The Rhythm of Rest

I’m surprised to realize that I welcomed beauty today.

I didn’t even realize how much I leaned into the refreshing tranquility it offered until I’d drunk it in for a few hours. I’ve heard other bereaved hearts describe the first time after devastation that their blurry eyes recognized an emerging bloom, but it’s been so long since I took peaceful loveliness for granted that I didn’t notice I was breathing it in.

There is both relief and a new sorrow in the mix of my discovery. Such is the symphony of grief.

Arizona’s belated autumns, as they arrive here in the desert in December, have transformed the full, broad arms of the tranquil ash tree beyond my fenced enclosure into a vibrant painting of golden leaves-in-waiting. Tonight, a winter storm arrives and the remaining, shimmering bangles now clattering together on the tree’s lengthy limbs will surely lie wet and downtrodden on tomorrow’s patio, leaving the ash barren and undressed until February’s spring. We march to the beat of a different drummer here. Our version of Americana only confuses Currier & Ives.

The Sonoran Desert doesn’t care anything about acceptable timetables or the approved behaviors set by social mores though. It does what feels right and distrusts anything which challenges its own inner wisdom. “You be you” is the heartcry of our temperate climate.

Maybe that’s why I love the desert so. We have the same maverick soul.

The sun, so far to the south this time of year, spreads softened rays across an overcast sky, making the golden ash appear more brilliant by contrast. Now and then a weary leaf flutters to the earth, its departure serenaded by a gentle melody played on the wind chimes, and the breeze behind it all whispers past my face as I sit inside my house, taking it all in.

It’s an invitation to learn the rhythm of rest. To drink in this morning’s beauty even as, in truth, it represents another kind of death—another passing season before new life emerges again.

I can only hope the same for me and my own bruised heart.

Parlez-vous Francais?

All my life I’ve wanted to know how to speak French. It’s a beautiful, melodic language, but it’s pretty impractical here in the southwest where even my doctor’s office has only two sets of recordings—one in English and the other in Spanish. It’s beyond me why I wasn’t born in Louisiana or Canada except that I wanted to be close to my mother at birth.

I don’t know where the inspiration to be fluent en francais came from. It’s not like I look good in berets or striped socks. I don’t even like fine wine. Or cheap wine, either. But in high school I found out French was an elective, so I signed up right away. For three years. And never became fluent. Fifteen years ago I went after that dream again at community college and signed up right away. For three semesters. I’m still not fluent.

Unless I decide to go live in France and immerse myself in the language and culture, I will never  become fluent enough to turn down cooked snails in a fancy restaurant.

Immersion is the key to understanding and absorbing a foreign language. You can’t learn it from a book as easily as you can by breathing it and living it day in and day out. Some people are adept at learning other languages. The top student in my college French class was a young woman who came from Taiwan. Mandarin Chinese was her native tongue, and because of that she can read a Chinese newspaper fluently. She also speaks Korean, Italian, German, and English. She was a Mandarin Chinese speaking woman who learned French in America in an English-speaking classroom using a book written with an English alphabet.

She’s brilliant. And I’ve never met anyone else like her. She is fluent in French.

My takeaway from all of this is that there are three ways to make French your second language. You can be born in a Francophile country or state where the language will naturally become your native tongue. You can reside in a Francophile country where no one speaks English and be forced to learn French or starve. Or you can make the rest of us jealous with your rare ability to pick up languages easily.

After my third college semester, I dropped out of French class. I still wanted to converse in French, but I was busy with the rest of my life and thought if I bought enough French instruction books at Barnes and Noble, keeping those volumes on my bookshelf would make me fluent. I’m sorry to say that no one learns French by osmosis.

For nearly two years now, I have been learning another language by immersion. It is the language of grief. I never wanted to become fluent in such a thing, but I was thrown into its culture headlong and forced to live with it day in and day out. At first, I didn’t understand any aspect of how it works. The only person who could translate it for me was the counselor I began meeting with. She told me things like, “There are no shortcuts.” And, “The only way through it is through it.” I wanted the Cliff Notes version so I could get back to my life, but she only smiled and shook her head, knowing I was new at this. “This will be a slog through grief,” she told me.

It was not good news.

So I began writing about it. Processing my thoughts and feelings and experiences with the one friend I’ve been able to count on for most of my life—journaling. I am never judged by the words I put down on paper. My laptop never interrupts me or tries to fix me when I’m trying to sort out my heart’s brokenness. Writing down how I feel when I don’t understand how I feel is as much therapy for me as meeting with my counselor. In fact, I take notes while she and I talk and when we finish, I write down everything she tells me. Because it’s that important. Still, no one knows how to navigate grief and survive a shattered heart unless they’ve lived here themselves, immersed in this culture of pain and confusion. Even my professional counselors, though they can guide me, say they are learning from me, too.

