Kateri and I weren’t exactly “texters”… or really even cell phone users, but for some reason I had started texting her when the time was 1:23 or 12:34 or 3:45 or 2:34… you get the idea. I’ve always enjoyed numbers. At the ranch where Kateri and I met, there really wasn’t much to do in the winter if you weren’t working, or snowmobiling, or snowshoeing… or any of the other things you do when there’s 5 feet of snow out the window… with another 4 feet on top of that. So I watched movies here and there, put together puzzles, hung out with the other seasonal riff raff, and read a few books. Some of those books were filled with stories, some were filled with history, and some were filled with exciting tid bits of information like how the Fibonacci Sequence shows up in the arrangement of the seeds of a sunflower. Over the years I have read less and less about “math” as my interests turned towards other things… like cooking, guitar, and hanging out with Kateri… and now I think I’ve dumbed myself down to where I simply get excited when I look at the clock and it reads 4:56! Which I guess has nothing to do with equations or mathematics… but it’s a fun little observance that has absolutely no real significance in my day to day life… and I guess I thought Kateri needed to know when the numbers lined up!
There are so many little things that pop into my head throughout the day that remind me of life with Kateri. Lately, for one reason or another, the memories have been coming in a bit more frequently. They aren’t all big memories of exciting times, or holidays, or those special moments that are only shared between the two people experiencing them… some are little tiny random blips that show up and turn into bigger blips… like texting Kateri 12:34. I don’t know how many times I texted her when the numbers were all lined up on the clock… but I do remember that once in a great while I would receive a text from her and all it would say is 1:23… and it put a smile on my face. I knew the only reason she was doing it was because she knew I got a strange little kick out of it and looking back on it, it’s just one of those little things in my past life that now has a whole bunch more attached to it. It’s kinda like these memories are little tug boats pulling twenty years of experiences behind them with all the emotions piled up high on the barge. Once that tug boat gets to it’s destination… it’s just a matter of time until those emotions need to be unloaded from the barge… and I never know if it’s gonna get unloaded quickly… or take longer than expected!… and there’s always another tug boat coming up the river with an emotional barge in tow.
Widower Notes n Thoughts:
- Kateri’s plants… I still view them as her’s and not mine. Broadly speaking, they provide me with a living connection to her that I need to pay attention to, take care of, and keep alive… which provides me with a sense of accomplishment along with being surrounded by other living things.
- I grabbed a coat from a closet and saw Kateri’s mustard yellow and redish coat. I haven’t gotten rid of or packed her coats away, so they have just been hanging in the spare rooms. This specific coat always made me think of how un-Kateri it was. It was kinda new, kinda stylish, kinda modern. Kateri was most comfy in well worn clothes and flannels, but she also really liked getting dressed up… it made her feel good… and she always looked good no matter what she was wearing!
- My guitar has provided me with an escape from the crushing onslaught of emotions, thoughts, and memories the death of Kateri brought into my life.
It provides me relief. When she first died and I realized I was playing almost every day… I bought myself a new guitar… a new sound. It provided me change, but with the comfort of familiarity. This year, I thought I would take advantage of my solitude and buy myself an amplifier because of the whole “I’m not gonna bother anyone”… and plus I needed a little personal growth with my hobby. I wanted a few more options with how my “Escape Time” sounded as I searched for relief from the swirling thoughts… and it has been working. Like everything else in this new life, I try to fill time and space with people and experiences that make me feel good… with the hope of dampening down all the crap. Unfortunately… the crap is always there. But fortunately… I can sometimes swap it out for a few moments of “The Good” in the world through walks in the woods with neighbors, conversations on the couch, Stewart’s Orange Soda, Ben and Jerry’s… or simply the strumming of strings. - The cold toilet seat-I took a crap the other morning in the downstairs bathroom and the toilet seat (and bathroom) was a tit bit nipply… almost to the point of invigorating. As I sat there, it made me think about how we put the portable radiator in there when Kateri was sick so that it would keep the space… and toilet seat… warm, since she spent most of her time downstairs next to the wood stove when cancer first appeared… and we were remodeling the upstairs bathroom. (the bathroom in which she put the first hole in the wall… but never saw it finished… or took a bath in her tub surrounded by subway tile.)
- I’ve been falling asleep to music lately… Tom Waits. I haven’t been able to listen to the Allison Kraus/Robert Plant album… we would fall asleep to that album or Neil Young’s Harvest Moon quite a bit. I just can’t do it… it feels too weird. It’s weird enough that the music emits from the little JBL speaker I had bought for Kateri when she was in the hospital so that she could listen to the Dali Lama chanting as she tried to relax and rest.
- Squishy… I sleep with Squishy every night. Squishy was one of Kateri’s pillows. She called it Squishy because it was… Squishy. I still only use the pillow case with the three flowers on the front for it… any other pillow case just doesn’t seem to be the right fit. I still use my pillow… Squishy just happens to be crammed under or behind it, as well.
- Food storage containers-Kateri bought us a bunch of food storage containers for our first Christmas in our first “Home”… the Schoolhouse. Every time I open the bottom drawer and grab one to put half an onion in, or maybe some leftover roasted root vegetables, it makes me think of that Christmas… and her. .
- I was so proud of myself for getting the studded snow tires on the Jeep before the first snow flew. Then I drove over a screw and had to use my un-studded full size spare for 4 days… and it snowed. Luckily, I only had to buy one new tire and not four.
- Kateri bought these current snow tires… our first ones studded… which is one of those weird memory type things. She bought them almost two years ago and I remember she had a doctor’s appointment the same day because of the headaches she was having… which turned out to actually be tumors.
It’s a hard memory for me because I remember not being very sympathetic to her headache. It was before we knew what was going on and I thought it was just a headache that would go away in time… but it never did… and I’m reminded of that morning by stupid studded snow tires… two years later. (I’ve written this down before and I just find it interesting how it’s one of those recurring memories that is time specific. I wonder if this memory is gonna visit me every year when the weather changes and the people start freaking out with the first forecast snow. I swear… people lose their minds!)
- Kateri bought these current snow tires… our first ones studded… which is one of those weird memory type things. She bought them almost two years ago and I remember she had a doctor’s appointment the same day because of the headaches she was having… which turned out to actually be tumors.
- I hope you have a wonderful Sunday… and thanks for stopping by!
ps… I thought it would be cool to post this blog at 12:34… but then I had to tend to the fire and missed it!
I established a draft! Yup… it’s pretty exciting! Not like a draft in the writing sense of the word… with my new woodstove and chimney. If you don’t know what I’m talking about… you’re missing out on one of the best things about cold weather… a hot spot to stand next to! It’s been kind of a fun challenge dialing in the new stove, but also kinda frustrating when I can’t get it to burn as efficiently as it should. Plus, when it’s 26 degrees out, like this morning… I wanna be all toasty and warm!
You know, do some shit outside… clean and organize the garage, take down window boxes, try to leaf blow the leaves from my yard to the empty land across the road without “Sunday Traffic” seeing me!… while periodically coming in to stoke the fire to keep The Schoolhouse nice and warm. It’s the first day in a bit that I would have this opportunity so I thought I would just go with it, go slow, relax, and enjoy the Sunday Morning doing a few things that would make me happy… like drinking coffee in bed as I hear the tick of cast iron warming my home.
It’s been a year and a half since Kateri passed away… that just seems all sorts of fucked up to me. It’s weird because at some points it seems like it has been that long (whatever that means)… and at other times it seems like yesterday. Actually, anytime I think about Kateri it seems like yesterday… which is hard… and the main reason why I have to try and manage my emotions much of the time. I can function in society without breaking down in the grocery store or coffee shop… but I still don’t care if I do. Although I haven’t become comfortable living my life without Kateri (I just want her back)… I have become more comfortable with my situation… and all the bullshit that comes along with it. Mourning the loss of a spouse is one of those “Big Life” experiences that happens to be somewhat complicated and I realize I am just settling into this whole grieving process… because it’s gonna be around for a while! Oh, it’s gonna change here and there… maybe it’ll even take a break once in a while… but it’s not going anywhere. I’m just learning to live with it.
