tired.

I didn't sleep at all that other night 11 years ago.

 

It was just about this time,

a bit earlier by the time this is posted,

just after midnight that we heard those words:

 

"Mr. Garrett, you do have cancer."

 

We were in the ER and the doctor was very matter-of-fact.

He came in, said those words

and that we would be staying for a while

and walked out.

It took about two minutes.

 

We had gone to the hospital at around 4pm.

It took them eight hours to give us the diagnosis.

Sixteen days later we went home

with a one to three months prognosis.

He lived eight months and three days.

 

Yesterday and this day are almost sacred to me.

I almost feel the need to whisper the date,

May 25/26, D-day.

And every year I feel the weight of those words,

the diagnosis of cancer.

And every year I think of the privilege of serving him,

walking him home over those next short months.

Every year I also feel the grace.

I feel the grace from my Lanny Love

when I talk about my Al more,

    say his name more often,

        say the wrong name occasionally as I did at least once this week.

He loves me through the "memory" days.

I feel the grace of God

who looks beyond my actions,

    my thoughts,

        my feelings,

and loves and accepts me in my imperfections and failings.

 

I was privileged to walk my Al home.

I am privileged to make a home with my Lanny Love. 

I am blessed beyond measure to love and serve

a merciful, graceful, forgiving God!

 

Last evening, on the 25th, we returned from a road trip

with one of our daughters and her family

to a bucket-list destination for my Lanny Love.

It was a fabulous time.

Still, I fought tears several times

and found myself to be more sensitive than normal -

and that's saying something.

 

Six years ago on this day,

my Lanny Love and I were on my first back-packing trip,

where I fell in love with the sport.

And where I thought of my Al

and wept for him in a mountain pool. 

Most years, I am here and visit the cemetery

at some point in my day -

and I laugh with my husband and children and grandchildren and friends.

 

Every year is different

but every year is a life adventure.

Life goes on.

And in grief, we must move forward into life

or, ourselves die, at least emotionally and mentally, in the grief.

 

Truly, grief has no end.

It changes, but it is with you, 

ebbing and flowing all the years of your life.

That is because love has no end either

and as long as one loves what is gone,

one grieves it.

But that is not the end of the story.

 

I think of a quote from one of my favorite movies, "Steel Magnolias":

 

"Laughter through tears is my favorite emotion." 

~~ Dolly Parton as Truvy after Shelby's funeral ~~

I think of my Jesus - life through death.

My Al is more alive today than he ever was here.

I think of my life,

living not simply existing.

Loving in the here and now,

not only in the past.

Experiencing joy and laughter,

sorrow and tears.

Life through grief.

 

I am very blessed! 

 

yellow roses...

 Yellow roses were my mom's favorite.

On that morning 42 years ago today

when her children chose her flowers,

yellow roses blanketed her casket.

Today, my Lanny Love,

who never had the privilege of meeting her,

remembered me placing a yellow rose on her headstone

and bought me yellow roses in her memory.

This is the kind of thing that make the unique difficulties

that may accompany remarriage from widowhood worthwhile!

Today my heart has been tender with the heaviness of March.

Today, my Lanny Love,

whose own heart has experienced 

the newness found in the midst of longevity in grief,

understood my tenderness and easy tears

when talking about a dog and my children.

He understood that it was not about the dog,

it was about it being March

and the third of three hard days in this month.

And he remembered the yellow rose.

 

Love is a wonderful thing!

 

 

Becoming my first great love...

Sometimes I'm jealous of him...

He had the purity of 

the "love of his life"

and on that day, 47 years ago,

he married her.

On that same day,

as it turns out,

I married my first great love.

Sometimes I envy that he never loved another.

 

We were unique.

Oh, we'd had crushes,

boys and girls we thought were cute,

that made our tummies tumble when we saw them,

but love?

No.

On that July day in 1971,

at the tender ages of just-turned-14

and not-quite-16,

we made a "going steady" commitment

and no one else was ever more than a passing thought after that.

We were each the love of the other's life.

And on March 20, 1976,

when even the "passing thoughts" had long since ceased,

we got married,

promising before God and man

to love only one another for as long as we both lived.

We both kept that promise.

 

Then the darkest of dark January.

The day I said "see you later"

to the love of my life

and the door to another great love was opened,

one that, a bit more than two years later,

I would walk through.

And the love of my life

became my first great love.

 

This morning I woke myself calling his name,

memories flooding my mind,

my heart swelling with love for him. 

