Author: Kathie

And so today’s moment of happiness despite the news.

It’s amazing, the effect strangers can have on you, especially those strangers that are only there for a short time, and then they’re gone.

The other night, I went downstairs to the AllWriters’ classroom to paint. The classroom has been quiet and dark since I finished my last class before Christmas break on the 20^th. Every time I’ve walked through the classroom, either to go through the garage to get to my car, or to take the dog out, I’ve said quietly, “Keep resting. Keep resting.” The room has felt quiet and peaceful, but it also feels like it’s waiting.

So I went downstairs to do an unusual activity in it. I do paint – though not often. I started, years and years ago, when someone challenged me to paint a self-portrait. I accepted the challenge, but was horrified. I couldn’t paint. I couldn’t draw. Well, at least, that’s what I was told, and so I didn’t think I could. After getting this challenge, Michael and I were walking past the window of an antique store, and there was a Styrofoam head in the window, like what wigs are displayed on. I grabbed Michael’s hand, yelled, “That’s it!” and we ran inside so I could buy the head. I painted on it, and I didn’t have to worry about how to make a face, because the face was already there. I enjoyed it so much, I went on to paint two more Styrofoam heads, a glass head, and then I bought a six-foot mannequin, and I painted her. She appears on the cover of my short story collection, Oddities & Endings. There are several other mannequins and mannequin parts as well.

When I went to the Oregon coast for the first time, I couldn’t bring a mannequin, obviously. But I felt compelled to paint, as well as to write. So I stopped in an art store and bought my first sketchpad, and I filled it during my time there. My favorite of those is framed and hangs in the stairwell leading up to the second floor. I painted every time I went to Oregon, and also when I went to Maine and to La Crosse, Wisconsin. My canvases line that stairwell. I am running out of room. Two canvases are on the wall that lines the stairwell from the second to third floor.

When I went to Oregon this year, the women who own the little house made sure my paints were out and ready. They store them for me in their attic, and they provide me with an old table to work on. Last year, they also provided a keyboard so I could practice the piano, and they provided it this year too. But I didn’t touch the paints or the keyboard this year. I was just too depleted. I didn’t think I would write either, but I should have known better. I wrote, and I’m still working on that book. I started a second book while I was there as well. One is a novel; one is a poetry collection.

But on this day, two evenings ago, I went down to paint at home. I recently signed a contract for my 16^th book, a poetry collection called Let Me Tell You; Let Me Sing. I’m supposed to come up with an idea for a cover, and I decided I would try to paint it myself. I can see what I want in my head. My previous covers have been done by friends and students who are artists. Michael’s photography is on my covers, and so is mine. But with this being a poetry book, and the title being in the first person – I wanted to see if I could paint the cover.

Will I show you when it’s done? We’ll see how it turns out first. I’m not feeling a lot of confidence. I still hear that voice that tells me I can’t do art.

The AllWriters’ classroom is one of my favorite places in the world. Everything in it has a story, holds a meaning, has a purpose. I felt it settle around me, a comfort, as I layered the table in paper towels and laid out my canvas. And then I started, trying to get what’s in my head onto the canvas. I laughed to myself as I thought I could call the painting, Let Me Tell You; Let Me Paint.

A lot of my life has been about “Let me!”

As I worked away, I realized that the quiet of the classroom wasn’t completely quiet. I could hear a voice, a male voice. I couldn’t make out what he was saying, but the voice was soft and rich and compelling. I thought maybe someone was walking past with their cell phone, but the voice didn’t leave. It stayed steady.

I finally walked around the table so I could glance out the windows. Right outside my door, a man stood next to my Little Free Library. He had a book opened in his hands. And he was reading out loud.

I couldn’t tell if he was reading to someone, maybe via Bluetooth, or if he was reading to himself. But he had on a winter jacket. The hood was up, and I could also see the fringe of a knit hat under the hood. I don’t use in-the-ear headphones, I can’t stand the feel, so I don’t know if these would work under that many layers. But he kept on reading.

As I painted, I listened. I couldn’t make out the words, but his voice flowed in a rhythm that was at once soothing and sincere.

He stayed for at least a half-hour.

Maybe he was homeless, maybe he wasn’t. Maybe he was reading to someone, maybe he wasn’t. He had to be aware of me in the classroom; the lights were all on and spilling out into the street, and I walked by the windows several times to get from one side of the canvas to the other.

Maybe he was reading to himself. Maybe he was reading to me.

All I know is that while I worked there, I was all alone, but I wasn’t. And as he read, he wasn’t alone either, as he stood by my door, under the outside light.

Eventually, his voice stopped. I was putting the last strokes onto what was going to be accomplished that night. I straightened and stretched my back, then walked to the windows. He was gone.