Ok. So all I really wanted to say is that… for me… 536 days into this experience is about the time that I needed to make the decision to start looking at the future a tiny bit more. I’m tired of the “routine”. Yes, there are things I have been doing that provide me joy (guitar, sitting by the fire or on the porch, eating cake pops, etc.), but those things are literally to get through the day. Losing a spouse is crushing… in every aspect of your life… at least it has been for me. We do things… anything… to just… not… hurt. (To give you a glimpse into the emotional state of this widower… I saw Kateri’s name in a sentence I wrote… and now I’m a wreck. I love her name… how it looks… everything that fills those letters and the spaces in between. That it was who she was.) But getting back to the point… I’m ready for change. I feel the need to make some small changes… and I’m ready for some big ones, as well. (ummm, FYI… not toooo big of changes… or too many!… or ones on a whim! Even though whims make for good adventures). I just feel the need to take a step back, take a moment, and move forward with a bit more focus on having my happiness and well being in mind going into the future.
The friend I was with was female… (ummm, and she still is)… so when R. asked if we were The Schoolhouse people it made for an interesting introduction when I had to explain that the schoolhouse was mine and my wife’s first home… that my friend is not my wife and that I live alone… because my wife died from cancer. Fun!
We were talking in the kitchen the other day how we couldn’t believe September is more than halfway over! Seeing the trees already trading in their bright green leaves for the vibrant reds, yellows, and oranges of Autumn Time in New England (well, Vermont) came up a bit quicker than expected… but then again… I don’t know where the summer went… or the last 17 months.
I’ve been kinda freaking out about losing pictures and videos… memories… as the time keeps piling up so I started going through them in an attempt to organize them… it’s a slow process. I realized we all get a YouTube account with our google account so I figured I would at least throw the videos I have hanging out on my phone on there so that they are consolidated, I could expand the sharing of this experience, and I could learn a bit more about this technology stuff. Again… slow process.
I took three days off of work last week… I felt that I needed to. I’ve been trying to take some time off during the summer, but it just didn’t really happen until this week. I’ve been feeling like I need a bit of time to address some of the obstacles this new life has put in front of me. It’s strange for me to think that it has 497 days… because I face it every single day. So at points it still feels like it literally just happened… and other times I can feel the space growing between points in the timeline. Either way, at the beginning of my Mini Vacation I had no plans on painting my bedroom… but I’m glad I did.
I guess this is just me giving an example of why some people compare the effects of traumatic experiences to roller coaster rides. My last blog post was pretty darn positive… the good shit in this new life! I’m actually trying to be a pretty darn positive person… but sometimes things pop into my head on the 40 minute drive home through the vibrant green hills. Like memories. I’m gonna keep this short.
needed the space to try and be comfortable. Somewhere in the last of month of her life, I was tucking her into bed when she said, “You can sleep in here if you want?”…. but by the time I was done trying to figure out hospital stuff, insurance stuff, cancer stuff, life stuff… she was asleep, looking as comfortable as she could be, and I didn’t want to do anything that would ruin that. So I laid on the bed above the covers, held her for a bit, and simply kissed her goodnight.
Well… as of today it has been a year since I started jotting some thoughts down pertaining to this whole widower thing on this little bloggery I have called Thirty Days of Mo(u)ring. Yup… a year. I have published 74 (75 now!) posts, learned a bit about how these things work, learned a bit about myself, have gotten some lovely words of encouragement, and have had strangers come into my world that I would now consider my friends… ish. I had absolutely no idea what I was gonna be doing with this blog, how I was gonna do it, or really even why (still don’t), but a few people have reached out to me to say “thanks for sharing… it has helped me get through my shit.”… and I can’t tell you how much that warms my innards.
Well, currently sitting in my garage because it’s cooler than the front porch right now and I don’t wanna be inside. I just let the chickens out so that they could feel the grass between their toes… and eat all the ticks. Today is one of those days that I’m willing to risk having to deal with death so that the chickens can enjoy being chickens. (when you live in the woods… there are creatures that rather enjoy eating chicken for dinner… hopefully not tonight, though!) Yup, today I’m just going with the flow. It’s kind of what I’ve been doing for the last week or two… which has been both good and… well… aggravating on some fronts.
Independence Day was fantastic. A friend and I had a wonderfully Vermonty 4th of July with parades (well… a parade), swimming holes, creamies, grilled burgers, macaroni salad, homemade key lime pie (not my home), fireworks and all! It kinda sucked getting a flat tire on the way down to the fireworks… and having the wheel decide it didn’t wanna come off for a bit even though the lug nuts were on the asphalt… but the spare made it on and we made it in time to watch shit explode! Personally, I love the fact that we both sorta rolled with it. We tried something with the tire… didn’t work… I tried it again! Oh hey, my AAA is non-existent…?… let’s try yours! Once we actually got to the point that a tow truck was coming, I just started to kick one side of the tire and it popped off! So we canceled the wrecker, threw on the full size spare (thank God… or something… that it was full size), drove to the town just south of the parking lot we were in, and enjoyed the rest of the evening! Rolling with it!… until it cost me $303 to throw 4 old tires on the Jeep and to replace the sensor that the flat tire destroyed. (Actually still rolling with it at that point… just reluctantly)
I’m just gonna say it… I just lost my shit (the emotional sobbing type) after reading someone’s post on FB. Yup, lost it. Loooosssst…… It. I was just so surprised by what this person had written! It was beautiful! It was powerful! It was posted by someone who was a part of my life in a time when I wore much smaller shoes. (well, not much smaller shoes… but smaller…. I was a kid) The post was touching, I had an attachment to the person… and there was a picture! It had all the makings of a moving moment! And then… then!… I realized it was one of those “copy and paste if you stand for/care for/believe in/proud of/hashtag whatever” things!… and everything changed.
I’ve gotta tell you… I meant to post this Yesterday. I felt good Yesterday. Yesterday was a good day… for no particular reason… just one of those nice, early summer days. Yup, good ol’ Yesterday. Now, Today is good, too. There isn’t really anything I could say that put a damper on Today… no big emotional moments… work was kinda fun… heck, I’m currently on my porch again… while listening to chickens as they scratch about… hopefully eating up all the ticks in the yard! Actually, I’ve had a good couple of days. I’ve been wanting to share some of the “Big Life” questions that I’ve been tackling lately… those that come along with losing your spouse… but I haven’t really had the time that I would want to devote to those topics.
(Yup, when I started this post it was NOT Mother’s Day… and now it is) Simply… after the one year mark… things are different… I feel different. I was gonna go into all the ways “this” has changed… or how “that” has been replaced by “those”, but there will be other times for all that jive. I just felt the need to say that through this experience, every once in a while there is a tangible feeling when a shift takes place. Kinda of like on the first day I didn’t cry… or when six months hit and I felt like I had a little bit of control over my life… and had to make decisions for myself. Although there is no destination, there’s this tedious little march going on that keeps pushing me forward and with every step, I overanalyze it… and then adapt to make the next step.
If you do, sometimes the big pile of shit get’s a couple of shovel loads taken out of it by three simple words… written in all caps… with exclamation marks. Sometimes… “GOOD, GOOD NEWS!!!!” pertains to the best news you’ve heard in a year and 19 days… at least for me. What’s the “GOOD, GOOD NEWS!!!!” you ask? The docs could no longer see any tumors in my mom’s brain!… yup, and we’ll take it!
It’s 7:35 in the morning… I’ve been up for about 47 minutes… and I don’t know what the fuck to say. I do know that the first text of the day came in a bit ago… and I’ve been crying those good ol’ crocodile tears ever since. Although I don’t really care if people see or hear me being emotional, I am sorta glad that I don’t have people walking past my house on their way to work or school hearing me as I sob uncontrollably while making odd noises through my mouth because my nose is so plugged up with snot! Kateri always said, “Trees make better neighbors!”… and right now I’m glad they are the ones right outside my window listening to me cope and come to terms with the fact that I haven’t been able to hear her laugh, hold her hand while walking down the dirt road, or kiss her goodnight… like I did every… single… night. It has been a year since Kateri has not been on this earth. For 365 days I have come home to an empty house filled with memories of a life that life decided to take away from me… from all of us. It hurts. It’s painful. It’s something I don’t want… but it’s what I’ve got… and I’m glad life didn’t take away the memories.
In the winter of 1998/99… December… Wyoming… I watched Kateri walk from The Chalet (female employee housing) down to the lodge, from the window of The Stables (male employee housing). She had on her blue snow pants, her white winter coat with the god awful neon patch work, and her funky hat from Nepal or some place (I should remember where she got it… she told me… it’s just not coming to me!) keeping her head warm. Kateri would sometimes tilt her head as she walked. I found the image to be calming. We didn’t really know each other at the time… we had just met. At the time, there weren’t any romantic inclining’s yet… she was just someone I found to be interesting. She was unique. There was something different about her. Thankfully, we got along and became friends!
