Okay people. It’s time to put our thinking caps on. This has bothered me for years and I sometimes get the feeling it bothers some of the rest of you.
The word “anniversary.”
When we’re talking about the day our spouses passed, we always seem to put that word in quotes, don’t we? Which to me signals that it’s not really the right word. “Anniversaries” are supposed to be fun. They’re supposed to be a celebration. They’re supposed to commemorate something positive…like not killing each other in the first 10 years of marriage.
I don’t know about you, but…I can stretch this definition to include the “celebration” of my husband’s life, but “fun” it is NOT.
(I hope I don’t get called on overuse of “quotations” during this blog.)
When I looked up “death anniversary” on Wikipedia (I know…who knew there was such an official thing listed?) it mentioned several countries where it’s tradition to mark the weeks, months, years since a loved one has passed. And guess what? America was not one of those countries. Go figure.
Now, in India it said, “According to Indian texts a soul has to wander about in the various worlds after death and has to suffer a lot due to past karmas. Shraadh is a means of alleviating this suffering.”
Well, that sounds like a downer.
I personally liked Vietnam’s custom. They said “it is a festive occasion, at which members of an extended family gather together. Female family members traditionally spend the entire day cooking an elaborate banquet in honor of the deceased individual, which will then be enjoyed by all the family members.”
Now, that I can get on board with. But I’m originally from Louisiana, so anything that involves food sounds like a great idea. As long as it’s fried.
Since America is obviously not on this list (and neither is Canada or England, so for my blog readers over the boarder and across the pond, we really need to make this an international movement), I vote that we work together and come up with our own word. After all…countries that don’t even have cable TV or iPhones have, so why shouldn’t we?
I’ve been thinking about this for awhile and I’ll be the first to admit…I’m stumped. I mean, we can’t say, “It’s been one year since I experienced the change” which is really kind of what it is, but any man out there who says it will get some odd looks, to say the least.
We can’t say, “It’s been one year since our life together ended” which is, again, what it is but depending on your tone when you say it, might land you in a psyche ward somewhere.
So we need something that’s not too depressing because, being the good widows that we are, we don’t want to make all of those outside our new world uncomfortable. We need something that suggests a small element of “crazy” but not too much because we don’t want to be monitored for the rest of our lives. We need something that helps us remember our loved ones, celebrates their life, and acknowledges how different our own is now.
I know that everyone’s traditions are different and no one handles these milestones in the same way. Some prefer a quiet day to reflect and remember. Some prefer a loud party and think the best way to commemorate their loved one’s passing is to tap a keg. And some fall in between the two and like to invite friends over for a quiet glass of wine.
Given my previous posts, some of you may know where I fall. I’ll give you a hint…it involves a cork.
I realize that how we all choose to remember a loved one’s passing is as individual as the person who’s gone. But I still wish we had some other universal phrase that would explain to the outside world that we’re remembering, we’re celebrating….
We’re just really not all that happy about it.
For more blogs and articles from other widow(er) writers, join us at www.theWiddahood.com!
© Catherine Tidd 2010
Showing posts with label humor. Show all posts
Showing posts with label humor. Show all posts
Sunday, June 13, 2010
Tuesday, June 8, 2010
Who Knew the Monster Lurking in the Closet Was…Love?
There’s a fear that lies deep in the heart of every widow. It’s not something we talk about a lot. Most of us probably don’t even realize how scared of it we are, but if you can show me one widow who’s not afraid of it, I’ll buy you the winning lottery ticket. Are you ready? Deep breath….
We don’t want to do this again.
I would imagine that most of us, at some point or another, have had a fear of dating. Some widows got over it early and some will never get over it. We talk about how we know we’ll never replace the person who is gone, we don’t have the energy to get out there, and, frankly, how we’re just worried about all the nutjobs that are in the world and would rather not sit down and have a beer with one.
But we don’t often talk about how scared we are of going through a loss again.
One of the hardest parts about losing your spouse is realizing how fragile life is. And that just because something like this has happened once, doesn’t mean it won’t happen again. I often wish, if the universe were a fair place, that once you hit your quota of bad luck, it wouldn’t happen to you anymore. Wouldn’t that be amazing? Not that it would have made losing my husband any easier, but in the end, I could have at least taken a deep breath and thought, “Whew, got that over with.”
But life doesn’t work that way.
Now I’m worried that it’s possible to earn the nickname “Black Widow” before I turn 40. I already can’t stand the idea of chin waxing and I can’t figure out the mysterious popping noise coming out of my right knee. I don’t need another dead spouse.
I’ll never forget talking to a friend of mine a couple of years after my husband died. What started out as a normal conversation about the new house she had rented, slowly turned into her verbalizing a nightmare I’d had since taking the plunge into the dating world.
“Yeah, our landlord lived in this house until her husband died. Then she started dating her neighbor, married him, moved into his house, and then he died. But she just decided to stay over there and rent this house out.”
You may insert your own expletive here.
It takes a lot of guts to get out there and take this risk all over again. And kind of like divorcees…it’s learning to trust again. But it’s not a matter of trusting someone else. It’s being able to trust fate not to send you up you-know-what creek without a paddle again. ‘Cause this time your boat’s a little leaky.