I went outside and looked in the Little Free Library. Someone had recently wiped out the entire bottom shelf, so there wasn’t much in there. I hoped whoever did was seeking to get gifts for people that couldn’t otherwise be afforded. From what I remember being in there, nothing was missing. I don’t think he took what he was reading with him.

But for a while this holiday, he was reading with someone, and even though I couldn’t hear the words, I shared his story. And for a while this holiday, I was painting an idea onto a canvas in an empty classroom, but it wasn’t empty at all.

When I’m done writing this, and posting it, I will be going back down to paint some more. Of course I hope he’ll be back. But I know it’s not likely.

I’ll be listening though.

And yes, that helps. Despite. Anyway.

And so today’s moment of happiness despite the news.

I took off my smart watch yesterday. Laid it down to the side of my desk, walked away, and thus far, over 24 hours later, I haven’t put it back on.

I feel like I’ve set down a heavy backpack.

It’s not that I don’t like technology. Most of what I do is dependent on technology. Email, Zoom, Google, you name it, I’m on it. I’m horrified at the idea of AI being used in writing, and I draw the line there. One of my books, The Home For Wayward Clocks, was included in the thousands stolen to train ChatGPT. I’m seeing people who now use the hashtag #AIAuthor. They aren’t authors. They’re AI users. Authors create their own work. Nothing artificial.

But then there was this watch.

Back in October, I went to my cell phone company to do something I was dreading. It was time to disconnect Michael’s phone and phone number. I’d used the phone for all I needed to after his death, and now, it was time to let it go. All a part of letting Michael go, I guess. There are many ways we have to deal with death now that wasn’t a part of our past. Social media, email addresses, bills paid online…the list goes on and on. But I was done. It was time for the phone to go.

The person at the cell phone store was very understanding. We took care of Michael’s line, laid it to rest. I also wanted to upgrade my phone, but “upgrade” was loosely used. I wanted a new phone that wasn’t as worn as mine, but that did exactly the same things in exactly the same ways. My learning curve, with everything I had to do since Michael’s accident and then his death, was so steep, I just couldn’t take anything more in. The person took me right to a phone and said, “This is it. This is what you want.” Oh, lovely. Easy. And he was right. I had very little learning to do with this phone.

As he was setting the phone up, transferring the data and such, I wandered around. The young man called out that smart watches were free with a phone upgrade. “Even mine?” I asked. He nodded.

I hadn’t thought of these watches much. One of my sons has one and uses it frequently. The watch I looked at had a sleep monitor on it. Health monitors. It would let me see my email and my texts and my messages from social media. It pretty much did everything but set up my coffee pot for the morning. So I decided to give it a try.

I hated the watchband, an ugly thing, and ordered a new one as soon as I got home. And then I set about getting acquainted.

It wasn’t long before the watch began to dominate my life.

It was the last thing I looked at before closing my eyes at night. The first thing I looked at in the morning. Instead of stopping to consider how I felt about my night’s sleep, if I was feeling rested, if I thought I’d slept well, I looked at my watch to tell me how I did, and then I felt accordingly. The watch kept telling me I was under stress when I was sitting quietly, reading or watching television.

And I kept checking it, checking it, checking it. I was suddenly never unplugged. The only time I didn’t have the watch on was when I was in the shower.

I began to notice that I showered with a sense of relief, not relaxation. The first thing I did when I got out of the shower: put the watch back on and check it.

The watch even kept telling me to get up and get moving. I’d be in the middle of talking with a client, or in the middle of writing, and it would shout, “Move! Move! You must move!”

I am not the sort that likes to be told what to do. I’ll move when I damn well please, thank you.

I watched a video the other day about cell phone addiction. The therapist said that if you can’t walk from one room to another without taking your phone with you, that’s a sign you might be too attached to your phone. I didn’t take my phone with me from room to room.

But my watch? It was with me wherever I went, except for the shower.

And so I took it off, as an experiment. Would I miss it?

Not at all. In fact, I think I’ve been breathing more deeply since I took it off. When I wake up in the morning after a good night’s sleep, I feel rested. I acknowledge when I’m under stress, and I know when I’m not.

I replaced the watch with a bracelet I picked up at the Milwaukee County Zoo. It tracks a penguin named Braveheart. She has a nest with two chicks in it. When I have a moment, when I’m sitting back and relaxing, not under any stress at all, taking a break the way I like to take breaks, and when I’m rested because I know I had a good night’s sleep, I look to my phone and I track my little penguin. I’d much rather track her than feel like I’m being tracked all the time by something outside of myself.

No more watch. Bring on the Braveheart.

And yes, that helps. Despite. Anyway.

And so today’s moment of happiness despite the news.