For the last 365 days… and for the four months and three days before that… I have been consumed with either the experience of watching and being a part of cancer ravish Kateri’s body and brain, the loss of Kateri, or trying to figure out how to survive without her. It’s been a struggle. I don’t eat, I find it a challenge to put myself to bed, I’m stressed out worrying about my future, my job, my home. I’m sad, I’m confused, and I hurt… this process physically hurts… but I’m here. I’m here surrounded by the memories that Kateri and I made with each other as we built our life together. She gave me twenty years of memories to draw upon when I feel the need to be close to her. She filled our home with relics which are attached to experiences over those twenty years which I can hold in my hand, I can feel, I can smell… I can touch. Kateri will always be with me… a part of me. That’s just what happens. This last year has sucked balls, but the great things that Kateri brought into this world… into my world… are still here… even if she isn’t. That is how we hold on… to the people we love more than ourselves. That is how I hold on to Kateri… because I miss her… I love her… and I always will.
Last year, Easter fell on the 1st. It was actually three weeks before Kateri passed. It’s weird to think about… she wasn’t in Palliative Care yet. Heck, we hadn’t even received the bad news of no more options yet. Maria had just gotten to our house the day or two before… I think. She came to help… and to be with her sister. It was the three of us for the last three weeks of Kateri’s life… going through it… together. I am forever grateful to Maria for being here for many reasons, but it really comes down to the fact that I think Kateri needed her to be here. Kateri needed Maria to be with her as she was preparing to leave this earth… she needed her help… her support… her love. And Maria… needed to be with Kateri.
I didn’t remember the video when I stumbled upon it trying to clear space on my phone, so it sorta caught me by surprise. It’s hard for me to see Kateri in the “Cancer Time” and it’s quick, but it’s Kateri… through and through… in a space she loved… with people she loved.
This is kinda one of those “spur of the moment” posts. It’s cloudy and a bit chilly…. with large patches of snow adding to the coolness of the image out the ol’ schoolhouse windows. I’m still in comfy clothes… from last night… because I fell asleep on the couch after watching the first scary movie… alone… in said schoolhouse… since Kateri passed away (“The Silence”. At least it wasn’t a ghost/paranormal/psychological sorta movie. And… I survived!). I actually woke up at 6 something, but was comfortable enough and warm enough, so I just decided to stay horizontal… till 9:13!… (a.m.)… and not trudge upstairs. It’s been one of those slow moving/Tupelo Honey on the radio types of mornings… and it feels good. The coffee tastes nice, dark, and strong… and I’ve already gotten to have a nice visit with a friend from down the road. I even got to pull out power tools!… and use them in my front yard while still in those comfy clothes… with the addition of rubber boots! It was literally just replacing a couple of straps… but some people… well I… will take any opportunity to fix something using tools.
I had told myself… and I guess the digital world… that I wanted to take these next two weeks (the last two of the first year without Kateri) to mourn the loss of my wife. The other day, at the end of a conversation with a friend, he asked me, “What does that mean to you?”…. and I realized… I have no fucking idea! But I figure rememberin’ has somethin’ to do with it so that’s what I’m gonna do a little of and see how it goes. I mean… we’ll see… it took me three days, 2 baths, a pint of Ben n Jerry’s, two hours and 23 minutes of Aquaman, and 13 packages of pills (Smarties) to get through 8 photos! (yup, the kind you can hold in your hand)
Each with an arm wrapped around my shoulders… a hand on my leg… one on across my chest. I remember them just holding me as I was processing what was going on… while they were processing what was going on… and I just remember saying to Keith… “This is it. We’re here for a reason…. right?… this is it?”… and all he had to say was, “Yes.”
There’s a strip between the coop and the house… which I was excited about… and then the chickens crapped all over it! (At least they looked happy!)
It hit me last night… I’m trying to jam “healing” into a time frame and attaching it to all sorts of things. This is one reason I’m thankful I decided to use writing, to start a blog, as a tool for myself as I go through this process. Recently, my plan was to just get all those things that I associate with “widower” stuff on the blog by the one year anniversary of Kateri’s passing. I wanted it all there… consolidated… organized… so that I could start year 2 with a fresh and brighter outlook, but I can’t do it. Tomorrow is the anniversary of one of the roughest days of my life… the day we found out there were no other options (two immunotherapy treatments which had two drugs at each treatment… along with one radiation session… did absolutely nothing). The day after that is the ER. The day after that… Palliative Care.
We were progressive n shit. (Actually, we didn’t like the idea of changing her name… Kateri Lidstrom wasn’t who she was… and it sounded stupid)
I was gonna write about all sorts of stuff… but then I read how long this thing was and decided against it… because I can do that. Looking back on this day (and I remember it clearly)… is just kinda weird. I remember wanting to be strong and positive. I probably overcompensated on the positivity, but I needed to at the time…… And then I fell asleep on the couch (seems to be a theme). Yup.
All I wanna say is… I really enjoyed reading through these notes… looking back on this one day. At the time, the day itself was just kinda meh… and I’m sure I was just floating around in a daze. But reading what I was thinking about and recognizing the mood I was in as I wrote down ideas… as I was first trying to figure out what it was that I was gonna do in my life… to survive (because that’s what it feels like)… it felt good. Instant gratification. A talk with a friend. Looking for good in… whatever. Saying, “Fuck it”… and doing whatever it was that I felt I needed to do to feel better.
I like these notes because I can see a little bit of both chapters of my life in them and it was a “typical” day for me.
For 346 days I have been filling time with projects, with work, tidying, cleaning, organizing, removing stuff, chickens… and chicken chores, moving wood piles, remodeling bathrooms, acquiring things to help in the future (I’m getting older… and definitely over shoveling snow off driveways!), watering plants, rearranging living rooms (just last week!… I like it, but there’s a strange feeling sitting at home in a space set up in a way that Kateri has never experienced), seeing friends once in a while, meeting new people, seeing family even more once in a while, taking baths, playing guitars, keyboards, or blaring music when it’s significantly past the one-two. I’ve tried to fill time with actions that would help me in the future and/or make me feel good… or better. Right now though, right this second… I just want to stop… and sit… and feel the sadness that the loss of Kateri has given me… because it’s the closest I’m gonna get to her. When I can feel the pressure in my temples, when I have to breath through my mouth because my nose is all snotted up, when the words are blurry after a good ol’ “moment” (like this one)… when it hurts the most… I can see her the clearest. I can almost feel her… feel her skin… her hair. Her beautiful black and silver hair. Again… almost. Now, tell me that’s not fucked up!… (it’s not)
Well… I’m heading back home to Vermont! It was a quick trip to Boise to see my family… specifically my mother… but, I am soooo happy that I did it. The look on her face when I walked through her door I will cherish forever. The fact that I have never done something like that (surprise my family… or anyone… by just showing up) has made me think about the life I have coming up in front of me… this new life where I am solely responsible for what I want to do… and how I want to do it. My perspectives have changed on everything. What I view as important has changed. My goals in life have changed. All because my life has changed with the loss of Kateri.
Those worrisome images that had found their way into my head a week ago have been replaced with relief and the expectation that there will be more than a few other trips for us to chill with each other because… well… she’s doing fantastic! I mean, she’s not running marathons and we won’t be doing any bungee jumping any time soon (I don’t think), but she’s doing much better than… you know… I expected!
It was a good day… I mean today was. Looks like Day 24 wasn’t all that horrible, but I’m talking about my day in Boise. Aaaand… I ate a banana for breakfast… I hate bananas.
When I walked past her window and she saw my Cedar Circle sweatshirt… she knew it was me! My father… well, I just walked into his office while he was on the phone with a client… and then caused him to fumble over his words for a second! I’m sure the client was like, “ummm… you ok?!”. My mother… well… the look on her face when I walked into the house… it simply filled me happiness.
It’s the second day of my weekend and after staying up way too late last night… but enjoying no alarm!… I decided to try and pluck some things off of the “To Do” list today. You know, those little things that you just keep meaning to get to… or are blatantly disregarding?! So I did chicken chores, replaced the Daytime Running Light on the ol’ buggy, brought wood over from the potting shed… with help from said buggy… and a sled, changed out the drip pans on the stove because the old ones had literally disintegrated, and then… well… I rearranged the living room.
