My husband died. One night he went to bed and just didn’t
wake up the next morning. He was 51.
I miss him everywhere I go and in every thing I do, but I
try to look for silver linings and smile when I find them. He died peacefully
in his sleep – a silver lining. My family came to my aid and rallied like I’ve
never seen them do before – a silver lining. I can finally throw away that
ratty t-shirt of his that should have been forcibly taken away by the
government years ago – a silver lining. Except now I want that shirt. And, of course,
the seat is always down now – a silver lining.
My
husband was the proverbial gentle giant. Standing six-foot-three with a belly
like Santa’s, he never once raised his voice about anything. He looked like he
could take a tree out with his bare hands if he wanted, but he never got mad.
There was always the daily morning rant about the idiots on the ‘Opinions’ page in the paper, but even then he never got
mad enough to write back with his own opinions.
And he had charm. Mason could charm a snake charmer. It
would be hard to find a person who didn’t get along with him. He turned that
charm into a career as a big-time ad guy on Madison Avenue, and was a man with
more friends than you can imagine. At his memorial service, we had 150 programs
made up, just to be safe. We ran out of them. The cathedral was packed. There
wasn’t a person who knew Mason who didn’t come from far and wide to be there.
*****
I still share a laugh with him now and then. When an inside
joke between the two of us pops up, I actually look around for him, wanting to
share that knowing smirk. I talk out loud to him all the time. I point out
stories in the paper that I think might get him riled. I let him know when
bands he likes are coming to town. Then I eventually realize there is no one
there. And I stop laughing.
So now our too-big king-sized bed has become a desk, with
mail, magazines and even a table fan, on Mason’s side – things that stay there
from day to day, depending on if I need to change the sheets. I still hear him
rattling around the house, typing on his computer, squeaking the upstairs
floorboards, letting me know he’s there. For a while, his name even used to
show up on my Facebook contact list, as having just signed off. I missed him
every time. I used to think he was coming back to play Farmville, his favorite
Facebook game.
I’ve been through most of the horrid paperwork and other
unpleasantries of losing him, but there is still much more to go. Much more
than I can face right now. I’m living alone in a 5-bedroom home that gets bigger
and more lonely every day. People keep asking me if I’m going to move, when I’m
going to move, where I’m going to move, what kind of job do I think I can get.
These are all important questions, but not ones that I can answer right now. I
couldn’t if I tried. I don’t want to.
I recently read a book by a famous psychiatrist, Kay
Redfield Jamison, who lost her husband. She wrote that “there is a time between
times,” the time between losing your spouse and the time when you feel you are
ready, or need, to face reality. That time between times, when you’re just
allowed to grieve, is so necessary. For the inconsolable sadness it contains, there
is something comfortable about it. It’s a time when no one makes you feel
embarrassed when you cry, no one expects you to be back to work, no one expects
much of you. They just let you be. And it just makes things so much easier,
when the weight of the world is temporarily off your shoulders, that you never
want it to change. I’m still clinging to that time between times with all my
might, because I can’t face a world without Mason by my side.