Today is Michael’s 60^th birthday. I don’t know if I’m supposed to say it like that, or if I’m supposed to say today would have been Michael’s 60^th birthday. So I’m going with a combo. Today is his birthday. He would have been 60 years old.

Michael’s age amazed me as I found myself attracted to him, living with him, marrying him. I’ve always been drawn to older men (though maybe not so much now, that I’M “older”). Michael and I met online, in a writer’s chatroom, and as it became clear there was potential for a relationship there, I asked him how old he was.

It nearly ended the relationship before it even began.

But we stuck with it. The hardest times were when I was in a new “decade” and he was still behind me. I turned 40 the year we had Olivia. I was, according to my doctor, a “geriatric mother”. Michael was 36. He wasn’t geriatric. When I turned 50, he was in his 40s. But the worst, by far, has been since I’ve been in my 60s. I turned 60 in 2020. Michael happily tagged along after me in his 50s.

At every one of his birthdays after I turned 60, I complained, “Would you hurry up? Get in your 60s already!”

He would just laugh and then strut around the house, shouting his age. Maddening.

Last year, Michael wasn’t home for his birthday. For his combination Christmas/birthday present, I flew him to Omaha to see his mother and sister. He hadn’t seen them in years, and I felt a sudden pressure to get him there. The best time for him to go was between Christmas and New Year’s, as he was in a new job and he didn’t have much vacation yet. Plus we were saving what vacation he did have for a cruise to London and Paris for our 25^th wedding anniversary. But because he worked for a technical college, he had more days off between the holidays because the school was closed down. So I asked him if that was what he would like. I wouldn’t go along, as I wanted to be here with the kids.

He was delighted. He told me it was his favorite Christmas/birthday present ever. He stayed with his mom and sister, visited extended family, saw people he used to work with.

I didn’t know, and neither did he, that it was his last chance to see his family. We didn’t go on the cruise for our anniversary either. He’d been gone for four months by then.

When I managed to get through Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, I breathed a sigh of relief, but then turned toward the next hurdle – his birthday two days after Christmas. And I had the oddest, most irreverent thought. He was never going to catch up with me. I was going to be married to a man in his fifties forever.

I swear, I swear, I swear (!!!!!) I heard him laugh.

Maddening.

(I am seriously tempted to go out and get him a birthday cake, with the number 60 written in frosting on it. Underlined. and with several exclamation points.)

Happy birthday, Michael. I love you.

And yes, that helps. Despite. Anyway.

And so today’s moment of happiness despite the news.

I’ve learned that grief moments come out of nowhere. But so do the Moments I write about here. Could be that most of life, good and bad, is unexpected.

Today is the day after Christmas. It is also the day before what would have been Michael’s 60^th birthday. I turned 60 in 2020. Michael, 5 years younger than me, did not.

The five years difference in our ages really didn’t usually bother me. The only times I twitched were when we would realize that the year I started high school, he was only in the fifth grade. Or the year I started college, he was starting high school. Or the year he started college, I’d graduated, and I was married and expecting a baby.

But the year I turned 60, it bothered me. With each of Michael’s birthdays since then, I’ve complained, “Will you hurry up and get in  your sixties? I don’t like that you’re still in your fifties when I’m sixty (61, 62, 63…).”

Well, Michael died shortly after he turned 59. He will never be in his sixties. And at times, I can hear him laughing.

Last year, Michael and I were not together for his birthday. As a combination Christmas and birthday present, I flew him to Omaha, to see his mother and sister and other family members, who he hadn’t seen since before the pandemic. So the last birthday I spent with Michael was in 2022.

So I’m stuck in the mire right now. Christmas, Michael’s birthday, New Year’s, and the anniversary of his accident. Today was a day that pretty much reflected that. We’ve been under a dense fog warning since last night. During the day, it’s been gray and murky. Now that the sun, wherever it was, went down, it’s black with a wash of gray over it. Walking outside, you’re immediately immersed in cold and moist. All day, geese have been flying over, and they are gray shadows. I think they’re lost.

Me too.

Partway through the day, I glanced at the time and realized that Starbucks was going to close in 25 minutes and I hadn’t been there yet. Horrors! So I went out in the murk and drove through the fog to get there.

One of my favorite baristas made my drink. When he leaned out the window to give it to me, he asked if I’d gotten everything I wanted for Christmas.

There was only one thing I wanted for Christmas, and it was impossible. So I just said, “I really didn’t want anything this year.”

This barista was one who knew about Michael, from the accident on. He and another favorite came to the Celebration of Life ceremony. They brought me my drink, which was one of the few things that got me through that day.

“Would you like a gift card from here?” he asked. “My gift to you.”

It may have been murky, but I still lit up.

What I wanted for Christmas, which would have been to rewind this year to January 17^th, to call Michael right before he left work, so he’d leave late and enter that crosswalk five minutes later, would have been a miracle. A big one.