He has held my hand all day.

At the funeral we attended

where another cried through the "see you later"

to the chill of visiting him at the cemetery 

on this blustery first day of spring,

he has held my hand.

Today, and that "going steady" day in July,

are the days I feel the "love of my life" loss most acutely.

He is my first great love.

And a great love it was!!!

 

Sometimes I'm jealous of him...

 

Roots

Forgetting isn't the right word.

You most certainly do not forget!

Moving on is definitely not right.

That indicates leaving something behind,

and you take it with you.

Getting over it?

No.

You don't get over it.

Change.

Yes, that is right.

Grief changes.

 

It goes through seasons

like all our emotions.

In the beginning,

the ferocity is all-consuming, overwhelming,

physical in its intensity.

It is a dungeon existence,

a torturous state.

Unsustainable for healthy existence long-term.

 

Then it begins to ease 

and you feel appalled that it has,

you feel as if you are somehow betraying your beloved.

But you aren't.

 

Finally it settles into a permanence

that is mostly comfortable and familiar,

a path with peaks and valleys,

laughter and tears,

ordinary and extra-ordinary.

It is simply a piece of the quilt of your life.

 

Love is the same.

My Lanny Love and I are in our eighth year of marriage.

We don't have the "seven-year-itch"

that some experience with their seventh wedding anniversary

but our relationship is different than it was in those early days.

 

Love, like grief, is all emotion in the beginning.

It's an amusement park,

sparkling lights, dizzying heights, almost overwhelming excitement.

That is not sustainable long term!

 

Then the intensity begins to be replaced

by "like", deep respect, admiration.

Friendship deepens.

"Thrill" gives way to ordinary.

You might think "Uh-oh..."

but no, love is not waning,

emotion is simply calming,

love is strengthening, deepening, enriching!

The roots are improving, stretching, widening.

They are gaining the ability to support the height of true love

through the ordinariness of life,

the storms that are bound to come,

and the softening of emotion that comes with "everyday-ness".

It is in this state that people become appalled,

decide they are no longer in love

when in reality they are no longer at the amusement park

but rather, have come home!

What a tragedy to give up at that point

for this is where love becomes sustainable and permanent!

 

In a couple days,

I will commemorate the 47th anniversary of my wedding to my Al.

On that day so long ago,

I had no inkling that I would some 40 years later

create another wedding anniversary

with another great love.

I was 13 when we met that August Sunday in 1969,

14 the following summer when our love story began to root.

We had known each other for nearly 44 years at the time of his death.

We grew up together.

He knew me inside out, 

    upside down,

        backward and forward.

I will never be known like that again.

Once my Lanny Love and I moved "home",

I missed that.

I loved the excitement of our new and growing love!

But I missed being "known", 

"knowing" deeply for a long, long time.

I missed that instinctual recognition and knowledge of 

    what made me tick,

        what made him tick.

Last year we moved from the home I thought 

would be the one from which I would be buried.

Oh my, how I have longed for that place 

where our love took root!

How I missed knowing all the nooks and crannies,

all the little oddities and delights of the space,

    the double kitchen sinks, 

        the funny attic doors,

            the wonderfully eccentric neighbors,

                the music in the park drifting to the deck,

                    the porch swing and fragrant wisteria,

                        being able to walk around in the dark and not stub my toe.

 

But over the last few months,

that longing has begun to change,

more and more it has become a cauldron of delightful memories

of happy, sad, loving, growing times -

of two truly becoming one -

and the house we now occupy has become home.

I love my custom-to-me kitchen with it's wide counter-top,

    our cozy bedroom with it's intimate dark, twinkling ceiling,

        the cozy nook where I can rock and look out at our birds and "mountain",

            walking around, once again, in the dark without stubbing my toe.

Remarriage from widowhood is like that.

In the early days of my marriage to my Lanny Love,

I missed being "known" well.

And I missed "knowing" well.

I relished the excitement of early love, the amusement park,

but I missed the familiar comfort and contentment of home.

I am an emotion based individual.

As such, I "feel" deeply and have a tendency to

spend too much time at the amusement park of excitement

or in the dungeon of whatever negative emotion I am feeling,

give those places too much importance.

But through the years of two great loves,

two strong marriages,

I have learned.

Home is the best place to be!

 

My Lanny Love and I are home!

We have watered and fertilized our sapling,

it has grown tall and strong with deep, wide roots.