I bought books, of course, at first. I tried to absorb the advice of experts, some of whom had never lost their husband and best friend before. When I bogged down reading them, I put them on my bookshelf and hoped for osmosis again. Eventually, I donated all of them and wrote down my thoughts instead.

Because I live here, in Sadness, as I explained in my very first blog post after Rob died, I know firsthand how it feels to co-exist with deep grief. I’ve learned that I have to make space for the heartache. I can’t ignore it, or it will eat me alive. I can’t postpone it. Or silence it. Or wrap it up in a box and shove it under the bed. Even more than all of that, I’m discovering that grief is important. I cannot, even after these twenty-two months of living without Rob in my world, fully comprehend that he is gone. How could I? He’s been my life for forty-eight years. I still reach for my phone to see if he’s sent me a text. Or for a split second think I should let him know I arrived safely at my destination. And hope this is some elaborate, lengthy bad dream instead of my horrible truth.

There is a protection in the way we are made that will only allow such a devastating truth to be absorbed slowly. I guess it's easier for those on the outside to accept that Rob is gone and not coming back. But his departure isn’t a side issue for me. It has rearranged my entire life, leaving me without direction. The daily grief I experience is one way my mind and soul and even my brain are ever so slowly adapting to the harsh truth of my husband’s loss.

I’ve discovered something else important, too. I’m not a lousy Christian just because this is taking so long. Though Jesus was a man well acquainted with grief, he doesn’t remove the pain for us when we become intimates with it, too. Instead, he stays close by, proving why he is so well acquainted with it. You know what else I’ve noticed about him when I’m overwhelmed with sorrow? He rarely says anything to me. He doesn’t give me advice. He never ever judges me. He just stays with me even if I can’t feel anything but my anguish and even if his presence changes nothing.

I think Jesus is fluent in grief. And though I would give almost anything to cut this whole educational experience short so I will stop hurting so much, he isn’t very concerned about making that happen. He’s not rushing me through this process. He’s not disappointed by how difficult I find it to be. He doesn’t think I’m failing at faith. He just stays with me. He lets me say what I need to say even if it’s not socially acceptable, and never condemns me for any of it. He’s not looking for performance from me. He knows how much this hurts.

To my great surprise, even though I’ve yelled at him for being so silent, begging him to say something, I’m discovering that in his silence there is full acceptance of how I am experiencing this pain. Which makes sense to me when I stop to think about it. His love and acceptance of me has never depended on my performance. It has simply depended on him.

I don’t think I’ll ever go to France to focus my attention on their language and culture. I’d have to stay there permanently so I could find someone to speak French with. I’ve learned enough in foreign language classes to help me understand the course I’m immersed in right now. 

Sometimes we’re just navigating in the dark without a flashlight.

La vie et un voyage au milieu de la nuit.

Merci beaucoup to Terence Faircloth for permission to use his photo seen above. The original can be viewed on his site by following this link: French Woman in Blue Beret | Mural by A-A-Ron aka @ag_pnt se… | Flickr

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In The Shadows of Courage

There are people who understand how to come alongside someone who is up to their armpits in battle. It’s a rare gift, and I know myself well enough to recognize that I used to be more comfortable supporting people from a distance (which might be a contradiction in terms) than I was standing so near I could see their lips quiver. At that distance, reality is too close for comfort.

Any kind of support helps. There are so many unspoken needs when death comes to call. I finally get why people supply food or gift cards for meals at the first whisper of loss. You have to eat, but when you can barely breathe there’s no energy left for cooking. I’ve learned everyone is different. Some people are comforted by flower arrangements, but I discovered that, for me, they were painful reminders. Live plants were different. Somehow, they brought hope. Against all odds I kept (most of) them alive, almost like their thirst gave me purpose when my world was gone.

All the ways people tried to fill the gaps left in our shattered lives made us feel loved and remembered. We saw the empathy and compassion underlying each thoughtful expression, like the friend whose bagpipe rendition of Amazing Grace suddenly filled the air one afternoon in Katy’s front yard. Dressed in full Scottish regalia, she stood in solidarity with her pipes and with us.

