Month: April 2021

The time between Mark’s death and his funeral was eight days. The reason for the delay was to allow time for our families, all of whom lived out of town, to get here, and for our favorite priest (who I desperately wanted to do Mark’s funeral) to arrive back in town from a fishing trip in Alaska. This priest had long left for an assignment in Belize, but came back to this area every September for some R & R. It was either a stroke of luck or something other worldly that he was able to be here when we most needed him.

In between those long and hard days I barely slept, lost a significant amount of weight, and was in shock. The night before the funeral I begged Mark to let me sleep, that I was exhausted and knew the next day was going to be brutal and I couldn’t do it unless he gave me a break. I did sleep that night but as soon as the alarm went off I felt sick to my stomach. I wanted to be able to speak at his funeral but had serious doubts I could pull if off. Anxiety wrapped around me like a snake and fear incessantly pounded within me. As soon as I walked into the church, though, I felt at peace. It was an odd sensation, my first exhale since our ordeal began.

Even though we arrived early, we were immediately overwhelmed with a line of people waiting to offer their condolences. The line stretched on and I spoke to as many people as I could before it had to be stopped to begin the funeral. I read the piece I wrote about Mark before the actual service started on the advice of the church liturgist who thought that I would be more emotionally in control in the beginning rather than the end. I have done some public speaking before and have always worn reading glasses. One is because I need them, but, secondly, when I look up and make eye contact I really can’t see anyone clearly which helps with my nerves. It especially helped that day and I got through that public tribute to Mark with the faintest crack in my voice and somehow managed to hold it together. When I finished, Mark’s dear friend, Joe, spoke and then the kids joined me at the back of the church to walk up the center aisle together.

When we did that and turned around to face everyone, I could finally take in how many people were there, and that exhale I took when I walked into the church immediately got sucked back in. All those distraught faces looking at us, so incredibly sad and sorry and in disbelief. Friends, family, and acquaintances who flew in, who drove for hours, who rented cars and hotel rooms, who cut their vacations short, who took off work and their obligations to spend time with us to mourn. I wanted to crouch to the ground and sob for this loss that was breaking all of us. Instead I put my head down and started to cry, my son put his arm around me and I distinctly remember saying to myself, “You cannot do this now. You cannot fall apart.”

I cannot fall apart at my husband’s funeral? Eight days earlier he ended his life and I tell myself I can’t sob with the dearest people in our lives at the shock and horror of it?

So began the journey of me being on that has replayed itself over and over. My “don’t you worry about me, I’m going to be okay, look at me sitting here good as before.” I could laugh and tell a great story and have a glass of wine and be just fine. It was eighteen months of that switch being flipped over and over until Covid hit and I didn’t have to be so on because that isn’t required when the only place you’re going is the grocery store, Target, or a Zoom work meeting. Behind a mask became the safest place in the world for me.

But now everyone is getting vaccinated and things are opening up. There is so much more traffic than a year ago, and every restaurant I pass looks packed. The idea of returning to normal feels threatening to me, like I am about to lose my safe place where being on wasn’t a self-imposed requirement I thought I had to maintain. Mark and I were great storytellers, we fed off each other’s energy, it was never work to be upbeat, positive, and funny when he was next to me. But now it is, and sometimes I want to be the observer, to give myself the grace to relax and not be on, to take in a conversation and for people to not assume that because I’m quiet I must be sad and need a boost up the rungs of the happiness ladder.

Very few people in my life have seen the side of me that is not okay. I can write it, I can put my thoughts and sentences together to show that this is what death looks like up close and personal, that this is what we have been conditioned to look away from as if it is never going to happen to us. This is not a gift, it is who I have always been, someone who is comfortable sifting through layers and words to figure things out, but doing that on a computer screen is far easier for me than out in the real world. In the real world, tears and sadness make everyone uncomfortable and so I hide that. I tuck it down deep and pray it doesn’t burst out and take me and everyone else by surprise. That takes a lot of energy and discipline, but in this past year there has been a mountain of losses for everyone and suddenly there is plenty of company in the grief department. Maybe Covid has become our great loss equalizer. That this very hard year we have been through is telling us that it’s okay to cry over the big and small things that have slipped away, that we get to evaluate what matters and redefine our normal, that with loss comes gratitude for what we failed to notice when we filled our lives with busy, and that being on is a contest for which there are no winners.

Five years ago, our youngest daughter went to New York City for two months over the summer for an intensive dance program. Her braveness at such a young age stunned me. She decided what she wanted, saved for it, and then flew to the largest city in the country by herself to chase her dream. If she was afraid she didn’t let it show while I was frantic with worry. The only thing we could agree on was for Mark and I to arrange private transportation from the airport to the dorm in Brooklyn where she was staying. It gave me the barest peace of mind and I didn’t let out a breath until I heard that she had safely made it to her destination.