But miracles happen in all sizes.

Making me light up in the middle of the murkiest day, in the middle day between two hard days, in the fog of this year…Miracle.

Thank you, Sammy.

And yes, that helps. Despite. Anyway.

And so today’s moment of happiness despite the news.

Actually, I’m going to take the day off today. I am surrounded by most of my family, and the Moment is simply that they are here.

Merry Christmas, everyone.

And so today’s moment of happiness despite the news.

Christmas Eve. 2024.

One of the things Olivia and I have talked a lot about is how the days around a big event, like a holiday, or a moment that was completely unexpected, are harder than the actual holidays. I’ve said that I think it’s because we’re braced for the bigger ones. We know Thanksgiving, Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, Michael’s birthday (December 27), and New Year’s Day are going to be hard. So we prepare ourselves.

And they are hard. But we’re braced.

Still, today, Christmas Eve, is hitting me really hard. I drove to the grocery store to pick up last minute things, started to sing along with “My Grown-Up Christmas List”, sung by Natalie Cole, and then had to pull over because I couldn’t see through the tears. The words that got to me: “No more lives torn apart,” and “that time will heal all hearts,” and “love will never end.”

My life has been torn apart. My heart is not yet healed. And love has, in a sense, ended. I’m a “widow” now.

So I’ve decided to step back from watching for a Moment today, and instead let that Moment be the memories I’ve being flooded with.

When I left and then divorced my first husband, Christmas Eve was the hardest day of the year, because he got our three kids on Christmas Eve. For the first years, we tried to celebrate Christmas day together, alternating homes, but that ended. When Michael moved in with me, and then we got married, he was very aware of this Christmas Eve sadness and he bustled around, helping to get our own traditions started. We wrapped presents together on Christmas Eve. He baked cookies. I made garibaldis for our Christmas Eve dinner. He came up with a new drink to try every midnight. We watched the made-for-tv movie, “The Homecoming” that created the tv show, The Waltons, and he didn’t tease me mercilessly about it, the way my first husband did. Though Michael did correct, every blasted year, the timing. In one scene, the Waltons family is listening to Fibber McGee and Molly (George Burns and Gracie Allen) on the radio, and Michael knew the radio episode, of course. He would sputter that they couldn’t be listening to that episode because it hadn’t aired yet.

Like grief, I braced myself for his rant every year, and got through it.

After the presents were placed under the tree, Michael made our newest drink and then we’d open our stockings together. Mine always had Junior Mints and Sno-Caps. I don’t know where he got the idea that I liked Sno-Caps, but I don’t. The little white pebbley things are annoying. But I never told him. He always got Circus Peanuts. We closed the evening by giving the pets their presents.

After Olivia was born, I had a little one to share Christmas Eve with again, but I still missed my big kids. We expanded our traditions to include going to a drive-thru Christmas light show here in Waukesha. We went as late as possible so that Olivia, as a child, wouldn’t have long to go to bed after we got home. The light show included an indoor electric train display, and Olivia was fascinated. There was a particular little red train car, that ran all on its own, that she loved. She’s 24 years old now, and when we go tonight, she will look for her little train car. I’d like to find it to give to her, but I haven’t been able to figure out what it is. And maybe that would take away the wonder of seeing it year after year.

Though we’re always braced for the year it’s not there.

We always asked someone to take our photo as we sat in whatever photo-op setting they had.

It was wonderful.

We didn’t know, of course, that last year would be our last year of being together. Of sharing the day and evening together, and then welcoming everyone else in the family on Christmas morning. First, the big kids. And then spouses, when some of the big kids got married. And then a grandchild.

But always, always, the cookies, the garibaldis, wrapping presents, driving through the Christmas lights, looking for the little red car, “The Homecoming”, opening stockings, and my exclaiming over Sno-Caps.

This year will be different.

Nobody is baking cookies, though my son is bringing some from the grocery store. I am not making garibaldis. I asked Olivia what she would like, and we are having chicken patty sandwiches and French fries. After I’m done writing this blog, I will be heading downstairs to wrap presents, by myself while I wrap Olivia’s, and then she will join me for the rest. We will go to the light show, with her sitting in the front seat for the first time. We will go in to the train building and look for the little red car. Please let it be there. I don’t know if we’ll do a photo. I will watch “The Homecoming”, and she might join me.

I hung everyone else’s stockings this year, but I did not hang up Michael’s. And I didn’t hang mine.

And so my Moment today?

Thank God for memories. Thank God for twenty-five years of marriage and twenty-seven Christmases together. Thank God for seeing the same lights over and over and still loving them, for watching a made-for-tv movie that I can recite all the lines to, and after a while, so could the man sitting beside me, even with his rant, and thank God for uneaten Sno-Caps.