I thought I was gonna write something a little more in depth of what I’m about to do for the next thirty days, but it’s 11:41pm and I got home a little later than anticipated… and I’m… well… kinda tired. A friend and I went up to BTown for a get together of absolutely wonderful people who wanted to show a friend of ours that we love him… that we support him… that we are there for him as he does his dance with cancer. This is a man who I met when I first came to Vermont… who I have cooked with and for… and who Kateri considered one of the early “Pocket People”… which should tell you something about this guy.
You are more than welcome to share any of this if you feel it may help someone out who is going through their own shit… to show them that they aren’t alone in having to cope with such a gut wrenching, confusing, scary, and lonely time. I don’t know how this will all go, or what going back to these notes will bring up, or if I should wait till after the year is up… or if I wanna even do it! But here it goes anyways!
Yup… I didn’t really realize it until I was driving home from work that today was the eleven month anniversary of Kateri’s passing. I felt a little off today, but didn’t think much about it. Plus, coming off of Kateri’s birthday and the ringer that that put me through, I was actually just looking forward to a little bit of a mellower time for the following few days… hopefully weeks… and so far it is. At this point, having gone through birthdays and holidays and anniversaries of cancer stuff… the month anniversaries are just a way to track time. Compared to Kateri’s birthday… or the date of the diagnosis of Melanoma in the brain… or the anniversary of her death coming up in a month… all the other months have just been a countdown to that 1 Full Year moment. So, for me right now… it kinda sucks to think that Kateri has been gone for eleven months, but I’m emotionally hung over… wanna take a breather… and just prepare (if you can) for 1 year. (wow… that just fucked up to think about)
I took an extra day off at the tail end of my weekend because… as I figured… Kateri’s birthday was probably gonna be the peak of the emotional mountain expedition. (no… I’m not a mountain climber or have any desire to scale Mt. Kilamenjaro or anything. Walks though… those are good) I wanted to make sure I had a little extra time so as not to have the sense of rushing it… and I’m glad I did!… cuz it’s been rough! I mean, yes it’s been rough, but I have come to expect that. However, I was surprised by the amount of crying I did. I was surprised by how early the water works and the “I miss those days” reminiscing started… a couple of weeks prior to her birthday. I was surprised by just how much… how many emotions… I had pushed to the side as I try to figure out how to maneuver, how to live in the present, how to get everything done in this new life… without her. And I knew I was gonna need a couple of days to recover from the onslaught of everything on Kateri’s birthday… on St. Patrick’s Day.
I had gotten up around six and hit the road at 6:30am for breakfast at George’s… in Gloucester… two hours and forty-three minutes away. It was gonna be my “I’m taking Kateri to the ocean for her birthday” end to the weekend, but when you drive for a few hours by yourself… the brain kinda does it’s thing! (having control over the radio has it’s advantages, though) As I thought more and more about it, I wasn’t taking Kateri to the ocean… I was taking just a part of Kateri to the ocean… and I was taking only a tiny fraction of what is left of her physical body… that which we cremated. I could try and make myself feel better by attaching her… by attaching Kateri to my little road trip, but she wasn’t by my side.
She didn’t order bisuits and gravy or shoot the shit with line dude. She didn’t feel the ocean air on her cheeks. And I didn’t take a selfie of us on the beach with her in the background doing some funny little kick… or doing anything at all. Yes, Kateri was with me in my memories, thoughts, emotions, and spirit as I drove 71 miles per hour across New England, but she wasn’t by my side… and I realized I just needed to cover some ground for myself as I remembered my wife… and all the wonderful “Let’s go to the ocean!” adventures we had.
So I had breakfast, I saw the ocean, I sat and thought about life. Luckily, Kateri’s birthday was the day for bawling like a baby so the last two days of my 3-day weekend were a little more manageable on the tear factor and I didn’t have to tell myself, “I don’t care if people see me crying on this bench… as I stare at the water”… while other tourists snap and bark at their partners because they aren’t holding the paper doll cutout correctly while posing beneath the memorial to fishermen lost at see! I mean, I got emotional here and there, but it has been a much mellower couple of days.
“YOU’RE AS OLD AS JESUS!”… Kateri loved to take advantage of any opportunity where she was able to say that. If it was someone’s birthday and they were turning 33… well, she would start with a, “Happy Birthday!”… and finish with, “You’re as old as Jesus!”… and then the birthday boy or girl would stare at us like, “What…?”. Now, I’m not a religious man and although Kateri grew up Catholic (she said she was a “Recovering Catholic”), she wasn’t very religious… spiritual, but not religious. So the addition of Jesus into the well wishing on birthdays is kind of a conundrum to me of how and why it started, but really it was just a fun little quirky thing that she brought into my life… that has been there over the years… that has put smiles on friend’s and strangers’ faces… and something I will probably say to every 33 year old I cross paths with on their birthday till my birthdays stop coming. (ps-I guess JC died at 33… how’s that to make you feel unaccomplished in life?! Jesus… he was a go getter!)
It seemed only natural to incorporate the whole “You’re as old as Jesus!” into the day when Kateri turned thirty-three. We were working in Burlington slinging “breads”… pizza… and we were renting a little cottage in the Green Mountains 50 minutes away that looked at the back side of Mad River Glenn. Life was starting to roll… we were at that stage in life where old friendships were solidified in their place and we were meeting wonderful new people to start new friendships with… people who became a part of our family. I wanted to capture some of those people… some of those memories from “When we were younger” to look back upon… decades down the road.
So I asked a friend to make a sign and I drove that sign to other friend’s houses and to their places of employment. I carried it with me in case I ran into someone on the road so that I could snap a picture of them holding it and wishing Kateri a “Happy… you are as old as Jesus… Birthday!”. I developed the pictures (yes, they were taken with a camera… with film) and grabbed a stupid little photo album to put them in. When I gave it to Kateri I watched the corners of her mouth turn upwards to a smile as she flipped through the pics and saw her friends and their well wishes. With every turn of the page, I got to see that simple smile turn into pure innocent love for the people who were holding that cardboard sign. Unfortunately, since that album was made, we only got a decade and a bit under our belts to do the whole “Remember when” thing together… to reminisce about turning thirty-three. Now I use the gift I gave her not so much to remember our friends… but to remember Kateri… and she’s not even in the album.
Sometimes, the plan was to just hang in a certain area and relax… or do something fun and fancy like go to a piano concert in some historical and beautiful concert hall or theater that overlooks the water. You know, pretend like we were fancy as we rubbed elbows with fancy people. Sometimes we would bring our espresso machine with us on these trips, set it up on the dresser in the hotel room, and drink cappuccinos on the porch as we looked down the line of empty rooms and listened to the water as it tried to run up the land… thinking about how lucky we were not to have to share the space.
I could write about the debates birthdays created between friends pertaining to when your “Mid Forties” start… and no, they don’t start at 41! There are a lot of good memories accumulated over the years I could share, but today is the first time in nineteen years that I’m not spending Kateri’s birthday with her… because life decided it was so… and presently I don’t have the time or energy to remember twenty years of good times that are simply all just memories now. That’s what I’ll use the future for… to remember the past. Today… after I write this, I guess… I’m just gonna sit in the present for a bit and see how it goes. Being a widower is rough… it’s hard… it’s emotional. Jesus Christ!… it’s emotional. Losing Kateri is harder… she was a part of me… and still is… because I love her… and I miss her………. so much.
I had to leave work early today. I knew when I was driving in at 7:24am that I probably wasn’t gonna make it that long. I knew at 6:50am that I was probably gonna be useless. As well as at 6:15am when the first harp started the progression from a musical instrument made to create beautiful sounds… to a car horn made to scare the shit out of someone who is unaware of the tin can behind them. It’s my version of the “Sunrise Alarm”… something which I will never own.
widower provides. It’s relentless. The brain just doesn’t stop. There are periods where I can balance the “loss” and “living”. There have been times where “living” overshadowed “loss”! Other times… not so much. Right now, it just so happens to be a “loss” time. Yes, there is still “living” happening… just not a ton… and mostly in comfy clothes.
Well there… all of that sad shit just to get to a point where I could raise my spirits by giving myself a compliment! In actuality, I don’t need to give myself compliments to try and make myself feel better. I’m a lucky person and have some good people in my life who are supportive, loving, and fun. There are a shit ton of things in my life that I am grateful for. There are a lot of good things in my life… many more than horrible ones. The horrible ones are just… well… kinda gross. This is a hard experience to go through and there are a lot of challenges, but people have been going through it ever since the first Pat fell in love with the first Pat… first Pat loved first Pat back… and then first Pat died from Metastatic Melanoma in the brain… with mutations. People survive death. It just kind of sucks that it’s a part of the gig.
