So This Is What It's Like

So, today's musings involve the weirdness that is 'widowhood'. Thanks to the Social Security Administration, I now know that my marriage ended "due to death"...wow, to see it phrased like that in black and white...well, it just really sucked to be honest.

I've been a wife for almost twenty years. My image of a widow was not this, not me, and not now. I'm not some wrinkly old silver haired grandma type. Sure, my mom-body(x5) could easily stand to lose 50 lbs, I've got at least a dozen gray hairs popping up, a variety of wrinkles, a slew of scars from biopsies and lymph node dissections, plus some random gnarly chin whiskers but for goodness sake- I am a widow now too! An odd feeling. I have my kids, my family, my friends, but essentially I am just me now- no longer a couple, a team, a pair. No "you and me against the world" mentality of our young love. Just me. Both a bit frightening but liberating a little too,in a purely strange way.

I look around the house, so much to do on my mental 'To Do' List, probably not much of it urgent or even necessary. Daunting to realize it is all ultimately my responsibility now. Pat truly is gone and all of this falls on me. As a military wife for many years and through several deployments, I have managed just fine and like many military wives- I basically ran the show 99% of the time anyway, even when deployments weren't involved! I know I can get things done and I have plenty of support and help but the strange thing for me is not having to consider another person's opinion, ideas or needs. If I want a pink flowered, girly girl bedroom I can have it. I don't need to keep those ugly knick-knacks on display just because they were a gift from some random airport gift shop from some medical conference trip. I can wear my super ugly orange striped granny sweater with the zipper in the front whenever I feel like it and sing as loud as I want to Kenny Chesney in the car. No one else cares about those things now. It makes me sad and unsettled to think of it but I am hopeful that in time I will adjust. And no, I am not going to have a frilly pink anything decorating my house- seriously people!

So, in a nutshell the new normal I'm at right now is a little bit more responsibility, a dash of freedom and a heap of alone-ness all wrapped up and stamped with a big check mark in the box labeled "WIDOW". It's surreal at best, heart-wrenching at it's worst but I am shuffling through it nonetheless. I have a box full of sympathy cards with more trickling in each day. I am buoyed by kind thoughts and prayers more than I can say. I still cry when it suits me- usually in the grocery store of all places, but I can think of Pat and our happier times and feel blessed. I look at our wonderful kids and know I am blessed. I saw a rainbow today and it made me smile and glad I am alive to appreciate the small things. Not so sure I am okay being a 'widow' but I'm doing my best to keep my humor about it. Life is still very very good after all.

Today's Glass Half-Full: "A widow is a fascinating being with the flavor of maturity, the spice of experience, the piquancy of novelty, the tang of practiced coquetry, and the halo of one man's approval." ~ Helen Rowland