One of my favorite movies is the original “ROCKY.” Coleen liked it, too. We usually didn’t agree on movies so it was always special to hit on one we both liked and ROCKY was one of them. That’s a movie I could still watch once a month and not get sick of it. Coleen wasn’t much for watching something she had already seen, but I know for a fact she saw ROCKY, or at least parts of it, several times. Probably every time she watched it, I was with her but she wasn’t with me every time I watched it. Not now.
The ROCKY series of movies made a sharp turn towards the absurd after the second one. Stallone took himself and his character too far after that and the stories got pretty ridiculous. For me, I didn’t care so much. I watched them anyway. Not repeatedly, not like the first one, but I have seen them all at least once. After ROCKY 5, I thought the whole thing was over and deservedly so. Stallone was pretty old and the idea of Rocky getting back in the boxing ring with anybody was pretty crazy. Then I heard about one last sequel. The last Rocky movie was called “ROCKY BALBOA” and when I learned of its existence, I had to see it.p>
I don’t remember exactly when that was but I do know that Coleen had been diagnosed with metastatic breast cancer (should that be capitalized? If so, I refuse to do it.) by then. Some evenings she would meditate or read or do some yoga or maybe just want to rest. Other nights we would be together talking or trying to console each other. Often times we would discuss her treatments and options and how she was feeling about some of the alternative things she was doing. And some nights we would just hold each other. I always tried so hard to encourage her. I hate myself for not being able to fix her. I’ll never get over that failure. It’s true that I don’t walk around with a pocketful of miracles, but she was my Baby and your supposed to protect your Baby. I couldn’t fix her and we both knew that, so instead we tried so hard to encourage and support each other.
Sorry about that. It didn’t have much to do with Rocky but I needed to say it anyway. Sometimes when Coleen was involved in some of her self-help things I would go upstairs and watch sports or TV or movies. One night I put “ROCKY BALBOA” in the Blu-Rayplayer. I didn’t know anything about the movie so I was surprised by everything. The opening scene had Rocky in a cemetery reading aloud and talking to his wife, Adrian who had died of cancer. He was seated at her grave in a folding wooden chair talking to her and he was there every day doing the same thing. He was still sad, but had adjusted. He missed her but created a life of his own after her. A new Rocky. At the end of the first scene he got up, folded his chair, and put it in the tree overhanging Adrian’s grave. He kept the chair there in the tree so he wouldn’t have to carry it back and forth every day. Because he went there every day.
At this point, I am going to assume that anyone reading this post knows about Rocky and Adrian. They were soul mates. She was his inspiration. They were deeply in love and married a long time. In many ways they were similar to Coleen and I. It’s true that I was never heavyweight boxing champion of the world like Rocky, but at least I can say that I am more than just a fictional character. When I started the movie and saw Rocky in the cemetery, I immediately thought of the foreshadowing that represented to me. Was that to be our fate? Coleen was doing pretty well at that time but her overall prognosis wasn’t good. Was I going to be Rocky Balboa someday? I couldn’t help but wonder about that. I didn’t want to think about it, but I wondered.
Coleen and I had talked about how she wanted things to be arranged after her death. I knew she wanted to be cremated but did not know her wishes beyond that. I asked her if she wanted her ashes spread somewhere like the Outer Banks, Adirondacks, Pacific Coast or some other place dear to her. She didn’t have anything specific in mind for that and asked me what I thought. I said that I liked the idea of having a place to go, a special place that would always mean her to me. And a place where our children and grandchildren and her parents and family could go to remember her. She mentioned a quaint little cemetery just down the road from where we live that she always liked. She rode her bike through there a lot and took me there with her sometimes. I liked that idea and we just kind of let the conversation settle right there, both of us seemingly content with our unspoken decision.
