Moving forward
This is the closest death has ever come – stealing away a person from those that ring my heart. It was unexpected and brought my life to eye level, letting me sift my actions into categories like Things I’ve Been Doing Wrong and Things To Keep Doing Because They Seem Right.
My father-in-law’s passing has been a lesson that, in many ways, my life and happiness are mine to shape and create, but there are key elements of my life that I will never own, specifically, sometimes people will leave when I don’t want them to and it will hurt and it will suck and I will be sad and I will be angry and then I will get to try. to keep. moving forward. I’ve also realized that I am totally fucked when people even closer to me die. Like when my own parents die. Or god forbid my husband or children. I can’t comprehend a loss like that. But I don’t get to pick when these people leave my life. I only get to choose how I live with them while we’re all still here.
One of the strangest parts of losing someone is that your life keeps moving. You still have to get gas, go to the store and interact with people who have no idea what’s happened to you. And when the check out person asks you, just like she’s asks that last 120 people, how you are doing, you still say “Fine,” even though the real answer is “Someone I love just died.” The other strange part is waiting for it to feel real. My father-in-law has been dead for 3 weeks, and I still find it hard to grasp that I will never see him again. That he won’t be sitting in his spot on our couch, wrapped in his favorite blanket, making small talk and tickling my daughter or snuggling my son. I can still picture and hear him clearly, and I wonder how long it will take for his image and voice to become muted.
I finally feel like Adeline is doing okay. The last few weeks have been tough, and while she never cried, she’d been incredibly naughty, having more tantrums and times out than I thought possible. But then we celebrated Papa’s birthday…without him. And she blew out the candles on his cake after we sang to him, and I feel like she started to understand because he didn’t even come back for his own birthday party. We spent an afternoon with my mother-in-law, now a widow, playing at the park Addy and Joe always went to together. A few days later, as we drove by it, Addy said, “Papa tickled me and pushed me so high in the swing.” “That’s right, Sweetie,” I replied. “But now Grandma can,” she said. And my heart burst, because to me, that was her starting to move on. And ever since we blew out the candles on Papa’s 58th birthday cake, her behavior has returned to normal…which means there are still tantrums and time outs, but now they’re on an occasional rather than regular basis. She still talks about him daily, often requesting to look at pictures or watch a video because she wants “to hear Papa talking.” It makes me happy to see so clearly how much my daughter loved him.
We still have a long road ahead of us. And I know that, no matter how much time passes, we will always feel his absence. But I have never been more certain that my entire family is being watched over by someone who loves them just as much as I do.
Oh, Liz! Every time I read these last 2 posts I cry through the entire thing. You’ve done a beautiful job of capturing what Joe meant to you and your family and how much he will be missed. I’m really sorry. And thank you for reminding all of us to count our blessings and be thankful for all the loved ones who are with us now.
Wow. Addy is an amazing little girl who really loved her papa!
Liz,
When Rose died, whenever someone we knew asked how I was, I wanted to say: “Imagine waking up tomorrow morning and SPOUSE’S NAME isn’t there and isn’t there for the rest of your life. That’s how I am.”
I was at store where I was a regular customer and they knew Rose had recently died. The man behind the counter asked “How are you?” He then quickly said “What a stupid question.” I appreciated that.
Beautiful posts, Liz. I tried to think of something eloquent to say about how it will get better and the memory is always there, but it’s so hard to be eloquent when it really does suck and all you can really do is keep living life day-by-day until it does get better. Your family has been in our thoughts and will continue to be for a long time.
Thank you to all of you for your support through this. It really does so much to help us.