One Life

Everybody deals with grief differently. Our responses to it are as unique as we are. It's not my place to judge how others grieve, nor would I want them to tell me how to grieve. I have chosen not to let grief  win.

When I found out Dan had died, I knew that my life would go on. I knew this with utter certainty. I consciously choose not to let Dan's death be my death too. It wasn't an option. I have three children who need their mom. I'm the only parent they have left. I owe it to them to  be as healthy mentally and physically as I can be. I owe it to myself. I owe it to Dan. The last thing he would ever have wanted would be for me to give up on life because he was gone  He loved life too much for that. He loved me too much for that.

 I love life. So I choose life. I choose not to be miserable. I know it is not going to be easy (and for the love of God people stop telling me how hard it's going to be. I get it. I'm living it everyday).

There will be hard days. There will be days I stumble. There will be days the loneliness engulfs me like a Bay of Fundy fog. But the fog will lift, and a new day will come. And eventually the good days will out number the bad.

I will enjoy my double doubles and my gin and tonic (without drinking so many that my lips get numb). I will savor the taste of fine Norwegian or Dutch or Irish chocolate (yes I've gotten lots of yummy care packages, I love my friends). I will inhale the scent of the ocean I love so much (but not the smell of rotting seaweed, that stuff is just nasty). I will treasure my friends and the time I spend with them. I will laugh, most especially I will laugh.

I will always love Dan. I will always miss him. I will always be sad he is gone. There is absolutely nothing I can do to change what happened to Dan. Nothing. The only thing I can control is how I respond to it. He would be the first one to tell me to get on with it, to pick myself up, dust myself off, and start all over again. And so I will.

I have absolutely no idea what this new life has in store for me. Or if I will spend it alone. I hope I won't, only time will tell. The only thing I do know for sure is that  I will never join the army (they won't let me join as a CO or an RSM, and I really hate ironing). Oh, and I also know I'm  not going to move to a commune as I'm not particularly fond of goat leggings, which a friend tells me are a must to join a commune.

We only get one life to live, and this is mine. It's time I start living it again.

Life was meant to be lived, and curiosity must be kept alive. One must never, for whatever reason, turn his back on life. ~Eleanor Roosevelt