Starting over

Or, I Guess I Got What I Paid For

Long story short: I took my glasses off to place them on top of the cabinet and dropped them on the floor.  As tired as I was, I failed to look where I stepped and my foot landed on top of them, with predictable results.  All efforts to try to fix them failed, so I thought maybe I could order another pair of frames and pop the lenses into them.  Unfortunately, the place I bought them from doesn't sell frames only.  I know that they say that into every life, a little rain must fall, but sometimes it seems like it's pouring over here.  But I have survived a lot worse, so I suppose it will turn out ok.
So... I have temporarily have had to return to using the falling-apart-but-still-usable-if-taped-together old pair and will have to check into buying a new new pair tomorrow. But if I can't blog tomorrow, that's why.  Thankfully, I just got paid last Friday and don't have to worry about rent until next paycheck.  So cue Gloria Gaynor...

Not quite done with bedroom updates

Or, Which Books Where?

After finally getting the bookshelf up, I find myself at an impasse as to which books I want to move from the living bookcase onto it: the bigger ones, which would leave more space in front of the smaller ones left behind, or the smaller ones, which are less likely to warp the singly-stacked boards? Furthermore, I had to explain to my grandson that just because I had cleared off a shelf in the living room that that doesn't mean it will stayed clear (i.e., that I might have to move some of the books back out there) to make sure that he doesn't cover a bookshelf I might need later with photos or similar stuff. Finally, between starting this post and then eventually getting back to finishing it, I left a comment in an internet discussion in response to someone (who happened to be atheist) who said his significant other was dying of ovarian cancer. Shared some of my experience going through a similar situation with Lorena and how quickly it went from thinking she had years to live still to her death. A bit drained by it, so I'll end here.

Getting so much (or at least somewhat) better all (or at least some of) the time

Then again, I suppose it depends on what's getting better.  Physically, I feel good... like I knew that I would now.  Ok, maybe "know" is a bit strong considering how I have been feeling the past few days due to the heat.  However, at the moment, whether it's because it's early morning and it hasn't heated up yet, the temperature has cooled a little, or maybe my figuring out that the fan has a high¹ setting for a reason, I seem to have a bit more energy.  Oh, great.  Just as I finish writing that, my eyes don't want to stay open.  After these messages, I'll be right back.
So... did you miss me?  Of course you did.  But let's return to our feature discussion and turn to how I have been dealing with my wife's death.  That remains virtually unchanged: long periods of coping followed by gut-wrenching moments of one thing or another reminding me of her.  Even events as innocuous as buying a rotisserie chicken (the focal point of many of meal since moving to Los Angeles) become an opportunity for such an attack, as if going to or arriving at one of the bus stops near our home or shopping at the pharmacy that filled her prescriptions or the other stores and restaurants in the same plaza didn't provide enough.  Yet from the very fields of familiarity where grow such weeds of sorrow also sprout forth the soothing herbs of tender memories.  Perhaps time can teach me how to better tend the latter while eliminating the other.

Just another difference between pre-widower life and post-widower life

While I was out shopping today (according to the scheduled posting date, which would be about a week ago by the time I actually got around to posting this), I saw a multiple picture with "Together is my favorite place to be" written across the bottom.  Before, I would have viewed it as merely a charming sentiment and some small part of me can still recognize it as such.  Now it mostly delivers a gut punch with the subtlety of a sledgehammer, a painful reminder that my wife's death bars "together" as a "place" I can visit with her in the present.  I'm not quite sure why I share this other than to point out 1) how differently I perceive an innocuous message before and after my wife's death and, 2) how randomly a "bad moment" can appear.

Suffering from PWRD

I don't know how prevalent Phantom Wedding Ring Disorder¹ or even if anyone other than myself suffers from it.  I do, however, know that in my case that is altogether too real.  After growing accustomed to almost sixteen years of brushing my thumb against my wedding ring to check that it was still there, it is now gone from the fourth digit of my left hand.  And even the knowledge that it's gone (and why) doesn't stop me from rechecking- just in case I misrembered or dreamt both the real and symbolic reasons for its absence.  But what can one do when she's gone from one's life, but not from one's heart?

¹ I was going to call it "Phantom Ring Syndrome" before learning that name is already taken for an entirely different malady.

A cautionary tale

I cannot recall the month, much less the date, it happened.  I thought I had narrowed down the time frame by finding a purchase made at the Salinas Amtrak followed by another at an Inglewood Costco, but their date of April 25, 2011 marks them as about a year too late.  While the exact "when" remains a mystery, the "what" I remember all too well despite dismissing it as trifling at the time.  My wife had returned to our Salinas, California apartment after visiting her sister in Los Angeles.  While there, she said, she went to the hospital with abdominal pain and the doctors discovered a lump/mass (masa) in that area of her body.  Maybe it was fear of the effect of hospital bills on our financial situation (we weren't too far from almost losing our apartment due to back rent we eventually paid off and both of us being temporarily unemployed) or perhaps I didn't want to believe that it was what it almost definitely was, but I should have rushed her to Natividad Hospital or pretty much anywhere to have it checked out.  I didn't.
And so I am left here to wonder: would they have caught it in time if I had?  Would it have made a difference?  Would she still be alive, perhaps even well?  What kind of husband was/am I, to allow that to have happened to her?
 I cannot prevent questions like these from haunting my thoughts or wounding my heart.  But that is as far as I will let them go in crippling my life and destroying my future.  Yes, I made those choices.  Yes, I own up to my failures.  However, I am human.  I recognize my imperfections.  The past remains unchangeable, but I can repent of what I have done and use the knowledge I have gained from my errors to make better choices now and in the future.  The story has not finished and I feel joy over that.

I just saw my (dead) wife

After I got off the bus at Crenshaw Avenue and Hyde Park Boulevard (hollow black dot on the map of Los Angeles, CA above) and crossed the street while returning home from work around 6:15 this morning, my eyes beheld the vision of my wife rounding the corner of South Victoria Avenue (hollow light gray dot to its left; the black circle with the dot was close to my destination) and heading towards me. Yet, inexplicably, as we approached, the woman I identified simply by her hairstyle slowly and agonizingly transformed into a complete stranger who I doubt I had ever seen before and appeared almost nothing like who I originally thought she was.
Silly, stupid, foolishly desperate me.

It's the End of the World As We Know It And I (Mostly) Feel Fine

Welcome to the first installment of recent widower's reviews, where I (the recent widower in question) look at some songs and possibly other media that relate- however remotely- to how I feel since my wife's death.
It should become a semi-regular feature on this blog since it's easy to do (except when I'm using it as a dual-purpose post, like this one) and I need filler from time to time.  So let's get to it.

It's the End of the World As We Know It And I (Mostly) Feel Fine

Welcome to the first installment of recent widower's reviews, where I (the recent widower in question) look at some songs and possibly other media that relate- however remotely- to how I feel since my wife's death.
It should become a semi-regular feature on this blog since it's easy to do (except when I'm using it as a dual-purpose post, like this one) and I need filler from time to time.  So let's get to it.