As I walk through the new, it will be the old that gets me through. The old and well-loved and treasured.

Merry Christmas, everyone.

Merry Christmas, Michael. I miss you.

And yes, that helps. Despite. Anyway.

And so today’s moment of happiness despite the news.

As of this past Saturday at 1:00 p.m., I am officially on Christmas break until January 6^th. I normally only take off the week between Christmas and New Year’s, but with those days being on Wednesday this year, it seemed odd to work on those little dangling days that weren’t part of that week. I’m the boss, so I gave myself the full two weeks.

But it didn’t really feel like my break started until today. Today is Monday, and normally, I would have six clients and a class.

Today, I just had me.

I decided to try very hard this time to have a break like what I give myself when I go to the Oregon coast. That doesn’t usually happen with my breaks at home, as there are still distractions. And of course, I have Christmas Eve tomorrow and then Christmas day, and that won’t be like Oregon at all. But at home, I almost always have breakfast at my desk, while going through email.

Today, I pretended there was an ocean right outside my door.

I got up, threw on my old ratty pajamas, and went downstairs. Before fixing breakfast, I had to take the dog out – not an Oregon thing to do – and of course, just as I opened my garage door, one of my neighbors was pulling out of the parking lot. She waved at me gaily as I stood there in my ratty pajamas and bedhead. A sight I’m sure she won’t forget soon.

Then I gave the dog her medicine, also not an Oregon thing. Finally, I settled down in my recliner with my breakfast and a good hot cup of coffee. The fireplace was on. I had a good book. I breathed out a sigh of relief.

Oregon doesn’t have a recliner. It has a wood stove, which I’ve always been too scared to use. I was content, even without an ocean.

I actually managed to drink my whole cup of coffee before it got cold. On a normal day, I would have to reheat it several times, and then finally give up and throw the rest away. I tend to be optimistic in the morning (really!) and fill my cup to the brim, determined to be able to drink it, even though that rarely happens. But today, I warmed my hands around my mug. My fingers did not need to be on the keyboard. Email could wait.

My coffee was in my favorite mug, one that I’ve used for years. It was a gift from my daughter Katie, who was living in Florida at the time. It’s a big heavy mug, artisan-made, with a mermaid on it. I have a thing about mermaids. And I have a thing about her, as I have a thing about all my kids. Every morning, when I use it, I think of her. I miss her a lot (she lives in Louisiana), especially at Christmas, and especially right now, this year.

In the last year, I received another mug, from my daughter-by-proxy Rayne. It’s from Starbucks, but a Starbucks in London. It has Big Ben on it, which I really, really want to see and touch and hear. It also is a big heavy mug, and when I received it, I began to alternate it with my mermaid. Then, when I was in Oregon this year, I wrote about my favorite mug from that kitchen, which has a big blue fish on it. It’s the only mug I use while I’m there, and I’ve been going there since 2006, even though there’s an entire cabinet full. This year, a student traced the photo I took and found me another mug exactly like it for sale in New York City. Imagine. By the time I got home, it was waiting for me on my counter – a bit of Oregon to enjoy year round. So that one was added into the cycle too.

But in the last week or so…I’ve returned to just pulling the mermaid out of the dishwasher, if that’s where she is. Holding the mug in both hands. Missing my daughter. I have been feeling such a pull to have all of my family together, in one room. Before they are missing, before I am missing. If there’s anything Michael’s experience has taught me, it’s that reality of “here one minute, gone the next.”

I seem to be in a missing season.

There is a novel by Elizabeth Berg, called The Pull Of The Moon. It’s an earlier book, but my favorite of all of hers. And there is a line in it, near the beginning, which has just been following me wherever I go.

The time of losses is upon me.

Oh, yes. And I just ache.

But this morning, as I sat there, well…I just sat there. Holding my coffee. Warming my hands. Looking at the fireplace. My book at the ready on one side, brown sugar cinnamon Pop Tarts, also warm, on the other side. It wasn’t long before I was joined by two orange cats, who were delighted to see me in my recliner at that time of day. One sat behind my head, on the back of my seat, and the other sat on the console, between me and Michael’s empty recliner. The dog was at my feet.

At first, I kept thinking of things I could be doing. I needed to run to the Park & Rec office, to rent a special space for the AllWriters’ 20^th birthday celebration (the space is where I taught for the first time). I wanted to work on both of the books I’m writing, one in poetry, one a novel. My bed needed to be made, my laundry put away. There was a message on the studio voicemail from a long-ago client who wants to return to coaching. “I miss you, Kathie,” she said. I needed to call her back.

I understand missing.

The condo was quiet. Other than the pets, I was the only one there. I didn’t have the television on. My phone was on silent. If there were notifications coming on my computer, that was upstairs, and I didn’t hear anything.