I’ve mentioned this several times before, but it’s worth bringing up again. Sorrow doesn’t lessen when the rush to comfort wanes. I know people must return to their own lives, responsibilities, and personal heartaches once the flowers are thrown out and the shock wears off. It has to be that way. This is a broken world. Death visits all of us, and other crises as well. We each have our own burdens to bear. And even if we love one another deeply, no one can walk through personal grief except the grieving. I alone feel what I feel, as painful and difficult as it is. No one knows what losing Rob has cost me except me. But in the lifelong aftermath, the road feels lonely.

And here is where things get a little tricky. This is where the desire to see someone’s pain end begins. Where we want them to go back to normal, for their sake as well as for ours. It’s hard to watch while someone tries to figure out how to build a new life they didn’t ask for. We want to fix them. And maybe we even want them to stop reminding us that no one is immune to extreme suffering.

So, we might try our hand at cheerleading. Judgment is the next step in that parade. The temptation to stop the tears or change the subject or see someone smile, or dissuade our own anxiety, comes out sounding like this. “Just trust in God and have faith.” “Everything happens for a reason.” “Look on the bright side.” “Things are going to get better.” “At least . . . . .” “Keep a positive attitude.” “This was God’s will.” “God is in control and we have to trust Him.” And then there’s my personal favorite, actually said to me a few weeks after I lost Rob. “Don’t set up a tent in the Valley of the Shadow of Death.”

Yeah. I know. We were lied to as kids. Words hurt a lot worse than sticks and stones.

I have spent enough time now as a widow that I’ve learned to expect criticism. It comes disguised as concern but only underscores how isolated this slog through grief feels. I don’t expect people to understand how I feel or what all the challenges are unless they’ve been here. I was widowed fairly young, so right now I’m surrounded by more spectators than club members. It’s just the way it is. First out of the chute, so to speak.

But there are those rare friends who know how to come alongside.

I just took a trip back to Florida because of a happy event. Rob’s youngest sister got married. I wanted to be there for a lot of good reasons. Still, I knew the experience would challenge me to the max. There are a lot of moving parts to flying across country on your own, for example. Things I didn’t used to think about. Rob was always there to help with the ridiculous amount of luggage I carried. He booked hotel rooms. Rented cars. Did the driving without getting us lost. Slept beside me in the unfamiliar bed. Was my soundboard and dinner companion and favorite comedian when things got crazy. Now all of that fell on me in finite detail, or was absent entirely, and I was afraid.

At this point, twenty-one months after losing him, I’ve put nearly forty thousand miles on my new Tahoe. By comparison, you might think flying sounds easier. But this trip, back to the town where we brought two kids into the world, where he established part of a career that he left behind when we moved to Arizona, and we built our first home—this time I knew I was in for a hurricane of triggers. And some of my friends and family knew it, too. They knew when I visited his grave on my own for the first time that it would be beyond difficult. That every street where I drove would remind me of the beginnings of us at a time when I grapple with the fallout from the end of us. That I would watch my sister-in-law walk an aisle on the arms of a friend instead of her father, supported by her mother and sisters but devoid of all three brothers.

While I stepped out on faith and challenged more fears, in the shadows of my courage stood a couple of friends who have never left my side. Honestly, I didn’t know what they were up to. I was so anxious about what I was dealing with within myself that I didn’t see them there. One by one, as each worrisome need was met and I moved on to the next, they stood silently and held me up. I wasn’t aware of how much they were doing. I thought I was the one doing it all, on my own, checking off each thing as I got through it.

It wasn’t until I added up the sum of their texts and phone calls and follow-up chats that I realized they had both anticipated what I was up against and prayed in detail for my success. They asked for things I hadn’t even thought of but which turned a fearful challenge into an unexpected gift of connection, confidence, and redemption. The details are personal, but these friends who know me well were able to stand alongside and hold me up when my self-assurance was anemic.

They weren't the only ones. Between my children's support and a few others who wrote encouraging words in various ways, I felt the love that reminded me I was on the minds and hearts of others. But every time someone full of their own heartache steps into the shadows of my courage to hold me up, this is what I think about:

I don’t think I’ve ever been a friend like that. 

I am astonished at the devotion of someone who prays again and again the way these women do. It cannot be easy to be a friend of mine right now. It’s not easy to be me right now. Sadness companions me—I’m not exactly the life of the party. Because I’m up to my armpits in a battle of survival and rebuilding and overcoming. Sometimes my arms get weary. My heart is weak. My soul cannot bear the thought of any more tears. I’m.Just.So.Tired.

And that’s the moment when, like Aaron and Hur did for Moses, a friend appears on each side and holds me up.

Slowly, the tide turns. Energy restores. Hope surfaces. And I begin to believe I will survive this. Not because anyone said the right thing. There is no right thing to say. Nor because I rose to the challenge on my own, because I didn't. It's just because someone knew that the best thing they could do, all that I needed, was for them to stand beside me. Even if it means standing in the shadows.