New show on Netflix?… nope! Hell, I’m getting emotional during sitcoms about high school kids, puberty, and first loves!
I slept in until 9:24. Well, I first woke up at 5:04am on the couch. One of those open my eyes… realize I’m still downstairs… check my phone to see what time it actually was… and then listen to the Smarties that were on my belly… from when I fell asleep… four hours earlier… roll across the hardwood floor as I stumbled to throw a couple of logs on the fire… before I stumbled up the stairs and flopped into bed. It’s a pretty normal occurrence these days on my Fridays (your Mondays)… the pile of Smarties just hanging out on my belly for 4 hours… not so much. For whatever reason, I have a tendency to want to stay up late… and if I have the next day off… helloooo couch-bed! I don’t know why I keep doing it. Every night I say to myself, “I should go to bed earlier!”… but I don’t listen.
at home in the schoolhouse… and then I move on.
I’ve been on a little “lists” kick lately. I feel like there’s just so many thoughts running through my head… and I don’t have Kateri to blurt them out to anymore! That, in conjunction with the whole “feel like you’re running out of time” gig you get when life seems to be overwhelming… well, lists help me organize… and remember.
it’s cooler… and the sun is running to the west providing another spectacular Vermont sunset… and feel Kateri’s skin as she holds my hand.
bone hair stick thing as a weapon… and TSA never questioned it.
you were actually hoping to do! It’s kind of annoying… but has also made me chuckle out loud a couple of times.
It was quite the psychological and emotional hit when Facebook started sending me notifications that only I could see my posts because I had “Violated Community Standards”… and then they removed them from my page. Those little messages brought up all sorts of questions for me… questions about my blog and it’s content. Did I infringe on some Trademark? Did I offend someone?… (Which I don’t really care if I do. I just don’t wanna say something and have someone think I’m trying to be mean or malicious. I know I can be a jerk… but I’m really trying not to be!) Questions about technology! Did I not set something up correctly? Why do these sites/apps/corporations work together, but these other ones don’t? Where do I go for help?
Kateri has had a profound affect on me and my life. There are things I want to do… and there are things that I need to do. If dipping my toe into the modern digital world will help me overcome some challenges and obtain some goals… well… I’m not afraid to download the app! (Until I delete it because my phone keeps harassing me that the storage is full with the gray bar… not the blue, yellow, or red bars… and I don’t know what “other” means… so I just start deleting shit)
I feel the need to share a bit of my thought process on Thirty Days of Mo(u)rning, the timeline, and some of my intentions with sharing the experience of losing Kateri. At first, at the very beginning, it was as simple as “I don’t wanna forget”. So on that first night, after I crawled into our bed for the first time in months… for the first time alone… I wrote shit down. Now comes a little insight into the mind of a widower… well, I guess into my widower mind. When I first lost Kateri, right after watching cancer cause her physical pain and force her to live with an unexpected outlook on life… after seeing it create the worry in her eyes… and me trying everything I could to hold on to the last experiences I was going to have with my wife… I was confused, lost, scared, and felt absolutely alone. I freaked out. My brain was going 8 million miles a minute… but through the dense fog that cancer creates when it comes into your life. And when it took Kateri away, for me it blocked out all those other good memories that were on the other side. Writing things down helped me cope with some of the ugly emotional stuff. It helped me be reflective on this experience. It helped me remember. And I hoped it would help make room for some of the other twenty years of good memories.
Creating this blog has been a learning experience. It has been therapeutic. With each blog post I learn a little bit more about who I am, who I want to be, what it is I want to do, and how I am going to do it. Every time someone visits Thirty Days of Mo(u)rning… I feel good. Every time someone likes a blog post or leaves a comment… I feel good. When someone I have never met emails me saying that they can totally relate to my words because they just lost their husband or wife and it has helped them… I feel good. This blog has led me to Widower/Widow forums and support groups which have been fulfilling, insightful, and have provided perspective… which has made me feel good. So when Facebook’s algorithm decided I was spam and I thought I wasn’t gonna be able to share my story on the one social media platform I know… it was kind of a personal and emotional hit. Although I don’t really know where this blog or experience is gonna take me or what doors it may open or how long it will keep going… I do know that it feels better when 47 people check out a blog post than when 3 do! (That whole positive affirmation thing)
I don’t remember if Kateri was coming home from the restaurant or from the art/artist/fancy store on Church Street, but I remember I was frantically learning origami so that when she came home and walked into the studio… which was above a garage… she walked in to her own little field of flowers… in February.
Long story short, we wanted out of the house, out of Burlington… we wanted our own space to start living our lives together. We had met this kid in Wyoming, who was also a Vermonter, and he mentioned that his father had a home with a studio attached to it above the garage. He made the introductions. It was perfect. It also helped that the giant house the studio/garage was attached to was empty… and on 28 acres. So when Valentine’s Day rolled around, I asked Steve (the dad) if I could use the bathroom in the big house so that Kateri could take a bath (it was a huge bathtub… and anyone who knows Kateri… she loves to take a bath… unless it doesn’t cover her boobs… then she finds that to be annoying… remember?). I got candles, some music, and all that jive. But she was gonna come to the studio first… so I wanted to do something that she would instantly see… like fifty origami tulips. Now, I wish I could say that I chose the origami tulip because I’m a hopeless romantic and there was some epiphany with Valentine’s Day, but it was really only because people give you things like books on origami for Christmas and we had a couple in a corner. So I thought, “Well, that would be kinda cool… and I don’t need to leave!”. So I started folding the bases of the tulips… and then the flower… then put them together and carefully placed them all over the studio to greet her when she came home from work. Side note-when you sorta just wing it, sometimes your origami tulips come with all sorts of colors and patterns.
About Kateri opening her eyes one afternoon as a new doctor came in to check on her and her saying, “You’re really good looking.”… he was. I wish I could share so much more, but it’s rough… and exhausting. Life is big… and it’s complicated. Sometimes it’s hard. Sometimes… it’s worse than that. Sometimes… for some things… they just don’t get better… no matter how many times you tell yourself that they are. I said it a lot… and it wasn’t true. We just weren’t gonna allow ourselves to give up. We didn’t want to. We couldn’t… because that’s not what you do.
Well, I’m more than halfway through my time off from work for a week. I had such dreams of grandeur when I first decided to use up some earn time for myself!… it hasn’t been that exciting. It’s been good… just not that exciting. At first, I thought I would try to drive to Key West and back, but I realized the end of January is a pretty popular time for people to go hang on a beach in the Florida Keys… and they like to jack up the prices! Then I thought about hitting ol’ Ned for a few days, be back in the Rockies, chill with one of my best friends… but that “best friend” already had plans to be in Utah!… jerk. (He’s not a jerk… well, yes he is, but not because he went to Utah… and I still love him). Soooo, I decided to stick around a bit, take a couple of short road trips, and attack a few things around the house I’ve been meaning to get to.
treatment. She had seen the worry on Kateri’s face and gave her a little four leaf clover pendant/pewter thing because she thought she needed it… it’s still in the downstairs bathroom on a plate with some other of Kateri’s things. I didn’t really remember Mary at the time, but I knew exactly what she was talking about because I had been seeing that little medallion every day for the last nine months and on the drive home it hit me… the memory of the day she was talking about… I could picture it… I felt it. It was one of those heart warming… and heart crushing things. As a widower, you get to have a lot of those experiences.
Wednesday I just took care of some normal everyday errands… oil change, clean the house type stuff, but on Thursday… I went to Atlantic City! (I’m not sure why there is an exclamation mark… it wasn’t that exciting) I knew I wanted out of Dodge, but wasn’t sure where to go. I had never been to Atlantic City… probably because I don’t drink or gamble, but it’s on the ocean and it’s the off season… which means you can get an ocean view room for less than $100! Soooo, why not?!
more than anyone else. I did a lot of just walking around and people watching… took myself out for a steak. Did I gamble?… yes. Did I win a ton of money?… no. Did I lose a ton of money?… nope! I gave myself a hundred bucks… and played the penny slots… in rounds of $20. Luckily, I have some self control… and it helps that I have put myself into my own financial austerity since going from a two income household to one. When you have the fear of losing everything already, it makes it pretty easy not to bet everything in the hopes of an easy payday… because most likely, it ain’t gonna happen!