Just quiet. I’ve needed quiet lately.

My list of what I wanted to get done trailed through my head, and then petered out. I pictured an ellipsis.

And then I said, “No.”

And I closed my eyes.

And rested.

Because I could. (I’m the boss.)

And yes, that helps. Despite. Anyway.

And so today’s moment of happiness despite the news.

As I said before, this is the season of deliveries at your door. For me, they’re mostly deliveries from online shopping, buying presents for others. Today, I received one that was for me, in a package and from a place that I didn’t recognize. Turned out it was for me – and it was from me.  I’d forgotten that I’d ordered it.

Olivia came upstairs from taking the dog out to tell me there was a package. When I asked her who it was from, she gave me the name of a company I didn’t recognize. I told her to bring it up. It was large and poofy, like a pillow in an envelope. It was, of course, impossible to open, so I had to attack it – carefully – with scissors, since I didn’t know what was inside.

As I pulled the plastic away, I saw a lovely royal blue, and then blazing white words:

KEEP GOING;

Well, that’s what I’ve been trying to do, isn’t it. I laughed out loud and pulled the hoodie the rest of the way out. That’s when I remembered ordering it. I did order it for myself, but in a sense, I also ordered it for others.

It’s a hoodie to encourage those around you, from familiar to strangers, who may be thinking it’s just not worth it to go on. On the front of the shirt is the message to keep going. On the back, a list of 100 reasons to stay alive. On each sleeve, facing out so that those around you can read it, it says, “You are needed. You are not a burden. You are loved.” I absolutely loved the idea that I could be encouraging someone without even knowing I was doing so, and so I ordered one.

But the first person this shirt talked to was me. One step in front of the other. Acclimating to this new way of life. Keep going.

But it also went deeper.

Two books ago, my novel Hope Always Rises was published. I wrote it to bring out a different perspective on those who choose to end their lives. To do this, I ripped first into the idea that suicide is a “mortal sin”, which is defined as “in Christian theology, particularly within Catholicism, is a gravely serious act that is considered a deliberate and conscious turning away from God, causing a complete separation from God’s grace and potentially leading to damnation if not repented before death.” With suicide, of course, this means that the person dies, so does not repent before death, and as such is forever cut away from God.

In Hope Always Rises, there is a special gated community in Heaven that is just for those who have chosen to end their lives. In my book, God does indeed forgive. And in my book, there is no Hell. God welcomes everyone.

To write the book, I had to dive deep into research on the subject. But I already had a lot of knowledge and experience, through friends choosing to go this route, and through my own personal experience. I decided to write the book after overhearing a conversation in a coffee shop, where two women were talking about someone they actually called “a friend” who had made this choice. They shredded her. “How could she do this?” they charged. “How could she do this to her children? To her husband?” I stood up and turned and said, “You’re asking the right question. How could she do this? But you might want to think about how she could do this to herself. What kind of pain must she have been in to have this seem like the correct path?” And then I walked out. And wrote the book.

I was asked recently, at the launch of my newest novel, Don’t Let Me Keep You, which of my books was my favorite. I used to answer that whichever one I’m working on is my favorite. But now, I have to admit, it’s Hope. I wrote my heart out in that book. In J.D. Salinger’s novella, Seymour; An Introduction, Seymour writes to his brother, Buddy Glass, who is a writer, and he tells Buddy what people will ask when he dies. “I’m so sure you’ll only get asked two questions. Were most of your stars out? Were you busy writing your heart out?” In Hope, every star was out.

This is all connected because recently, there was a review of Hope which was not very nice. I normally pay little to no attention to reviews, and I despise the importance publishers place on them now, pushing writers to weigh their worth on something external, something outside their control, as opposed to putting their worth on the internal, on their work…on their stars. Instead of asking ourselves, Are most of my stars out? while writing the piece, we are told to focus on the stars on websites.

What matters is what we write and how we write it.

This not nice reviewer didn’t like the book because…well, do you suppose it was because it was poorly written? Because the characters didn’t feel real? Because no emotion was conveyed? No. She didn’t like the book because the way I presented God and Heaven wasn’t the way she saw it. And yet, it’s very clear on the book’s description what kind of character God is, and what Heaven is like. She knew she wasn’t going to agree with it before she even read the book. She bought the book so she could bash it.

I think, because of the events of this year, I am probably a little more vulnerable than I usually am. And so this review really hit me, not because she attacked my writing, because she didn’t. She attacked the idea of the book. It didn’t matter how it was written. To her, she didn’t like the idea, so she hated the book.

And so I’ve stepped away from my creative work again for a bit. As I said, I think I’ve been more vulnerable.

But then today, I open the package and read, “KEEP GOING;”.