We visit the amusement park a lot,

we each occasionally find ourselves in the darkness for a moment,

but we are home! 

I love being home!

 

 

His mercies are new every morning...

As I begin this post,

our home is still and quiet,

the sky outside just beginning to show pale gray light.

The dog has had his morning romp

and is sleeping by the fireplace.

The kitties are snuggled on our bed with my Lanny Love.

I have spent an hour and half sitting in my cozy chair,

Bible, journal and book at the ready.

It has become one of my favorite times of day.

 

I am not a morning person.

I never have been.

If I didn't have to be up early,

I wasn't!

I used to sleep until late morning or early afternoon

on Saturdays and vacation days!

And even when I had to be up at O'dark-thirty for work,

I wasn't really awake until about 10am,

always scheduling rote tasks early

and brain tasks for mid-morning and later.

That part is similar still 

so the first part of my early mornings

always consist of time wasters like social media

until my brain both settles and wakes up.

So despite the fact that I am usually awake

sometime between 4:30am and 5:30am, 

I am still not a morning person.

 

I have occasionally wondered what changed.

Why, when I no longer have to be at work early,

do I wake and rise so early?

It always comes back to the same event:

becoming a widow.

A lot of things changed permanently with that one event.

 

Now, one wouldn't think there would be positives in widowhood

when one has been happily married.

But I'm a silver lining girl.

And I looked for those things in the early days.

Because not seeing the silver linings

didn't change a single thing.

I was still widowed if I didn't see them.

 

Once I got through that initial shocking, confusing, anguish,

I began, with the Holy Spirit's help,

looking for those bits of silver shining behind the dark, ominous clouds.

I remember one of the early silver lining realizations

was that I could pick up and and go whenever I wanted.

I love to travel, my Al did not

so while those trips were not pleasure trips

but rather grief-escape attempts,

still, I could simply decide on my own to go somewhere

and do it.

Small reward, it seemed, for an unwanted state,

but a silver lining nonetheless so I embraced it.

I learned to look for those things and,

after a while,

I didn't have to look so hard.

I simply saw and appreciated them.

I still do.

 

There has been a lot of permanent silver since my widowhood.

The silver I most embrace and nurture is relationship,

specifically, my relationship with God

and my relationship with my Lanny Love.

 

I am different now.

I must honestly say

I didn't appreciate what I had in my marriage to Al.

Or probably any of my relationships, truth be told.

But now I know more fully...

 

Life is fragile!

 

Those irritations and inconveniences are minor!

They should be counted as joyous opportunities

to serve one's people and grow love!

 

I am a better wife to my Lanny Love

than I was to my Al.

That makes me sad.

And glad.

 

It is my habit when I wake in the mornings

to lie in bed for a half hour

until I can have coffee

(I take a pill that requires the wait...)

During that time,

I love snuggling up against my Lanny Love,

    feeling his warmth,

        hearing his heart beat,

            listening to his deep, steady breaths,

                thanking my God for His unending mercy,

                    His greatest gift but salvation.

                        My Lanny Love.

 

 

The steadfast love of the LORD never ceases;

His mercies never come to an end;

they are new every morning;

great is your faithfulness.

                                ~~ Lamentations 3: 22-23 ~~

The last first date

He beat me to the restaurant

that was always my "first date" choice

since it allowed escape from the parking lot

without being followed.

You'd be surprised...

 

And there he was...

He was standing in the lobby

directly across from the door.

I recognized him immediately since,

unlike most men I'd met,

he mostly looked like his profile pictures -

but better!

Much, much better!!!

 

We had spent a significant amount of time

emailing from the eHarmony site,

copious, deep, revealing emails.

I'd done my due diligence,

including discovering a mutual friend

who gave him a ringing endorsement!

 

I was already half in love when I agreed to a date.

 

We spent three hours that night

across from each other in a booth -

an untouched bowl of chips and salsa between us.

What a man!

Giving up chips and salsa

because I couldn't eat them

during my Lent commitment!

 

We talked and laughed.

We shared some deep, serious moments.

We never left our seats.

For three hours.

For people of a certain age -

which we were -

that's significant!

Suddenly we looked around and realized

we were the only customers in the restaurant

and chairs were being stacked on the tables!

It was time to go!

 

He walked me to my car

where we stood and talked for another 15 - 20 minutes.

Then, he stood in the same spot and watched

as I drove away.

No need to be sure I wasn't being followed!