I’ll admit, it was kinda fun… entertaining to say the least. The highlight was probably my last 10 minutes in the casino as I was calling it a night and walking back to my room. As I was heading to the escalator, there was a lady at the bar who made a gesture towards me which caught my eye… and then she proceeded to the base of the escalators to intercept me. Now, it became pretty apparent to me pretty quickly what her intentions were… especially when she said her name was “Angel” and was just wondering if I wanted to “conversate” with her?! “Conversate”!!… with her!! I mentioned to her that we could “conversate” right here and I took 5 minutes get to know a hooker a little better. She was really nice, had been in AC for 7 years, she was from Alabama… or Georgia… or something, she didn’t like that there wasn’t much fully nude dancing in AC, but has also met a lot of nice guys! (I’m sure she has!) It was actually the perfect end to my night in Atlantic City… and no, we did not 
“conversate” up in my ocean view room. Now, I don’t exactly have any problems with that line of business… it’s been around for a while… but I just don’t think it’s my cup of tea. (And I don’t want my ding-a-ling to fall off or feel like I’m gonna burn the house down when I pee!)
bathroom stuff from when we were remodeling the bathroom. I hung the banner from Kateri’s Kick Ass Party (our funeral) which has been draped over the spare bed for seven months. Basically, I’m trying to get the most bang for my buck with this time off so that I can hit the floor running when I go back to work. I understand that this is going to be a long process… this new life… but steps do need to be taken. Widows/widowers still need to live life and are constantly trying to figure out how to do that. Although I’m in no rush to figure everything out, I do have a certain sense of urgency for some things… or for things I’ve just been meaning to get to. So I adapted to what I was feeling and came home to my little red schoolhouse in Vermont… where there aren’t any hookers. (I apologize if we don’t call them hookers anymore… prostitutes?… ladies of the night?… rentals?… it’s not my area of expertise)
In the days after Kateri passed away I told myself I wasn’t gonna go to the doctor for at least a year. The main reason being… what did I care if there was something wrong with me? I had just lost the one thing in my life that I didn’t want to live without… yet that’s what I was doing. So what if my organs were on the fritz?… or that headache was something more than just dehydration or lack of coffee?… or that pain in the tummy was more than just the Boston Baked Beans from the night before? So what? I was good with life and if life wanted to take me just as soon as it had taken Kateri… well, so be it… it was a fun run. Now, I’m not a religious man, but in the back of my mind there was the hope that if something did happen… it just meant I got to see my sweet Kateri sooner. I wasn’t gonna do anything to hasten that journey, but I was comfortable if life handed me that card.
to use up and figured that was a good place to drop some dough. Plus, my friend had never been there before so I thought it would be a nice introduction to a wonderful, local store. We didn’t actually buy anything, but it was fun walking around looking at flannels (real flannels), winter coats, knit caps, work gloves, shoes, and messenger bags that cost 372 dollars (gift cards combined couldn’t buy that shit!). But it was seeing a good friend who works there and chatting with him that was the catalyst for me throwing a snow blower on a credit card. When he told me that the storm this weekend was expected to drop about two feet of snow on us… my brain went into panic mode on how to get a snow blower to my house!… and no, Farmway doesn’t have snow blowers. After the storm the week before… and my shoulders taking a week to recover… I was gonna do everything I could to not have to move all that white shit by hand. I mean, yes… I get a huge sense of pride by staying on top of the driveway using nothing but man power, but I’m not THAT proud! I figure, we (humans) have come up with machines to do certain tasks for us for a reason… and I was more than happy to figure out a solution.
That was Wedensday. It was Thursday that I jokingly asked a buddy to just pick one up and drop it off at the schoolhouse… 45 minutes north of him. This is where I was reminded of just how many good people I have in my life. I was actually at work when I texted my buddy and he, without hesitation, offered to meet me at the hardware store, load up a snow blower in the back of his truck, and drive it 45 minutes north. So I quickly chatted with my co-workers, jumped in the Jeep, and zoomed to Home Depot to try and snag one of the last remaining machines. It was a good thing we did it when we did. As I walked in, so did another gentleman with the same thing on his mind. This is where I felt lucky on the timing. There were only 5 machines left. Two were reasonably priced… the other three were twice as much. I staked my claim on one of the lesser expensive ones… he took the other one. It was at this moment that a wave of relief came over me knowing that I would not have to shovel my driveway… and more importantly the end of the driveway where the plow likes to push four foot high piles of snow, ice, and dirt that form a nice little barrier to keep out the riff raff. Of course, it also provides a nice barrier for when you are trying to get to work at 5:30 in the morning.
That was a Thursday and the storm wasn’t coming until Saturday night/Sunday, but do you think that stopped me from firing it up when I got home?… because IT DIDN’T! Yup, I did some snow blowing. Plus, I wanted to make sure I new how to work it BEFORE the storm actually hit. It would kinda suck to have a storm come through… to have a snow blower… and to have it NOT work. Don’t worry though… it worked… and it was fun! As a widower, this was one of those things that I viewed as an investment. Not just in the machine, but an investment in my well being… in my life. I am here alone now. I need to figure some things out. There are challenges and problems that I need to find solutions to and this is just one of those things. It’s such a stupid little thing… getting a snow blower… but I can’t tell you how much it improves my quality of life (side note-I hate the term “quality of life”.. it just reminds me of Kateri and cancer because doctors like to mention it quite a bit). I think about days like today. 
What if a storm came through… I feel like shit… and would still need to shovel my way out? Well, now I could just fire up the snow blower and make a path! It’s pretty exciting!
![img_4036[6962]](https://thirtydaysofmorning.files.wordpress.com/2019/01/img_40366962.jpg?w=73&h=97)
they’re supposed to be tough and all, but I want them to be comfortable. And if I have the ability to make them more comfortable… I should do that.
I went for a drive yesterday. As a cook, you get to be lucky and have days off like Tuesdays and Wednesdays… while your friends are working. I haven’t really taken any time off for myself since Kateri passed. The time I have taken has been loaded with the heavy shit… 2 weeks after she passed, 3 days for Kateri’s Kick Ass Party (our version of her funeral), a long weekend for my parent’s 50th Anniversary, and a couple of days for Thanksgiving to spend with the fam in Boise. For whatever reasons, it’s just kinda hard for me to take time for myself, so I have decided to take it when I can in the form of a day here and a day there. Hence, I am currently laying in bed on a Thursday morning, the I Love NY coffee mug on the stool I call a nightstand (with a quarter inch of cold coffee in it), and I’m typing away… well, slowly… procrastinating the shoveling of snow I’m gonna need to do… again… while trying to capture some of the things I thought about yesterday on my drive from my schoolhouse in Vermont, through the middle of New Hampshire, to York Beach in Maine where I sat on a folding chair as it sank into the sand…. with Kateri by my side.
I planned on grabbing some clam chowder from Lobster Cove, but they were closed until Friday. So I parked on the side of the road, grabbed the folding chair, and walked across the low tide beach, plopped down in said folding chair, and placed the little jar Kateri was in down on the sand next to me… and just sat for a spell. Although hoodie hoods and winter hats muffle the sound of the waves as they try to reach land, I could still hear the rhythm of the ocean and feel the salty air on my face as I sat there… once in a while looking around and wondering if there was anyone who could tell that I was crying beneath my sunglasses as my body sunk deeper into the chair. It’s not that I cared if anyone would see me crying… as a widower, you become comfortable with the fact that some emotions may bubble up at any moment… day or night… here or there… but it’s still nice NOT to be a babbling idiot in public or have a stranger stare at the frozen tears on your cheek or snot stuck in your mustache. Luckily, not that many people go to the beach on a Wednesday… in January… so for me, the experience was just what I was looking for. Well, except for the plan to smoke the joint that was in my pocket on the beach… Kateri would’ve loved that. I, however, am too much of a Nervous Nelly to be so brazen with those types of things when I’m out and about alone. Just another thing I miss about Kateri… she was the instigator… she liked to egg you on… she was the one telling you to “jump, jump, jump!”. If you listened to her, she would provide you with experiences that you wouldn’t of had if she wasn’t there… like smoking a joint on the beach.
at the absolute vastness before me. I’m sure there are all sorts of beautiful things you could say about the scenario to make it sound poetic… or you could attach metaphors to the water, the land, the vastness, the sun, or the wind, but it was really quite simpler than that. I was just a man, saddened by the loss of his wife, who was trying to find some way to feel closer to her. Although Kateri loved the ocean, although she would’ve loved sitting on the sand with me in Maine, although she would’ve loved to get some clam chowder, although she would’ve smoked that joint on the beach… she wasn’t there. So I left… got a lobster roll at Bob’s… and drove home… alone… with her by my side.
blower… and there is more snow coming tomorrow. Yup, a widower still has to put pants on, water the plants, go to work, get oil changes, feed the chickens, do the laundry, clean the house, chop the kindling and bring in wood, replace faucets, fix gutters, shop for food… prepare that food… and to eat that food (which sounds easier that it is)… all while living in a world that isn’t gonna slow down because you are sad. Soooo… I’m gonna do what is hard for a widower to do many a mornings, but we do it anyways… and get out of bed.