And you know who told me to do that? ME. I bought the damn shirt. So I could reach out to help other people. Which is why I wrote Hope Always Rises.

But instead I sent a message to myself.

Keep going.

Of course I will. Despite the news, whatever the news brings me every day. Hope Always Rises.

And yes, that helps. Despite. Anyway.

 

 

 

And so today’s moment of happiness despite the news.

An odd one today, with several layers.

First, you need to learn about my relationship with a billboard and a guy named Craig.

I live right across the street from the Waukesha Metro, which is a combination parking garage and bus terminal. Consequently, a lot of buses go by my home. Livvy, as a little girl when we first moved here, would stand at the floor-to-ceiling windows in our living room and wave at all the buses going by. The bus drivers began to wave back. Michael was also a daily rider of the buses, to get to and from work. He was walking to catch his bus home when he was struck by the passenger van.

So buses are a part of my daily life. And so is one particular bus-size advertisement. It’s for a well-known jewelry store, and the advertisement shows the owner’s face with a big friendly grin as he’s holding out what appears to be a diamond the size of a softball. His name is Craig Husar,  and his store bears his name.

I see his face many times every day, and over time, I began to say, “Hi, Craig,” whenever he passed. But the face appearances expanded. Whenever I’m out driving somewhere, I’d see a bus, and on that bus, Craig. So I’d say, “Hi, Craig.” When Michael was still alive, he would point at the buses and say, “Look, there’s your good buddy, Craig,” and we would both wave. Craig is also on billboards, and so I say hello to him there too.

Now if you read my blog regularly, you know that one of the things that bothered me so much after the accident was Michael’s missing wedding ring. As I was handed all of Michael’s things in the emergency room, I asked where his wedding ring was. They said he hadn’t come in with one. This made no sense because Michael always wore his wedding ring.

As the days, then weeks, passed, I had the hospital double-check the ER and the lost and found. I hounded the ambulance company and the police department. But no ring showed up. A couple months before the accident, Michael had carpal and cubital tunnel surgery, and so he took his ring off. I didn’t drive him that day, Olivia did, and so I worried that Michael took his ring off at the surgery center and didn’t get it back. When Michael became cognizant after the accident, I asked him about the ring, but he didn’t remember the surgery and he didn’t know where his ring was. After he died, I threw myself into reorganizing my kitchen, which I now recognize was a way that I was trying to gain control over my suddenly out of control life. In a drawer that holds our ladles and big spoons, way in the back corner, I found Michael’s ring. That drawer is under the segment of the kitchen counter that was designated as Michael’s. He must have set it in there to make sure it didn’t fall off the counter.

I, of course, promptly burst into tears when I found the ring. Since then, I’ve worn both Michael’s and my rings on my ring finger.

In recent weeks, I began to ponder the rings. I’ve had a few experiences now where I’ve filled out forms, asking for my marital status. I had to choose between married, single, or widowed. I didn’t feel single. I don’t want to be widowed. I felt married. But in legal terms, that is no longer what I am. I am no longer married.

So I checked widowed, and hated it.

But I began to look more and more at the wedding rings. And I thought more and more about how, through no choice of my own, I’ve been moved into a new phase of my life. There is a lot of emphasis, of course, in literature about losing a spouse, on moving on. I don’t like that phrase at all. It’s like I said yesterday in response to a student hoping I would find joy. I’m really not looking for joy, and I don’t think it’s about moving on. It’s about finding peace, and also finding acceptance in where I am now. While Michael isn’t physically in my life anymore, our lives will always be intertwined. The wedding rings represent those twenty-five years we were married. And now…I needed them to represent our new relationship. Our history and our relationship connects us, as does our daughter. But Michael is no longer present. I am alone.

And so I began to wonder about taking the wedding rings and making them one ring. I thought at first about having them soldered together. But I began to think more about having the two rings recreated into a new ring, a blend of the two of us. I am blended with Michael, even as I step into this new life, on my own.

So I began to wonder how I could find a designer for this new ring.

I thought about this last week as I was waiting for my coffee to finish reheating in the microwave. It was snowing, and so I stood by our windows and looked out, admiring the prettiness as I pondered this whole issue. And a bus went by. So did Craig Husar’s face. “Hi, Craig,” I said automatically.

And then I thought, Craig!

A quick search on the internet showed me that Craig’s jewelry store indeed did custom design. So today, I showed up in the store.

Shortly after arriving, I was introduced to Becca, Craig’s daughter, who designs jewelry.

I told her Michael’s whole story, my whole story, and why I felt I needed to make these two rings into one, to represent Michael always being a part of me, but also, my being on my own in a new life. A new chapter. I also want to wear the new ring on my right hand, not my left, leaving the ring finger on my left hand bare.