I mean…can you imagine? What if something happens and you’re at the hospital with you second spouse as a doctor is trying to explain what’s going on? Do you just put your hand up in his face and say, “Yeah. I’ve seen this before. You can go about your business”?
You would think they would at least give you a punch card or something at that point.
Now, I didn’t mean to write this to promote this insecurity that we all have. And I certainly didn’t mean to make light of it. This is a real fear. And I’m just as worried about it as any of you. Humor is just my defense mechanism and the only way I can keep myself from going completely around the bend. I think.
Guess we’ll see.
But what I hear from most widows is that the times we had with our spouses were the best times in our lives. We wouldn’t trade them for anything. All of the pain and sadness we have been through cannot equal the amazing experiences we've had.
You cannot love without taking a risk. But if you had shut yourself into a box years ago, you would have never met the person who gave you all of those great times in the first place. I know that getting back out there, after losing someone, is a huge risk. But what if…what if…those good times are not gone? After all, marriage was a 50/50 deal so that means we had to be at least half of the good times. What if we could get to the point, look past the fear, and know that the other half just might be out there again?
We are all people who are capable of great love. If we weren’t, we wouldn’t have lost so much. It’s there. It’s in us. Those people who have decided not to take the risk again…that’s okay. But it’s not because you can’t. You’ve already proven once that you can. We are all in different stages of getting past that fear and, honestly, we’ll probably be working through that for the rest of our lives.
For me, I’m just trying not to take it personally that one guy I know uses the “Itsy Bitsy Spider” as his ring tone when I call.
For more blogs and articles from other widow(er) writers, join us at www.theWiddahood.com!
© Catherine Tidd 2010
We don’t want to do this again.
I would imagine that most of us, at some point or another, have had a fear of dating. Some widows got over it early and some will never get over it. We talk about how we know we’ll never replace the person who is gone, we don’t have the energy to get out there, and, frankly, how we’re just worried about all the nutjobs that are in the world and would rather not sit down and have a beer with one.
But we don’t often talk about how scared we are of going through a loss again.
One of the hardest parts about losing your spouse is realizing how fragile life is. And that just because something like this has happened once, doesn’t mean it won’t happen again. I often wish, if the universe were a fair place, that once you hit your quota of bad luck, it wouldn’t happen to you anymore. Wouldn’t that be amazing? Not that it would have made losing my husband any easier, but in the end, I could have at least taken a deep breath and thought, “Whew, got that over with.”
But life doesn’t work that way.
Now I’m worried that it’s possible to earn the nickname “Black Widow” before I turn 40. I already can’t stand the idea of chin waxing and I can’t figure out the mysterious popping noise coming out of my right knee. I don’t need another dead spouse.
I’ll never forget talking to a friend of mine a couple of years after my husband died. What started out as a normal conversation about the new house she had rented, slowly turned into her verbalizing a nightmare I’d had since taking the plunge into the dating world.
“Yeah, our landlord lived in this house until her husband died. Then she started dating her neighbor, married him, moved into his house, and then he died. But she just decided to stay over there and rent this house out.”
You may insert your own expletive here.
It takes a lot of guts to get out there and take this risk all over again. And kind of like divorcees…it’s learning to trust again. But it’s not a matter of trusting someone else. It’s being able to trust fate not to send you up you-know-what creek without a paddle again. ‘Cause this time your boat’s a little leaky.
I mean…can you imagine? What if something happens and you’re at the hospital with you second spouse as a doctor is trying to explain what’s going on? Do you just put your hand up in his face and say, “Yeah. I’ve seen this before. You can go about your business”?
You would think they would at least give you a punch card or something at that point.
Now, I didn’t mean to write this to promote this insecurity that we all have. And I certainly didn’t mean to make light of it. This is a real fear. And I’m just as worried about it as any of you. Humor is just my defense mechanism and the only way I can keep myself from going completely around the bend. I think.
Guess we’ll see.
But what I hear from most widows is that the times we had with our spouses were the best times in our lives. We wouldn’t trade them for anything. All of the pain and sadness we have been through cannot equal the amazing experiences we've had.
You cannot love without taking a risk. But if you had shut yourself into a box years ago, you would have never met the person who gave you all of those great times in the first place. I know that getting back out there, after losing someone, is a huge risk. But what if…what if…those good times are not gone? After all, marriage was a 50/50 deal so that means we had to be at least half of the good times. What if we could get to the point, look past the fear, and know that the other half just might be out there again?
We are all people who are capable of great love. If we weren’t, we wouldn’t have lost so much. It’s there. It’s in us. Those people who have decided not to take the risk again…that’s okay. But it’s not because you can’t. You’ve already proven once that you can. We are all in different stages of getting past that fear and, honestly, we’ll probably be working through that for the rest of our lives.
For me, I’m just trying not to take it personally that one guy I know uses the “Itsy Bitsy Spider” as his ring tone when I call.
For more blogs and articles from other widow(er) writers, join us at www.theWiddahood.com!
© Catherine Tidd 2010
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