A New Day

As many of you know, my husband has been very ill for some time now.  January 5th was our 35th wedding anniversary, and the next evening he died.  He had everything planned out so I would be okay; he had seen two of his three sons and his oldest grandson recently, and had made sure the addition to the house was completed.  He had only been unable to do the things he loved for about 3 weeks.  Cancer had ravaged his body, but he was not in pain.

My family and friends have been wonderful, staying to watch over him so I could sleep, or just visiting with him so I could run errands.  For two weeks after he died I only spent one night alone, and that at my request.  Now they have returned to their lives, and I am getting on with mine.

I am not at all sure that he realized how close the end was for him--I think he fully expected to rally as he had done before.  He had spoken quite recently of plans to build a greenhouse on our property this spring.  But it will not be done.  It is painful for me to realize that much he has done over the past two years has come to nothing, that the business he was trying to build will not continue.  But I am not a gardener, and know nothing of running a business, so I have decided to liquidate his nursery business through charitable donations.  I will keep enough stock to landscape the house and property. I will continue to employ the high school kids that worked for him; goodness knows I will need the help keeping the place mowed, the landscape plantings going in, and sorting through the mountain of 'stuff' he left behind.

He was cremated and his ashes interred at the National Cemetery nearby.  He had Masonic honors at his funeral and military honors at his interment.  A bagpiper played in tribute to his beloved Scottish heritage.  I think he would have been pleased.  It would be easy for me to remake him into a saintly figure in my mind, but he was human like the rest of us, and I prefer to remember him as he was.  He was a good man who loved me and his family and friends to the best of his ability.

So what is ahead for me?  I will take all the time I need to grieve.  I will keep myself busy at all the myriad tasks that must be done--the sorting and filing of papers, the endless phone calls and notifications, the cancelling of orders and subscriptions.  Tax season will soon be here, and I have to complete the paperwork of closing his business.  I will transfer assets into my name. I will rearrange my home and my life to suit my own tastes.

I will make an effort to get out and socialize, although I find myself in tears at the oddest moments.  I will try to keep in touch with friends.  But I will also get used to living alone, to sleeping alone, to eating out alone. Maybe I will travel a little; maybe not so much.  But all things considered, I will be okay. Life will go on, on Little Elm.

**********