The Receipt

Dearest Trick~

As I fill box after box with our items I find myself sifting through all our papers. Among them simply folded in fourths I found a receipt. The colored paper stayed folded as I ran my hand very slowly over the corners. My mind drifted to the one and only time I had touched that paper, signed that paper, made choices on that paper. It is the receipt from your … how shall I call it… celebration.

Ever so slowly I found my fingers pulling back and flattening the creases of the sheet, the last sheet I ever had to fill out as your wife. The first time I ever had to write widow. And then the greatest thing happened… my heart filled with joy. The sides of my mouth turned up, as I could not stop the smile from forming on my face. As my eyes scanned the receipt I felt pride in every choice I made, every penny I spent, every decision that came together for the best farewell party I can think of. There may be many things I do not do right in life, there may have been a ton I could have done better…but, that day… that day I put YOU and the essence of who YOU are into every piece of the celebration.

Here I stood completely alone laughing out loud as I saw “periwinkle velour “ casket listed. I giggled when I read Beastie Boys for visitation and Spiderman theme for opening of service.  How odd it is that a receipt from the hardest moment of my life could not just bring tears but a laugh and comfort. I love that we loved so hard. I love that my love for you was bigger then my sadness for myself. I love that a piece of paper, a receipt can remind me of the joy one can feel when they honor another with happiness, laughter and love.

As a tear slowly ran down my face I placed that receipt carefully next to your death certificates. And now the certificates that rip my heart apart are covered with the receipt of … well LOVE. So often in life we have receipts that drag us down. We have papers to remind us what money we just spent, or what show we just saw. We toss then to the side or shred them.  There will never be a receipt for the fun and mazing life we lived together, but this paper reminds me of the amazing man I got to call my husband.

Around the world and back again~

Inch by Inch

Dearest Trick~

You always use to say to me, “inch by inch it’s a synch, yard by yard is awfully hard”.  I have given that advice many times since you left and went to heaven. But here I find myself having lacked to follow your amazing words of wisdom.  Today it hit me…. Practice what Trick preached.  With this advice I have been able to:

~Pack 9 boxes of memories

~Go through EVERY file and paper you and I kept ,and release those that I no longer needed

~Take a walk even when I thought I had more to do then there are hours in the day (the walk was important for my mental health)

~Laugh… yup I laughed today

~Filled out papers for my new job

~Embraced the change that is happening in my life

~Stop and actually smell the flowers (on the tree outside)

~Drink a cup of tea in pure silence

I still have a ton to pack. I still have more paperwork to fill out. I still have a scary new life and move ahead of me. But for now I feel okay, I feel accomplished, I feel like each inch I take is a win. You were right, you have always been right. It is much easier to tackle life a little at a time. Maybe that is the key to all of this … to this life I live. Maybe all I need to do is live in the present moment, accomplish what I can in that moment, and be proud of even the smallest of steps. So I shall take life inch by inch but I miss you yard by yard because my love, it is beyond hard!!!!

Around the world and back again~

BOXES

Dearest Trick~

Boxes…  I never thought about how often we are put in boxes. How others and at times even ourselves close four walls around who we are and what we are. We allow life to box us in, to be determined by others and simple. We are boxed into roles we play and labels we put on ourselves. But somehow those labels never seem to “ship” us anywhere; often they keep us collecting dust in the same spot in our lives. And now, I am surrounded by boxes! I am packing all of OUR belongings and heading to a new city, a new life, a new me and part of me wants to stay in this box…this box of pain that I have created for myself since you were taken from me.

I never thought it would be so hard to fold and pack the physical pieces of our lives. That the simple and yet overwhelmingly horrific act of putting the sweatshirt you wore to the hospital that day would bring me to my knees. It is not just filling these boxes with items but filling them with memories. And I know when they are delivered to the next place you will not be there to unpack them, to share in this new adventure, to put everything in its place. And so I am left facing cardboard, facing a new life, facing a new step to take and I am paralyzed with fear, with sadness and with a task that seems impossible ~ moving… moving on!

I can let this box I have placed myself in as a young widow be where I live. I can let the sadness crush the sides and tatter the tape closing me in. I can allow myself to be stacked on top of with piles of anger and pitty. But I know that staying in a box, living in four square walls conforming to a lable I placed on myself, on the outside of myself, is not authentic. It is time for me to seal these memories with love. It is time to place our history, our dreams and what I thought was our future in bubble wrap and carefully hand it over to the movers next month. It is time for me to pack.

The wall in the far end of the apartment is beginning to be lined with boxes. Each numbered and inventoried. Each box containing things YOU helped me pack weeks before your passing. My hands run along items knowing you had touched them, knowing my hands will be the only ones to touch them from now on. And through the tears and fear I pack on. The stack of boxes gets taller, I get stronger and this life I am left to live becomes clear. The boxes of life were never meant to hold us back, they were meant to hold our things so we can MOVE forward. I am moving love, I am moving forward and I hold YOU in the best container I have ~ my heart!

Around the world and back again~