young widowhood

The Details


Wedding Dress

Image by LollyKnit via Flickr

So, we have gone from a small ceremony with just ourselves and our daughters to planning a wedding on location and with guests no less. And it makes me smile to think about it really because I can remember us not long ago joking about theme weddings in Vegas.

It doesn’t matter really. As long it is us. Rob and I. Our girls.

I bought a bride’s magazine the other day. It felt like an odd thing to do. At my age. Looking at “princess” gowns like a teenager getting ready for prom.

When I married Will, it was in a dress that I didn’t really like, wearing accessories that were better suited to my sister DNOS, who had picked them out, than myself. The ceremony was written by the Catholic church and the songs prescribed by them as well. The reception was old school with a sit down dinner and dancing afterwards. All I had wanted was my toes in the sand, a flowing, slightly sexy gown and white cake with sickeningly sweet thick icing.

This time I will have the mountains, and I have come to love them more and more, a very exotic Canadian who fulfills the sexy requirement more than just slightly, and a ceremony written by the province of Alberta.

I don’t know if Tool has ever written a wedding appropriate song, and I can’t eat cake anymore without making myself sick. And I don’t think the gown will be white much less princess-like.

Details. It’s a good thing I am marrying a Virgo*

 

*Rob planned the entire wedding really, I picked out a dress for me and a flower girl dress for Dee. I also arranged for the few flowers we needed. Mostly though – it was Rob. Interesting my late husband, Will, was also keen on wedding planning, the mark of an enthusiastic to be wed man though Rob did tell me that when he married his late wife, Shelley, he couldn’t have been less interested. He was just nineteen though and as he tells it, whenever pressed into wedding planner mode, he was more than willing to oblige her. (see How Do You Know)

Something New


An engagement ring.

Image via Wikipedia

I had a dentist appointment after school today. I loathe six month check ups. It is one of those left-over aversions from my teenage years when I couldn’t seem to go to the dentist without having to come back and have a cavity filled. I haven’t had a cavity in years. So many that I am tempted to say that I am probably in my second cavity-free decade now, but I still dread going. Just entering the office renders me nearly mute as I focus on stemming the tide of tension that builds slowly until the all clear is given after the final inspection of my not so pearly whites.

There was a new hygienist today. She  attempted to engage me in small talk which I still don’t understand really. Am I expected to reply, just nod, or make  sound effects?  Rob would find this line of thought amusing as he already thinks that I use sounds in place of real words so often anyway that why would I find the expectation of this cave person dialect an imposition?

She had a daughter who was 6’ 4”. I found this out after she commented on my height and wondered did I have a hard time finding pants that fit. I do. The world of trousers caters to the short(er). The conversation somehow wound it’s way to the daughter’s boyfriend, who is only 5’10”, and did I have a tall husband?

And I nearly said, “yes”.

Of course I don’t have a husband anymore, so I hesitated, stammered, and finally told the woman that my husband had died over a year ago. She apologized, as they always do, and then yammered on, but I had stopped paying attention for the moment. It was natural for this woman to assume I was married. I have a ring on my finger now. But, I thought of Rob first, not Will.

I had almost said, ‘Yes, my husband is nearly 6’ tall.”

Looking Back


Lot's Wife on the Dead Sea Shore

Lot's Wife on the Dead Sea Shore by Ian W Scott via Flickr

In the beginning, I looked back a lot. Went over every detail and tried to figure out what I overlooked or just didn’t see that could have made the difference between Will dying or still being alive.

When it finally sunk in that this was not the most productive use of my time, I downgraded that particular brand of self-torture to “hobby” and took up the full-time task of trying to stay one-step ahead of disaster.

My world was a house of cards, and it took only the slightest suggestion of a breeze to threaten it. I was single-minded in this respect as well. I rarely let anyone stop me from doing what I thought needed to be done. There were times when I was wrong, because who isn’t, but more often I managed to come to just the right solution and stave off the wind for another day.

Afterwards, I tarried for quite some time in the eye of the hurricane that I had been holding off with super-human will, but as time passed and the urgent needs of survival faded, I found that I wasn’t able to anymore. The adrenaline surge came to an abrupt and I was swept into the maelstrom.

Storms pass, even tropical ones, and you climb out of the temporary shelters, assess the damage and call your insurance man. That used to be Will. And then it was just me and whomever I could cajole into assisting me. Now there is an exotic Canadian applying for the job. It is harder than I thought it would be to allow him to help. I thought I had learned so much. In the end, I still have trust and control issues to work on.

Still, once upon a time, I didn’t even acknowledge the existence of  these issues, let alone work on them.

I am not sure how it happened that I came to fall in love and agree to abandon the cocoon existence I had so carefully constructed for myself and my daughter. For all my Saggitarian impulsiveness, I am more of a water rabbit. Bunnies don’t like working without a net. It makes us cranky. Crankiness being our standard cover for insecurities and fears.

I guess it would be too simple to say that I just couldn’t resist, but I couldn’t. There is something compelling and ultimately futile in resisting destiny and oddly unmistakable. I have never been able to back away, even when I was terrified, and I wouldn’t say that I am really. How could I be after all that has happened? But, I am not naive. I don’t lightly discount the fates. Destiny is the stronger force, but the fates will play havoc where they may.