I am starting 2018 with a wife who I love more than I did in 2017…or ’16…or… (which I didn’t think could happen), a beautifully drafty little red schoolhouse nestled in the hills of Vermont that I share as a home with my wife, my friends…my family, and with hope for a bright, fun, fully lived life time to come. The last chunk of 2017 has provided me with perspectives on life that I didn’t expect, don’t want, and don’t wish upon anyone else, but this is…what it’s about… life. In the past four months I have felt that absolutely crushing emotion when you realize that life isn’t fair. In the past two weeks I have felt that stomach wrenching emotion everyday at some point, whether it be for a minute… or ten… or more. In those two weeks, I have also witnessed, heard about, and felt the love and support from friends and family that is quite simply put… overwhelming. Life. This is our life and it is filled with compassionate, artistic, respectable, honest, hard working, sometimes hard headed, but always hard loving people. Perspective. Knowing what kind
of life you live and how the past got you there. Knowing what is important. Being a part of “The Good” in the world. I have hope, because I know what it feels like when “The Good” in the world reaches out and replaces that bottomless pit of despair feeling with the memories of good times and laughter, with plans for the future, with food, art, jewelry, games of Uno, snowshoe trails, music, and more. I have hope because I have you in my life… and you… and you… and you. Soooo, thanks.
It doesn’t matter what challenges you faced or hardships you endured or successes you achieved… it can always get better. As a cook, it’s ingrained in you that New Year’s is just another day you may have to work. As you get older, you’re just as fine going to bed at 10:30. As a widower, the New Year is a point in the timeline that brings up all sorts of thoughts, questions, emotions, and memories. Personally, I don’t know if I would necessarily consider myself happy as I go through this experience… but I’m getting happier.
I don’t really have much to say about this right now… just thought I should jot something down. For me, the finding the mass in Kateri’s brain was the significant date. It didn’t matter what type of cancer it was… it was in the brain and that didn’t seem to be a very good thing… any which way you cut it. The diagnosis was three days after finding the mass and we new of the melanoma in the arm from a couple of years prior so it wasn’t much of a shock. The shock comes when you barely even scratch the surface on the information out there on melanoma… when it reaches the brain. You’re immediately thrown into a world filled with word’s like “Stage 4″… and “Metastatic Malignant Melanoma”… and “4-5 Months”. That’s when the shock sets in.
WE LIVE IN A LITTLE RED SCHOOLHOUSE!! I love that I found one for the village that Kateri sorta started for me. It seemed like the perfect piece given the circumstances!
underside of a counter. Headaches and stars… that’s all they were at that time.
but I can’t picture any of the specifics in my head… it’s a blur. It was three days before we heard the diagnosis of Melanoma… six days before I hopped on a plane to spend time with my family for the holidays… and nine days before Kateri spent her last Christmas in our little red schoolhouse… without me.
I thought it would be the Christmas decorations that I would have a hard time going through, seeing, remembering the memories attached to them, but it was the tidying of the house, organizing it, making room for Christmas that slapped me in the face with the reality of my life. It was the taking down of Kateri’s Birthday cards that have hung above
my kitchen for nine months… and reading through them… seeing the words of friends and relatives giving my wife support… celebrating her life in a time when it was approaching the end… thirty-six days later… that threw me for a loop. The last card in the pile was from me… and I kinda had to take a sit on the floor. It was the tidying of the book shelf and finding pictures spanning the last twenty years… of horseback rides in the Tetons and snowmobile rides in the backcountry. Images of road trips to Ohio (where we said we would never go back to… and then went back 5 times), sailboat excursions in Maine, snowstorms, beaches, adventures with friends, and adventures for just the two of us. Images of sister in-laws when they were twelve, at their college graduation, and then from this year holding my wife… their sister… for one of the last times. Pictures of the various places we’ve lived in… from the Rocky Mountains to our little red schoolhouse in Vermont… pictures of 
various cabins and cottages filled with the richness of what was our life… pictures of our various homes. Snapshots of a life I don’t have anymore… and no Christmas miracle is gonna bring back my sweet sweet Kateri.
with the people who are here sharing it with us. It is the relationships with those people in our lives that we celebrate as we prop up trees and decorate them with artifacts from our past, pull out the flying Santa’s, set up various Nativities, and plug in lights to soften the darkness.
I haven’t hung up the smashed and weathered piece of mistle toe that I used to kiss Kateri beneath… and it may not ever hung up again. Things change. Significance and meanings attached to those things change… and we adapt. It’s not the mistle toe that’s important… it’s the memory of feeling Kateri’s lips, of holding her in my arms, of remembering how excited she would get during the holidays that is important to me… how she would treat people… love people… how she would put on Kenny Rodger’s and Dolly’s Christmas album at 7:00am or yell out, “Festive to the left!” as we drove through the hills of Vermont at night during the holidays. That is how I keep her with me.
think Kateri would be proud of my decorating, happy with our tree (with 2 angels and a star on top), and excited that there is snow on the ground. Although Kateri won’t be sitting next to me in her robe this Christmas morning as we open gifts of food storage containers, flannels, and Obama dolls… (actually, those are all old gifts… it’s a little more sparse under the tree this year without her), but she will be with me. If you think about other people, if you remember what is important in life, if you are true to yourself and your intentions are good… if you get excited when you see an over the top display of Christmas lights… she’ll be with you, too.
I am thankful that I was just able to give my mother a hug… to hold her in my arms… on Thanksgiving morning… and I wish Kateri was here. It took me ten minutes to write that sentence. Thanksgiving. The first Thanksgiving without my wife. The first Thanksgiving I am spending with my family in years… in at least over a decade… and it’s where I’m supposed to be today. The last seven… nine… eleven… twelve months have been filled with some of the most horribly inexplicable events that I have had to deal with in my life. My mother was diagnosed with lung cancer which spread to her brain. Melanoma took Kateri away from me in four months and three days. There are many things in this life that I am not thankful for, but there are more people, friends, family, and experiences that have been in… or have entered… my life that have given me strength, love and compassion to keep moving forward through this timeline. It’s a strange life to live when your mantra is, ” Well, for being the worst thing I have ever gone through… ever felt… ever experienced… it went as well as it possibly could have.”… and it’s still going.
There have been more than a few moments in the past couple of weeks that have made me want to write stuff down… to document things I don’t want to forget about as I go through this process, but it took four inches of wet, heavy snow to keep me in my bed… drinking coffee from the I Heart NY mug… to get me to open up the computer… and procrastinate shoveling the more than a few inches of wet/heavy white stuff from the first significant snowfall. Yup, it’s beautiful… but I’m really not ready to start pushing it off of the driveway or to chisel out a hole at the end of it where the plows keep stacking it up into a nice wall of ice chunks as if a glacier just went rolling past. So, I’m just gonna jot down a few notes, drink my coffee, and rethink my decision to not get a snowblower (I don’t like the idea of having a 100 pound paper weight taking up space in the garage 352 days of the year… but they’re less expensive than four wheelers… and plow trucks).