When you are a writer, you think in symbols, donchaknow.

I also told her to be sure to tell her father that I say hello to him several times a day.

And Becca understood. Looking at the two wedding rings, she picked up details from their design, including what made us pick out these rings to begin with. On either side of the channel of diamonds, there is a gold braid. And she began to braid and to blend. Blend. There’s that word again.

She came up with a beautiful design, using the diamonds from both of our rings, and the gold and metal from the rings themselves. That’s exactly what I wanted.

She left me for a moment, to figure out the pricing and such, and when she came back, she was accompanied by a man.

I recognized that grin immediately.

Craig Husar sat down next to me, introduced himself, and shared his condolences. He told me I’d come to the right place, and there was no one better to create this ring than his daughter. As we talked, he said, “You know, there’s a real warmth and energy here. I think your husband is in full agreement with what you’re doing.”

I’d been feeling it since I entered the store.

“Hey,” Michael said over and over, “there’s your good buddy, Craig.”

And Craig and his daughter are helping me with my next steps now.

I came home with a bare finger, which feels very strange. But I also came home with another piece of the peace I’m looking for.

Amazing.

And yes, that helps. Despite. Anyway.

And so today’s moment of happiness despite the news.

I can’t say what came over me at 3:00 this morning.

We were in the middle of a snowstorm. It started in the early afternoon, then built up power, and by this time of the morning in a new day, the snow took up all the air between the sky and the ground.

I was exhausted. I’d fallen behind somehow this week, and so I had all of my Friday clients to read, starting when I finished with Thursday clients at 9:00 at night. I read through midnight, into the morning, and finally finished at 3:00. My first client was six hours away.

Throughout the night, as I read, I glanced outside, noting the snow. I was glad I wasn’t out in it. When I finally shut down my computer, all I wanted to do was stagger into bed. But there was Ursula, my dog, to take outside first. It doesn’t matter what time I go to bed; she knows that she is taken out before my head hits the pillow.

So we went out.

Ursula looked around at the newly white world and ventured out further than usual. We stood in the middle of the city parking lot, now a white field, with no cars. That snow that filled the air between sky and earth fell all around us. I remembered catching snowflakes on my tongue when I was a little girl, and I nearly stuck my tongue out to try it again. But then I remembered one time when my mother caught me scooping up fresh white snow with my mittens and eating it like a true-to-life sno-cone. I did it then because I’d just read a Bobbsey Twins book where the kids, brothers and sisters, two sets of twins, Bert and Nan, Freddie and Flossie, filled a bucket with new snow. Their mother helped them add flavoring to it, I don’t remember what kind, and they stirred it and then ate it. They called it snow ice cream. I wanted some.

My mother was horrified. She filled a clear glass with snow, then brought it inside, where she insisted I watch it melt. She pointed out all the flecks in the snow, and told me that was what I’d just eaten. I never ate snow again, and so I didn’t stick my tongue out now.

Though I wanted to. To taste the snow as I thought it was then, and as I wished it could be now.

Ursula, however, apparently had no such memory, and she stuck her head in the snow up to her ears. She came out with a polar bear head and I laughed, but quietly, because it was three in the morning.

Sometimes, even cities get quiet. It was quiet enough that I could hear the snow falling. The flakes swirling around me, I felt like I was in a star storm, and I thought how wonderful that would be.

I took a deep breath and let the chill air come into me, as well as around me. For that moment, everything stopped and it was just…quiet. And so pretty.

The Christmas greetings I’ve received this year have been very different. All tinted with a bit of sadness, a bit of compassion, and a lot of support. One person said, “Have a Christmas!”, acknowledging that it’s not likely to be merry. Most have confirmed that they know that this is a hard holiday this year, but wishing me some happiness. A student emailed me and said, “I know this is a difficult time, but I hope you find some joy.”

But it’s not really joy that I’m looking for. It’s peace, which is also supposed to be a hallmark of this season. But I’m not looking for peace on earth either. Peace of mind, of my mind, that’s what my wish is for this Christmas, and for the new year.

Standing there in the snow with my dog, the rest of the world asleep, the city quiet, the snow like stars around me, I had it. Peace. For that moment.

Before I turned to go in, I looked at Ursula and smiled. She gave me a doggie smile back. Then I reached down, scooped up a mitten-full of the whitest, purest snow, and I ate it, spinning myself backwards to that little girl that I was, looking for ice cream falling from heaven. Before I found out that things aren’t always what they seem.

As I truly know now.

But standing there in that Moment, grinning dog by my side, snow melting down my throat, more snow settling on my sleeves, my shoulders, sparkling in my hair, quietness all around as if there was nothing loud in my life, there was peace.

Hanging on to it.

And yes, that helps. Despite. Anyway.