May I be a friend like that someday, too.

With thanks to Ben Seidelman for the lovely photo seen above. The original can be viewed by following this link:

Brace Yourself | Ben Seidelman | Flickr

To B or not To B

We never talked about what I should do if Rob went first. 

We only talked about the smallest details of funerals and burials, and how we didn’t really care much about a lot of hoopla. It was whatever the other wanted and needed to do. Rob wanted his name on a marker in the family plot in Sarasota, even if he was cremated or buried somewhere else. And he wanted a special song that he once played for me which I didn’t write down and needed a miracle to remember later on. Beyond that, I didn’t want to talk about it. I told him not to let some hellfire and brimstone preacher run my funeral. Find someone who understood the fathomless love of God and speak hope and encouragement to the grieving.

That's it. That was our plan. He dies. Or I die. Have this song. Don’t have that preacher. Put his name on a headstone in Sarasota. And I didn’t know where I wanted my remains to remain. There was no Plan B. There wasn’t much of a Plan A.

I'm not sure if we really had a plan.

Because I didn’t want to talk about something that sad. I didn’t want to think that I might lose him someday. Or ever. And I didn’t want to think that my life could be cut short. I told him we were in this together to the end – let’s kick off side by side. I thought we could arrange that without breaking the law or jeopardizing our salvation. Just grow old together and die hand in hand of natural causes.

Too bad life doesn’t include your requests when it hands you over to death. It’s all out of your hands at that point. Control is an illusion anyway. And making plans for a funeral is, by contrast, the easy part. Surviving the rest of your life without your darling is where the hard comes in. Maybe we should have talked a little bit about that. Even if it made me cry. There’s plenty of crying now. I wish I’d figured that out beforehand.

There were a lot of things we should have talked about. After all, forty-four years of marriage is a pretty long run even if you start early like we did. We’d both had scares. Several. We also had some bad information. Like, God always performs miracles. No. He doesn't. He did for all those earlier scares. Just not for this one. This one ended badly.

I wish I’d known more detail about Rob’s feelings regarding life support. I wish he’d used that superior intellect of his to help me figure out where I’d live if the unthinkable happened, no matter where we were living at the time. I wish he’d written down all of his computer passwords. I’ve said this before, but I wish I’d forced him to tell me on camera that he loved me and always would.

I wish I’d scratched his back more. I wish I’d made him gingersnaps and spice cake and snickerdoodles every month. I wish I’d let him take me to Paris. I wish I’d gotten on a plane by myself, flown to a big city, rented a car, and driven to the sticks by myself just so I’d know that I could. He always wanted me to do that.

I did that. This week, I did that. I know he’s proud of me. And also, he knew I could do it all along. He just wanted me to know I could do it.

I can do it.

I’m doing all of it. I had to figure out the Plan B on my own, with the help of my children. I had to make hard calls while he was incapacitated in the hospital. I had to face my fears and walk this grief journey alone. Not that I don’t have support. It’s just that when you grieve, no one else can feel the loss you suffer except you.

Maybe he and I couldn’t have come up with Plan B. We barely came up with Plan A. But sometimes, when the comparison train rolls by and I notice how some couples have months and even years together handling longterm illness before one of them passes on, I feel a little jealous. I know that’s another kind of hard and horrible road to travel, but I can’t help but wish we’d had time to talk before he left. There wasn’t any talking. Now there’s only guessing. And hoping I’m going to keep figuring out Plan B, the plan I never wanted to talk about. How to go on living without Rob beside me.

They say an ostrich sticks its head in the sand so it won’t have to look at what’s going on around it. Pretending that nothing bad is happening even if it is. It turns out that’s just a myth. What they really do is dig a hole in the dirt with their heads so they can make a nest. They prepare for the future. It only looks like they’re ignoring the present.

Maybe if I’d understood what ostriches are really doing, I’d have prepared myself better for what I’m forced to live out today. I’d have understood Rob’s insight when he joked that we’re all terminal. Or possibly I’d have realized that the price of deep love will someday be deep, profound grief.

And then again, maybe not. After all, “life is what happens to you while you’re busy making plans.”

We lived life, he and I. We lived it well and long. And when the end came, we faced it with courage. Together. The same way we did everything. 

Hand in hand, after all. Which was the plan.

With thanks to Sven-Kare Evenseth for the captivating photo seen above. The original can be viewed by following this link: Ostrich | Ostrich at Kristiansand Dyrepark (zoo). | Sven-Kåre Evenseth | Flickr