I shaved my head the other night (that’s just my hairdo… I haven’t paid for a haircut in seventeen years), looked in the mirror… and didn’t recognize myself. You wanna talk about a fucked up thing to go through… well… it was fucked up. It could have been the fact that my beard is the longest it has ever been coupled with the newly trimmed noggin. It could have been the fact that it was the first time I shaved my head in the bathroom after working on it for over a year… a bathroom in which Kateri put the first hole in the wall and I was now cleaning up 
little pieces of hair from a sink and tiled floor in a whole new life. A floor I tiled in the early morning hours over the course of three nights while Kateri was in the hospital… Maria being there by her side for her… while I did whatever I needed to do before Kateri was discharged with gastrointestinal issues from the immunotherapy. A floor I needed to learn how to tile for the simple fact that my wife needed a toilet upstairs so that she could sleep in her own bed. Staring at myself in the mirror… looking into my own eyes for the first time in a while… it was hard to deal with all the emotions that came flooding in as I recognized that specific point in the timeline… that life is different… but I couldn’t recognize myself. To my core… I am different… I have
changed, because my life has changed. I cried… a lot…. as I leaned on the sink and didn’t move as I searched in those eyes for understanding to what was going on, but never really got an answer. So what do you do? Well, I took a shower to remove those little bits of hair from my shoulders, beard, and body… put on some comfy clothes… texted with a friend… and waited for the “next day” to come.
Bloggery Post Addition…
Widower Day 179… really 180, but 179 was six months and I just couldn’t write anything… I didn’t have the energy for it and simply… there were other things I wanted and needed to do. I started this post because of the kindness and compassion of a friend and thought it kinda fit for the six month mark. It’s the people that keep us going, that give us purpose, that give us reasons to get excited for life… even after you find out that it’s our relationships with people that sometimes makes us hurt, makes us sad, makes it so that we don’t want to leave our little schoolhouse homes and face the world… but we do because the risk is worth it… and because sometimes its just what we have to do.
Ummm, now its Widower Day 174 and I was gonna continue on with stories of grilled steaks, talking on the porch, and four hour drives to Quechee, but I think those texts speak to what I wanted to say today… what I needed to just get out of my brain after having a “moment” driving between the lake and my house… and then for twenty minutes in the driveway.
Friendship. When you’re wading through that pile of poop (trying not to say shit so much), you rely on all sorts of friendships to get through the day. I feel the need to say that in the grand scheme of things, in this new “chapter”, I’m doing ok. All honesty, I am excited to see what the future brings, to meet new people, to have new experiences… and I am. There has been laughter, and singing in the bathtub, and sitting by fires, playing guitars, fun texting banters with friends… old and new, and beautiful fall scenery. There’s still enough Good in the world to show us that it’s worth putting pants on for… especially as the weather is turning. But when dealing with this shit (twice, sorry), this upheaval of life, I am grateful to have people in my life who share the common value of what it means to be a part of “The Good” in the world… who understand what is important in the world…who are present when needed even with distance in between. Just knowing that I could call any number of people at 3:07… a.m. … and they would be there for me is not only heart warming, but I also rely on it to keep some of that feeling of being all alone at bay. It’s not that I call people at three in the morning all the time, but if I did!… they’d answer! Everyone should have those types of friends and friendships in their lives, but more importantly… you should be that type of friend.
blog post except for this… I have had a rough go lately. I haven’t wanted to do anything… at all. To just stop everything for a bit. I have wanted off this ride… to change the song… or at least the tune. (side note… NO, I do not want to slit my wrists in the newly tiled bath tub while drinking a glass of whisky… smoking a joint… and a cigarette or anything. I kinda figure this is all sorta normal “widower” stuff. Life—beautiful…. sometimes a pile of shit. 3 times… I’m gonna stop apologizing) I have been sad, lost, and lonely. And it’s not that I need anyone to do anything because……. I guess here is the point I’m trying to make. This has sucked, these things suck, but it’s the people in my life… the people who are still plopped here on this earth with me… whether they be from when we were making memories as stupid boys 26 years ago or from this new “chapter” in life… it’s the people who provide me with strength, security, and reassurance… with excitement and smiles… with joy. It’s my friends… and I find them everywhere. Friendship comes in all shapes and sizes… in varying degrees… and with all sorts of intentions. When going through a traumatic event like this you need people. You may not talk often and you may not live in the same town. Hell, you may not even know each other very well!… but that’s not the important part of friendship. It’s being there at the right time, for the right reason… however big or small. That’s what I have… that’s what everyone should have… because that’s what let’s you know you’ll be ok.
Jesus… where to start. Although our wedding was the happiest day of my life… it’s not the story I’m jotting down here. This is about losing Kateri and having to face the overwhelming onslaught of “Firsts” that a widower goes through because the clock just won’t stop ticking. The first month… alone… the first five. The first summer. The first fall which will lead into the first Stick Season. The first load of laundry without her sleeping socks mixed in. The first home cooked meal with mushrooms. The first trip to the store when you realize you are shopping for one… and you can get whatever you want. The first trip away with no one to call home to and say “Goodnight”. I guess from day one… everything is a first in some way or another.
also knew it wasn’t gonna be an easy thing so I should probably start today on Anniversary Eve. The thought crossed my mind that going through pictures had the potential of taking a bit of time and energy so I might as well get the memories started. I have to say… I was correct in my assessment… going through pictures was rough. Beautiful… but rough.
Our wedding was awesome. We had it on a Wednesday at 4ish because we thought it would be easier for all of our friends in the food world to make it. It was held at a wonderful camp in central Vermont… before all the camps realized they could rent out their places after the kids go away to brides and grooms from far away places who want that “rustic” or “Vermonty” wedding experience… for an exorbitant amount of money. For us, it was a place we could afford that was in the next town over and it turned out to be the perfect choice for us to celebrate our love for each other… and our commitment to each other with around a hundred and twenty-five of the most caring, fun, loving, artistic, and just plain fantastic people around. Actually, as I was on my front porch this evening, it was me thinking about those people… one in particular… that put into a certain perspective where I was in life and what this date means for me.
can’t tell you how hard that is to accept. I find solace and strength in the fact that the man who was there standing, speaking, and guiding us through the ceremony of our marriage was in our home days after we first found out about Kateri’s cancer, when she was in palliative care, and is here for me now as I struggle with a loss that has been absolutely crushing. I know I can call any one of the men who stood up for us at any time of the day… for just about anything… and they would do everything they could to help me out (side note-we only had “Men of Honor” in our wedding party). Thinking about those men is what made a slight shift in my brain as I thought about what our wedding anniversary meant to Kateri and I… and what our anniversary means to me now that I am in a this strange widowed state. I’ve been struggling with that whole breaking life up into segments (before Kateri, Kateri, after Kateri) and am just starting to get used to the fact that different periods of life like to mingle for a bit before moving on or slipping off into the past. As traumatic as this experience is, I don’t think anything will be slipping off into the past anytime soon. Kateri will always be a part of my life… I’m just hanging on for some more hours in the day to not feel so crappy.
We smoked a pig… another glorious thing. Along with smoking the pig, we were able to have some entertainment when the grease lining the lid and walls of the smoker decided to join the party and provide us with a bonfire. Of course, then you realize you still need to put the pig on so you have someone… hopefully without a ton of body hair… slam the lid shut. Luckliy, our volunteer had all of the hair on their face, head, and body afterwards. We scrounged and found windows to attach to wooden stakes so that we could make our “church”, meeting a wonderful cast of characters and seeing some cool places during the search. Our friends picked flowers from the farm up the road… the one with the beautiful big white barn. Kateri and friends brewed our “Wedding Beer”… I bought a shit load of A&W. We were able to buy wine from a friend… and neighbor. We made steamed buns… mmmmm, steamed buns. There were cabins and porches for friends and family to stay and hang in… and for us to write our vows on… three hours before the ceremony (yes, both of us). There was a pond for people to naked swim in under the faint light of the stars. There were people. Nothing but wonderful people. We wanted to have nothing but friends and families that we loved and cared about at our wedding. Even the people helping serve the food, pour drinks, play music, and wash dishes… everyone was someone we wanted there, someone in our life. We wanted to know that whoever we came into contact with on the day of our wedding… they would put a smile on our face… and they did. Kateri always said our wedding was the type of wedding that she would enjoy going to… I agree.
It’s Sunday morning. I’m drinking coffee in bed from my “I Love NY” cup for the first time in a while. I loved our Sunday mornings. I would get up, make coffee, bring up two cups… one with just the right amount of half & half to make it the appropriate color. Kateri would look at bathroom designs, gardening shit, far away places that have beaches and blue water, pictures of friends and family, calendars of events happening in the area, or cool shit going on just far enough away to warrant a road trip. I would look at Craigslist, check my email… the weather… and the headlines. I’m sure we weren’t the only couple with that sorta routine. It wasn’t anything unique or exciting, but for me it was perfect… and I miss it.