What a gentleman he was!

 

It was my last first date!

 

A few weeks later we exchanged our first of many

"I love you!"s

And just over nine months later,

we exchanged wedding vows.

 

Our path to great love 

and contentment with one another 

was not easy!

But then things worth having rarely are!

It was grief filled!

It was lonely!

Even during our dating months

there were feelings of confusion;

feelings of guilt, as if we were cheating;

there was a scary moment of potential heartbreak where,

on one of my tearful walks

during our isolation from one another,

the Holy Spirit whispered,

"Do you trust Me?

Then trust Me with this!"

and I knew for certain that I was ready,

that he was the one and that, 

if his time of seeking God revealed he wasn't ready,

I would wait for as long as it took. 

Turned out he was ready too.

That long week in May

resulted in a whole-hearted giving of ourselves

to one-another and a basic time-line to marriage.

 

We have marveled many times

over the things we had in common,

the ways we can see from before we even knew one another,

that God's intention was to bring us together.

We marvel at, from the beginning, 

how similar our thoughts are.

How similar our desires.

How similar our tastes.

How we say and do "couple" things,

and always have,

that normally take years of marriage.

How it feels like we've always known one another.

 

In my life, I have received many incredible gifts!

But, outside of salvation, 

the greatest gift,

    the most amazing gift,

        the most marvelous gift, 

is the gift God gave me in this remarkable man,

    this healing relationship,

        this "beauty from ashes",

            my extraordinary husband, 

                my Lanny Love!

 

I am so glad for that February 28th eight years ago

when God brought together two widowed individuals

for their last first dates

and over the next months,

grew them into one!

I didn't really understand Job before my Lanny Love.

How could new children be fulfilling and joyous

when the first children were still lost???

Now I understand!

After Job had prayed for his friends,

the LORD restored his fortunes 

and gave him twice as much as he had before. 

                                                                        ~~ Job 42:10 ~~ 

 

Our first photo together about six weeks after we met

 

A funny thing happened...

It really wasn't funny,

it was actually quite delightful,

a lovely experience.

It wasn't the first time something similar happened,

but it was the most unusual.

 

Recently, we met a young man

while picking up a FB Marketplace purchase.

Negotiations were settled to both our satisfactions

and the sale was final when we arrived

so I don't believe there was anything "kissy" about it.

 

When we arrived at his home,

I texted that we were there

and as we walked up the path

talking and holding hands,

he opened the door and exclaimed,

"Y'all are rock stars!"

Now this was shortly after the Superbowl

and we giggled as we thought of the commercial.

As we entered his home,

he continued to stare at us.

Several times he commented on

how he could see the love we had for one another.

We briefly shared our story,

commenting on how God had so richly blessed us!

Finally, as we were leaving with our lamps, he said,

"I want what you have someday!"

 

Now people often comment on our glowing love.

It is obvious in our countenance and our actions.

Even relative strangers,

people we have only recently met,

even people met on the same day,

see and comment on our obvious love and respect for one another.

But this is the first time 

there was such an immediate reaction.

And it is lovely to know our love is so radiant. 

But it gave me pause as well.

Is my love and respect for Christ so radiant

that others immediately see it

and want what I have?

 

Once upon a time...

...and they lived happily ever after.

 

We all want the fairy tale, don't we?

We want Prince Charming

    and the castle

        and the horse-drawn carriage.

 

But the fairy tale doesn't come without a price!

There's the wicked step-mother 

with the poison apple.

(Is "wicked" step-mother even a real thing???) 

    The wicked step-sisters

    with the dirty hearth.

        The wicked witch

        with her tall tower. 

 

At the beginning of "once upon a time"

life is good,

filled with love and light.

At the end is "happily ever after".

But that middle stuff really stinks!

It feels unsurvivable!

It's dark and heavy and lonely!

It's that way in real life!

I got the "happily ever after"

with my Lanny Love

and he with me!

And I love our fairy tale

that is not fairy tale at all

but, rather, delightful reality!

But the happily ever after,

fairy tale life

came with a price.

Widowhood is hard!!!

My Lanny Love felt life held nothing.

I felt that life held nothing.

It felt unsurvivable!

But it wasn't!

 

And, really, don't you suppose

Sleeping Beauty and Cinderella and Rapunzel

all thought the ending was worth the middle?

I sure do!

Now, "happily ever after"

may not mean remarriage for you.

 

For example, Hansel and Gretel didn't involve marriage.

