AVOIDING HYSTERICAL DEATH TALK

Death is part of life – there 2 cannot be separated: we ALL begin to die as soon as we exit the womb.

I have never been afraid of death – and I am not afraid now.

Death does leave its mark on our lives; and there is no getting around that.

For ME, at this moment in time in MY life … I choose not to focus on the {what ifs} death scenarios everyone else is focused on. I am dealing, every minute of every day with the REALITIES of death’s fallout in my own life: I am not going to get caught up in the {what ifs} fear-mongering hysteria everyone is wanting to pull me into.

That someone – AS WAS DONE YESTERDAY AFTERNOON – would actually say to me that I need to educate myself because I have no idea what it’s like to watch someone die; AND I don’t know how death affects a family … is outrageous! Of all the nerve!

From September 1^st, 2018 to December 14^th, 2018, I WAS BY BOB’S SIDE WATCHING his spirit slipping away from me. I WAS THERE AT HIS LAST BREATH. I will NEVER be able to erase those final moments from my thoughts. Bob’s leaving was peaceful, but it was HARD to say goodbye: Bob was my entire world; he is the love of my life. My entire family nucleus fell apart in 10 months’ time … I think I KNOW “how death affects a family”.

People have lost their minds.

People have become arrogantly intrusive in MY life – barging through it like they own it, and insisting I follow their demands. People are too fueled by their self-righteous self-importance. Especially those who have now been pinned with the ‘hero’ badge. They are NOT ‘heroes’ to me … and they are behaving very badly. Real Heroes do not call attention to themselves – and they do not intrude, or stomp all over someone else’s life like a dictator.

I do not want to hear any more about coronavirus.

I am still reeling from the physical death of my husband – I am still trying to adjust to the abandonment of my immediate family – I am NOT going to have people caught up in fearful hysteria browbeating and lambasting me because I do not respond to this virus outbreak as they think I should.

I am sorry if that comes across as “a bitter bitch” or “an unmitigated asshole”, but the {what ifs} death scenarios shouted at me from media sources (which I have stopped watching), thrown in my face by FB Pages (which I rarely visit anymore), as well as from people who SHOULD KNOW BETTER because they “were there” with us every step of Bob’s leaving … these fearmongering scenarios mean nothing to ME compared to the loss of my husband’s presence in MY life. I refuse to feel guilty about that feeling. I also refuse to go down that road hedged with paranoid fears: I am too busy juggling my OWN emotions following a death in MY OWN life. I am not responsible for juggling everyone else’s emotions, or feeling the fears in their lives.

Death is part of the package of life – yin and yang concept.

I post MY Life Journey on MY Page; if that is offensive to you, you are free to leave. You are NOT free to tell me what I can – and cannot – post on MY Page.

STOP talking to me about coronavirus.

I don’t want to hear any more about it.

THE LOOK THAT WROTE OUR STORY

I looked at Bob.

He looked at me.

Standing in his kitchen: 10 PM; 46 years ago – last night, today. Love striking fast and furious was the last thing on either of our minds. Still, it struck … and we rolled with it.

And we liked what we saw ;-)

We liked what we were feeling.

A chance meeting.

Happenstance.

Fate.

The midnight hour was fast approaching … time for teenage Cinderella to wrap up the convo with Prince Charming; and head home.

He walked with me.

I walked with him.

And our galloping hearts were recklessly on their way into the future.

As soon as the present (back then) was wrapped up.

Old relationships of betrayals to end.

A new relationship to begin.

Hope catapulting our wounded hearts out of the night and into the day.

The dawning of March 28th, 1974, set things in motion that we couldn’t turn back.

Our young hearts took on lives of their own and were aiming for a brighter future.

And it was too late to look back …

What followed with the dawning of March 28^th, 1974, was a future filled with 44 heady years of passion that still burned as brightly, and hotly, when our life together ended … as when our life together began; deep abiding love that stayed a steady and faithful course; easy friendship ties that bound tightly; parenthood joys, and disappointments; and adorable grandchildren. 

Of course, as all married couples do, we had our {moments} of occasional strong dislikes when we strongly disagreed with each other – which always moved us towards marital growth and made us dig our roots in deeper to withstand the tough times of upheaval, Bob dying twice in a short 7 year span early into our married life, financial uncertainty that came with unexpected upheavals: and the years of unrelenting angst our grown children still nourish.

