how did i get here?

my husband, my beautiful Dragon, died suddenly at 12:03 AM on 9 February 2009. there was a cold, lovely full moon and 3 feet of snow on the ground. i "slept" for the following 10 months and "woke" to the physical and emotional pain and torments of deep grief. i "woke" to find i had moved the day of his funeral and that i am lost. i am looking for me while i figure out the abstract, unanswerable questions that follow behind any death. my art has evolved. his death changed that as well because i am forever changed and will forever bear the mark of losing the only man i can ever love.
there is alive and there is dead and there is a place in between. i am here wholly in my heart for my children, but i feel empty inside at this time. i miss him. i have not gotten very far in my grief journey. i make no apologies for this.
this is my place, my blog, where i write to tell the universe that i am still here.

Wednesday, October 14, 2009

Halloween and beyond

it's happening again. every night i go to sleep and the world doesn't end. the next day comes, time marches on, and i have to get up and live. my daughter got married. Halloween is coming and after that...... i can't cope with after that.

i had to go get more embroidery floss and i always feel a small level of thrill at the thought of looking at all the colors. i'd love to have one of each. can't but it's a dream. walked through the doors and, though i anticipated the early arrival of snowmen and Santa, trees and ornaments, i didn't anticipate the sudden inability to breathe.

it's going to come whether i can cope with it or not so i better put on my big girl pants and start practicing. i'll start with Halloween.

he loved Halloween. said it was the one day he didn't have to put on a mask. funny man. he was always a pirate. he said it was his true nature. he'd do the "arrrrr" sound deep in his throat and it was never hokey. the man could pull it off.

we'd go to the farm stands. they are all over New England. out of the larger cities, you can't throw a stone for hitting a small orchard that has a farm stand. i love them. i'm going to miss them. the photo is of the one we could walk to. yeah, an orchard close to the ocean. the man's land has been in his family since America belonged to the King of England. it sits close to Dogtown and isn't large by New England standards but is delightful to see considering all the terminal moraines and granite outcroppings that litter the coastline north of Boston gratis of the last ice age. the owner has enough dirt to maintain apple trees and a host of other vegetables. also bees for honey and, as a sideline his daughter brought in, a small shop that sells to the tourist crowds with things brought in plus art from the locals. she took in and sold my driftwood sculptures there. i was just getting a foothold in the community with my art - my sculptures, my stained glass, and my textiles.

we were going to have a good, quiet life by the ocean. we would go out after storms to find the driftwood and treasures the ocean had thrown back. i would create art from the things abandoned by even Mother Nature.

but he died. the only dragons i have are the ones i'm embroidering. he's around, i guess. but i hope more and more that he doesn't see me like this. i pray he's happy in Heaven and doesn't know how lonely and sad i am; that he doesn't see me ache for him like i do. i'm trying so hard to "get better" as it's been put, but i am slower i guess than others. i'm taking my time to "get better."

us finding each other was a miracle. i thanked God everyday for him. i told him every day how handsome i think he is, how much i love him. he knew. he knows. it's me that doesn't know. so much of my family has died. i'm so very alone. my two children are so great at making sure i'm alright. i just can't talk to them about some things because they are my children however adult they are.

i miss him. i got my full moon photos printed. all 9 of them. the one from the night he died and the other 8 that have occurred since he died. the man at the photo store said, "very nice moon photos. i can see your passion for the full moon." i didn't tell him it marks the passing of another month since my husband died. this "passion" seems too eccentric to put my face and name to it.

i saw the weather this morning. there's a hard freeze warning out tonight for Rockport. wind off the ocean will be chilling.

frost on the pumpkins. oh, Lord, how i miss my Dragon.

5 comments:

Chillin' with Lemonade said...

oh dear friend. seasons changing is so hard. just a reminder that "life doesn't stop". i went shopping with a friend yesterday and she was so excited about buying fall decorations and my whole body just clenched and stopped. Couldn't do it last year, and apparently I can't do it this year either.

Supa Dupa Fresh said...

Now I miss him too. LOVE

X

Supa

Widow in the Middle said...

You always say so much in your posts. I enjoy getting to know more about you. What a creative spirit and nature you have! With your Dragon you were creating driftwood sculptures (how very cool). Now, despite your loss, you are channeling that creativity into taking the moon pictures. That is such a subtle and unique idea. It says so much about you as a person - your artistry, your strength in marking each month in such a naturalistic way.

I just think you have shown remarkable courage and fortitude in facing and getting through the past eight months. You are so totally not eccentric! I am inspired by your self-sufficiency and the unusual ways you are honoring your Dragon. I would have told the photo guy why I was taking the pictures. I like the discomfort it puts people in when I say I am a widow because I think it makes people take some stock in their lives (if only for that moment).

I totally get your desire to have all the floss colors. I would like to have a skein of all the colors of my favorite yarn (Brown Sheep Lambs Pride Wool). Just to have them displayed like a rainbow where I could look at them and be inspired for my art projects. Thanks for sharing that - it was a little piece of you that touched me inside.

abandonedsouls said...

Chillin' with lemonade, thank you for your thoughts, your admission. i don't feel like such a failure.

Supa Dupa, always so good to hear from you. love back to you.

Widow in the Middle, sometimes i can explain that i am a widow but more times than not, i am not brave enough to fight the tears i know will come should i say the words out loud. my art is my only voice in reality, other than my writing which is done anonymously. the quilts are for others and my income. i love being able to do them for people as it makes me believe i've made a difference. i haven't changed their status. i haven't cured anything. but maybe in the darkest of moments, i've brought comfort. as for honoring my Dragon. he deserves it, i can't not do it, and it brings me my own comfort. everything i sew for him, in his name, will last through my two children and on so that others will know him, will know he lived, and hopefully will believe in Dragons.

Boo said...

My heart goes out to you as I strongtly identify with what you speak about in this post, the marking of time since you lost your dragon, and how much you miss him, the fact that the pain is so raw and exposed despite months having passed ... I miss the presence and the charisma, some facets of his being that I only recently understood that I missed about him, the never ending list of what I miss can be added onto until I draw my last breath and go to be with him again, you put into language far more succinct yet clearer than I have been able to express right here and now. I love the analogies that you bring to the loss/grief work that we are tasked with. I can credit myself with applying a whole load of water/ocean/ boat related expressions, but yours are far more colourful. Simply calling your love and soulmate a dragon makes it so clear to those of us not fortunate enough to have met him in this world, in this time ... but i believe that we shall one day and I for one will be glad that I cared about you and never meant you any harm at all as opposed to someone who might have treated you less kindly ;-) I say it in jest but am very serious in fact when I explain what I feel and truly believe. They are waiting patiently for us, I wonder if we have to complete our lessons that they tried to get us started on ... if we have to prove that we are strong enough to be rewarded for accomplishing some hurdles or obstacles that appear large to us, and there is another thing that you give us - the ability to provoke thought and on a pretty philosophical basis, applying imagination too and testing our faith, without fear of being laughed at. I love you for being you and being in my life.

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