This morning I slept in a bit, my arm around one of the dogs,
wrapped up in the warm comforter.
When I did wake, I took a nice warm shower and
put on the 90s-style velvety knit sweater –
I bought it last year at a thrift store.
I remember coming home and modeling the clothes for you.
I set out in the car,
the mid-morning sun kissed my skin through the windows.
The blue Colorado sky greeted me with a few wispy white clouds.
The air was still chilly, but the heater in the car quickly overwhelmed.
I had to alternate between cooling and heating.
I stopped and got some coffee –
but if you had been with me, we would’ve stopped somewhere else.
You don’t care for Jack in the Box iced coffee like I do.
I wouldn’t have cared where we stopped, as long as you were with me.
What some people might have seen as wishy-washy resolve on my part,
was really that my love for you was stronger than my coffee preference.
What does it matter where we stop for coffee or breakfast –
making you happy and being with you is better than the world’s best coffee.
The sun on my skin felt so nice, so warm.
I had an audiobook playing, and traffic wasn’t bad.
When I got to my destination – a little shopping on a weekend morning,
I quickly found a parking spot, and the store was not too crowded.
Just how I like it!
I started browsing, when all of a sudden a huge surge of grief came in,
unexpected and incredibly strong.
I was surrounded by a place you loved shopping at,
trinkets all around that you would smile at and show me.
Fun foods that you would toss in our basket, grinning.
I would try to negotiate, but likely give in,
knowing we didn’t stop there too often.
I tried to blink away the tears, and kept looking around the store,
doing my best to will away the panic that was rising within me.
Eventually, the immediate surge of grief relented,
and I got everything I needed and went to the check-out.
Back in the car, the tears fell.
The sun, still warm and pleasant, felt wrong.
This is what should be a perfectly enjoyable weekend day.
I have a massage later, and a gathering with friends tonight.
But without you, things aren’t okay, even when they are.
Even when the sun is shining and I get a great parking spot.
Even when I get to sleep in snuggled and warm with the pups.
Even when I start using a great new soap in the shower.
Right now I am always surrounded by a cloud of grief,
a cloud that colors everything at all times, and makes things feel wrong.
I don’t know how long this will last.
I know I will always be touched by grief,
touched by the lightning strikes that hit my life in 2019.
I do hope that I will eventually get my arms around my grief,
such that I can perhaps enjoy some Saturday shopping without tears.
But for now, I remind myself that my grief is mine,
and that it is okay that I am not okay, even when it feels like I should be.
I am doing what I can, when I can.
I am functioning and socializing.
I am here, being, feeling, and living in this “life after”.