But always – always – love for each other was the stabilizing factor in our life together.

Our lives were casually thrown together with a big bang effect, the evening of March 27th, 1974.

The Maker of the stars liberally seeded our bruised young lives with fresh hope as March 28th, 1974, unfolded.

But there were still loose ends to be tie up before our life together could really kick in (https://jeastofeden.blogspot.com/2020/03/46-years-ago-tonight-love-walked-in.html).

Our 44 years together really was an amazing time of blessedness, despite the occasional teeth-jarring ruts along the long and winding road that led to the December 14^th, 2018 solo journeys – Bob’s beyond the clouds, and mine to continue alone, until I too, am called Home.

Bob’s physical absence in my life has left a nameless void (there are no words in any language to adequately explain how I feel) in my life, and I struggle every day to learn how to live without falling into that void.

So, I write.

Writing helps keep me balanced between the past and the future as I walk the shaky tightrope of widowhood. As I inch forward, one small step at a time, I am trying to figure out how to effectively live my life the best way I can … without the greatest man I ever knew, in it.

Bob was a big man.

Bob had a big heart filled with love for me.

Bob wore mighty big shoes.

Bob’s unconditional love lifted me out of the ordinary, and gave me an extraordinary life in a private world we created just for us – while we lived in this twisted world … where real love and traditional marriage between a natural born man, and natural born woman, seems like a foreign concept.

I want our grandchildren to mature and live their own extraordinary lives.

I want to live my life in the now, in a way that honors the man I loved; the man I still love. The man I have always loved, since I was a slip of a girl at 10 years old and married at 17. I want to live my life moving forward while still reminding the living of the memory of the man I still love; the man, whose DNA our grandchildren carry into the future.

Their futures started with a look.

That look wrote Our Story.

And so, I write.

I WILL CONTINUE TO WRITE

THIS.

This article I can SO IDENTIFY WITH, posted on a FB Page, is why I will never be silent.

(https://medium.com/@davidvienna/the-teacher-everyone-feared-taught-me-to-fight-back-321d7bb5937e)

People can chastise me. People can scream at me. People can tell me, "YOU do NOT get to talk!". People can avoid me. People can abandon me.

But people cannot silence me.

I.W.I.L.L.C.O.N.T.I.N.U.E.T.O.W.R.I.T.E.

A diary kept me sane in a childhood home that was crazy.

I never "feared a teacher" - I never feared anyone: if anything, people feared me ... and I made sure they were kept on their toes. LOL. I could't afford not to be tough growing up.

High School teachers, Mrs. Borg & Mrs. Irving, both encouraged me to continue with my witty and sarcastic literary assignments - most of my handed in assignments focused on the Vietnam War at the time (my choice of writing, not the teachers'); I Aced the classes. Because they allowed me to be my lovable witty and sarcastic self (and I think they knew my home situation ... small town, and all), their classes were the only classes I actually attended. They knew my writing was keeping me grounded. But, Mrs. Irving KNEW me - she saw into my soul. When I married before my Senior year started, and immediately got pregnant my 'honeymoon week', she told me, "Val, don't drop out of school. I'm starting a Night Course Class in my class twice a week: come! I'm signing you up. Come." I went. When she saw Bob walking me to class, she was glad to see I chose well in love. She and Bob knew each other - small town. I did well in her course, and graduated with a bona fide Graduation Diploma. It was mailed to me; I was heavily pregnant by then and didn't want to chance going into labor crossing the stage to receive it. But, every time I look at that diploma, I think of the teacher that KNEW me, and liked me enough to help me succeed.

Bob & Mrs. Irving grew me up.

A journal kept me focused when I was a young wife and mother.

Blogging helped me share my life for 16 years (grandparenting/parenting, home education, gardening, raising/butchering chickens, several homes renovations, life with a wolf - a real 4-legged wolf, not just my Bob. LOL, road trips, 2nd time around grandparenting) - Blogging helped me hold it together when my world was shaken in 2018, and totally torpedoed in 2019.

I write because life continues to give me assignments I'd rather not have to endure.

I write because it is liberating.