Nor did Little Red Riding Hood. 

Or Jack in the Beanstalk.

But they all lived happily ever after!

 

God has a plan!

And this time of deep sorrow and loneliness

is survivable!!!

Hang on...

...Your happily ever after won't look like mine...

 

...But your happily ever after is there!

 

How do you get it?

Quit living in and for the past.

    I know that's not easy!

    It takes work and determination and trust in God!

    You can do it!!!

 

Quit expecting God's version of your happily ever after

to look like yours.

    I know that's not easy!

    It takes work and determination and trust in God!

    You can do it!!! 

 

Accept His gifts, 

they're far better than you could hope or imagine!

  

 

I will restore to you the years 

that the swarming locust has eaten, 

the hopper, the destroyer, and the cutter, 

my great army, which I sent among you. 

“You shall eat in plenty and be satisfied, 

and praise the name of the Lord your God, 

who has dealt wondrously with you. 

                                                ~~ Joel 2:25-26 ~~

How do I love thee...

I wish I had the ability

to create poetry that would

through generations of lovers

be used to express

"the depth and breadth and height"

of romantic love for another.

~~ How Do I Love Thee (Sonnet 43), Elizabeth Barrett Browning ~~

 

I wish I possessed the genius

to pen and compose a great song

to sing how "I'm born again"

with his amazing love

~~ With You I'm Born Again, Carol Connors, David Shire

Recorded by Billy Preston & Syreeta Wright ~~

I wish that my words

of love, passion, admiration and respect

for my most beloved

could inspire God Himself

to use them as instruction and example

of true, deep, romantic love

for all of time to come.

~~ Song of Songs (Solomon), The Bible ~~

 

But then, there are no words after all

that would adequately convey

the wonder that is my Lanny Love

and how deeply we are one together.

 

But I wish there were...

 

I have found the one my soul loves

                                        ~~ Song of Songs 3:4 ~~

Ten years...

An entire decade!

How is that even possible???

Is it even real?

Was that life a figment of my imagination?

Are you???

 

An entire decade since I last saw your face. 

An entire decade since I "tucked you in"

    one last time...

This day was harder than the one five days earlier

    when you drew your last breath

for it was the last day you would be

    physically with me.

And there was no softening by the gratitude

    that you were no longer suffering

        only the knowledge that I was seeing you

            for the last time.

 

I can feel your presence recently.

You are "with" me constantly again.

Mostly now, you are my shadow, 

there even at the brightest, overhead noonday sun

and there in even the darkest midnight.

You follow me through this life with which God has blessed me.

My shadow, constant in your presence,

    coexisting with me as I move forward,

        but out of reach,

            now a black and white and gray water painting.

 

But sometimes,

    sometimes you are more than shadow.

Sometimes you are palpable,

    somehow physical in your presence,

        as if I can touch you,

            hear your voice,

                smell your scent,

vivid in your color, 

    almost within my reach,

        walking and contributing as if you were still here.

 

I was heartbroken when your colors began to fade,

    to run and blur,

        when you began to be shadow.

I felt I was losing you again, 

    more deeply than I already had.

But as time moved on,

I realized that it was for my benefit that this happened.

I couldn't really live 

    while I only walked fully with your memory.

 

I love your shadow now.

And I love those brief moments when you are more.

But can I tell you honestly?

Will you be hurt if I say it out loud?

It's uncomfortable and difficult when you are more

    for an extended period of time.

Because you are not, in fact, physically here.

You are, in fact, physically dead.

And walking fully with you in memory ten years later

    still inhibits my ability to 

        fully live in the amazing life God has given me.

It's uncomfortable, disconcerting, confusing.

 

You were another life.

That was so hard to face

     as I contemplated dating and remarriage.

This year I have relived those days over and over,

both the good ones and the difficult ones.

The missing has, again, become acute.

The longing has returned.

The loving has remained...

    ...as it will for always.

I love the life we shared!

 

But I love my current life too! 

And can I risk another admission?

I wouldn't change my current life if I could

    and I'm anxious for this to pass...

 

So here I am, ten years later,

laying you to rest once again.

It is infinitely different from that first time,

but similar to the other times I have done it since

and, I suspect, similar to those future times.

Rest well, my Alfie, rest well.

 

Ten years. 

An entire decade.

How is that even possible...

 

 There is a time for everything,
and a season for every activity under the heavens.

                        ~~ Ecclesiastes 3:1 ~~