A week or so after Coleen died, I went to that cemetery and looked around for plots. It is a very old cemetery and there are many trees there. That became one of my priorities in choosing the right location. I wanted a tree overhead or at least nearby. So that she could have a lot of sun because she loved the light, but at the same time, I wanted there to be shade sometimes to protect her. I can not say that the ROCKY BALBOA movie wasn’t playing in my head while all of this was going on because it was. I didn’t intend on putting a folding chair in the tree, but I wanted a tree there anyway. And I wanted a place to go where I could be alone with her and where we could talk. During a different conversation Coleen and I had toward the end, I told her I was always going to be talking to her. She laughed and said that she would try to find a way to talk back.
I don’t know how Rocky Balboa made his choice, but I was very deliberate in selecting Coleen’s final resting spot. I visited the cemetery several times and viewed the surroundings from many different grave sites. Did I want a new area, an old one, open to the sun, lots of trees? I never bought a piece of land in a cemetery before, especially one as important as this one. The very first plot I was shown stayed with me, though. I kept going back to that one. I brought Patrick with me to get his opinion. A few days later I brought Lindsay and my granddaughters to the cemetery so I could show Lindsay the plots I was considering. We looked at two and then I took her to the very first one I saw. The same Patrick said he liked. It was the one under a tree, part sun, part shade. It was in an older part of the cemetery where there were lots of neighbors and she could be social. The sun was shining that morning, sending streaks of itself through the trees. The girls were running around through the markers, laughing and playing. Lindsay and I watched and laughed ourselves. Just to the right of that plot was a small trail and to the right of that was the stump to a large tree that had been cut down years ago. The tree stump was within a few yards of the grave site. It was about six inches above the ground and maybe three feet in diameter. When the girls discovered it, they decided it was a stage and they took turns standing on it and singing songs. Right next to where their Grandma could hear them.
How could I possibly not think that Coleen was talking to me at that moment, through her granddaughters, through that sunshine, telling me, “Yes, yes, please, this is the spot. This is where we can be together, where we can meet and rendezvous, laugh and cry and remember and be perpetual and eternal. This is us. All of us. I like it here.”
I was listening. I heard her. I went back the next day and bought that plot. Coleen’s not there yet but she will be this spring. I talk to her now but I think it will be very special to have that place under that tree, part sun, part shade, where there’s a stage next door for the girls to sing and sunlight through the trees and where we can all go to be together again.
Sometime around May of this year, I saw an announcement in the paper that a comedian named Brian Regan was scheduled to do a show at Shea’s Performing Arts Theater in December. Right, the show was in December but they were selling tickets almost six months early for it. Coleen and I had seen two or three Brian Regan shows on Netflix and we both thought he was very funny. Especially Coleen, she loved him. When I told her I was going to buy tickets, she agreed but said to get four instead of just two so we could take people with us. At that time I worked very close to the theater downtown and walked over and purchased four tickets from the box office. I always liked buying tickets in person because it was easier to pick out your seats and I also saved the service charge. I took them home and put them in my top drawer where I kept all of our future activity admissions.
Circumstances changed between the time I purchased the tickets and showtime and I had an extra ticket. Coleen had passed away in September and for a while, I almost forgot about that show. I had already used a ticket to another concert in November to see John Sebastian that was supposed to be Coleen’s, giving it to my old friend Mark. While at that concert, I was constantly reminded of her and how she was supposed to be next to me. It was certainly bittersweet and I felt a great sadness throughout much of that evening. That concert was one month earlier than the Brian Regan show. I wasn’t sure what to do with her ticket to that event until the light came on in my head and I asked her, and now our, good friend Barb to come with us. That evening, four of us met at a restaurant downtown for dinner. It was Barb, Lindsay, Karen and me. We had a wonderful meal at a place where Coleen loved to eat and we talked about her and what she might have ordered and how she was so particular with food. We shared some stories about her and we laughed. It wasn’t quite like she was there, but the memories she evoked in us were certainly fresh and alive. I think we all felt good about what we were doing. At the theatre, we sat and talked and laughed and just enjoyed the show and what we were experiencing at that moment. Not thinking ahead, not looking back, just right there, right then. Did I miss Coleen? Yes. Was it different without her there? Yes, for all of us. But we let it be different, accepted it as different, and enjoyed the experience. All of us.