At the end of the training program was a recital and Mark and I counted the days until we could finally lay eyes on our girl. Our flight was delayed due to weather, our shuttle was long gone as we arrived four hours late, and we finally got to the hotel at 11:00. We dumped our bags and Mark said, “Let’s go explore.” He was an incredible traveler. He rarely let hiccups ruin his mood or his trip, and never wasted a minute of his time in any place new. We walked out of the hotel and within a few blocks were at The Lincoln Center, the Alvin Ailey dance studio, and Fordham University. We both had the same thought. Is this real? Are we really here?

On a Sunday morning over coffee when Mal had an all day dress rehearsal, I said to Mark that maybe we should have a day of no plans, grab our books, and head to Central Park to read and people watch. He loved the idea and we wandered around until we found a bench. As we were wandering, I noticed that many benches had plaques on them, sweet memorials to those who passed. I wanted to read all of them until I found the perfect bench to sit on that was dedicated to love lost. When we passed one that said, “For my darling, Hugh,” I knew that was the one. Darling Hugh became our home for a few hours while Mark read, and I imagined Hugh to be the kind of person who had dinner parties that nobody ever missed.

As the clock ticks towards three years since Mark’s death, I often feel pressure to get past this, to heal as if healing is The Golden Ticket I can’t claim because I’m not trying hard enough. Over and over I have asked myself why that word irritates me so much until I finally realized what it was. In our quick fix society, healing feels like winning. It’s losing 160# of sad, it’s a new life, moving on, having some fun, and how about a boyfriend? Wouldn’t that feel good? Somebody special to soften the hard edges of your life? That’s what you need.

Except I married what I needed and loss is knitted into my cells now, firmly planted on the park bench of my life. The loss can be fat, loud, and demanding and take up all of the space, it can be a resting spot and the perfect place to reflect, a place where I can recall Mark’s laugh and smile, his eyes and cry, his death and scream. But it’s also the nameplate on the back reminding everyone passing by that my Hugh was here too, that he was the best person to sit next to at a dinner party, that this hurts like hell because it’s supposed to, and if I agree to not run away from this loss that one day I can embrace something new and love this fragile life again and again.

When Mark took over the backyard to turn it into Green Acres, he dug up some daffodils of mine and replanted them in the front yard. When I saw what he had done I was so mad at him and asked why he couldn’t have just waited a few more weeks until after they had bloomed. “Ahhh, they’ll be fine” he said, “they know what to do.” Because Mark’s gardening style was fly-by-the-seat-of-his-pants, he shoved them in random holes in the yard, and these non-daffodils forever remained confused and never bloomed again.

When it came to planting and tending his vegetables, Mark took particular pride in his dirt. He had a compost pile and when I was cooking would hover over me to get every scrap to put in the compost bucket. Everybody in the house knew to do that but I’m not sure he trusted us and eagle-eyed our every move in the kitchen like an overzealous hall monitor. It used to drive me crazy until I gave up. Who knows why any of us get fixated on something and cannot let it go? For him it was compost. He’d empty the bucket into the pile outside in the corner of the backyard and turn it and work it and I thought it was one of those odd things dads do to keep busy when all their birds have flown the nest. The summer after he died I had the backyard redone, all the gardening beds were dismantled and I had loads and loads of dirt to get rid of. I filled holes in the yard, added to beds around the house, and neighbors came with wheelbarrows and shovels and trucked it to their houses. The rest was spread to level the yard for sod. Mark thought grass was an utter waste of resources and I imagined every day that if he were to come back he’d shake his head in disappointment over what I’d done to his farm. I felt guilty the first year. The second year when I cut more beds, added more plants, and got to ramp up my creative mojo I let the guilt go. I liked how it was turning out. I liked hanging out back there. I understood the draw to that little piece of land he was constantly tinkering with in the summer evenings.

As it warms up and everything is starting to bloom again, I have been back working in the yard. I cleaned up the rest of the leaves, cut dried grasses, and got my favorite shovel out of the garage to carve clean edges on the beds. I didn’t think I’d get much accomplished as the ground looked dry, but a couple of shovelfuls in and that dirt underneath was as rich and black as could be. It was hard work and I only got half of it done, but in every scoop were worms, squiggling, surprised worms getting turned over and seeing sunlight.

I wished some neighbor had been passing by so I could show them that black dirt I uncovered. They probably wouldn’t share in my excitement that beneath the surface my husband created ideal conditions for plants to grow and flourish. That in order for that to happen he had to train everyone in the house to rethink what they considered garbage so he could take it outside, dump it, turn and turn and turn it, and then wait for life to do its thing.

It’s a hard thing to believe there is life and beauty in places I cannot see or imagine, but I cling tightly to the promise of spring and new life rising from the dead. Then I crouch down to take a closer look at that rich, fertile soil and the worms my spade unexpectedly startled from their work.