A week ago my granddaughter Samantha slept over at my house. It was just for fun and we both had a good time. One of our favorite things to do together is play the Go Fish card game (in which she says “Go fishing” instead of “Go fish”) and she wanted to play it when we got up in the morning. But we couldn’t find the cards. It had been a few months since we played and the cards weren’t where they belonged. We looked all over but came up empty. We had to go out for something anyway and I told her we would buy some new cards and we stopped at the local toy store. The owner helped me find the card game that she sold and I showed it to Samantha. She was less than excited about it and I was surprised by that. I bought the cards anyway and we left. I gave them to her in the car and she started crying. When I asked her what was wrong she said “I wanted to get the same ones as before.”
Sammie and I replaced the missing cards with different ones and they served the same purpose. Karen, Lindsay, Barb and I replaced the times we had with Coleen with a different one and still had dinner and saw the show. The Go Fish cards don’t look the same, but you can still play the game. Life without Coleen isn’t the same, but we still live it. Samantha and I played two games of Go Fish and she laughed and won and didn’t seem to mind that the cards looked different from the old ones. We all went to dinner and the show that night and laughed and talked and sometimes didn’t even notice that we were playing with a different set of cards.
“When we lose a branch from a tree, a new one will grow in its place. It won’t always be in the same spot, and it might not offer us the same shade, but it will grow and comfort us.” – RJoys
I kind of remember what it was like the last time. It’s really not much different than looking at a faded snapshot from a Polaroid camera and trying to decipher what it is you’re looking at. It was so long ago that I lived alone and I’m trying to remember how that felt, how it looked. I’m wondering how different it was then.
I moved to Buffalo from Cleveland in November of 1979. I remember because I was in Buffalo at Thanksgiving and trying to get back to Cleveland for the holiday through a severe snowstorm. I actually lived in Hamburg, NY, a little suburb southwest of downtown Buffalo. I chose Hamburg because it was on the right side of town and I could get home to Cleveland easier. I knew when I moved here that I would be going back frequently. After all, I had a daughter, mother, brothers and friends in Ohio. All I had in New York was a job and an apartment. I didn’t know anybody except some people from work that I was just getting familiar with. I was months away from meeting Coleen and for the most part, I was alone.
Much of that is different now because I know a lot of people. I have family here and some friends and neighbors. I don’t have the same bond with people from work now than I did in 1980 though because I don’t work anymore. That’s a funny thing because I love not working but I do kind of miss some of the conversation, banter and camaraderie of the workday. Now I spend that time either alone or searching for different ways to fill it. Don’t misinterpret this statement, I am not complaining or missing work. I’m just observing the differences.
Back in 1980, back BC (before Coleen), when I lived alone in Hamburg and didn’t know anybody, I had a hard time of it. Before moving here, I had lived alone in a small apartment in Cleveland and loved it. I was then recently single and was living it up. I also had a strong network of family and friends and girlfriends. For the first few months of my new life in Buffalo, I spent a lot of weekends in Cleveland because I knew people there and I was comfortable there. I would drive the 200 miles right from work on a Friday night and get there in time to hit the town or crash at my mom’s apartment. Then I would drive home late Sunday after squeezing in as much fun, family and friendship as I could in one weekend. In Buffalo I was lonely, in Cleveland I was popular. When not in Cleveland, I would often have company from there over the weekends. My mom and daughter came a lot as did a variety of friends.
Technically, I still lived alone after I met Coleen, it just didn’t feel like it then. I mean, we were together so much and she was at my apartment so often, after a while it seemed like she was living with me anyway. Especially after I moved from Hamburg to a duplex no more than seven minutes by car from Coleen’s house. She would come over after work or sometimes already be there when I got home. We would cook dinner (or she would and I would watch), listen to records, watch black and white TV and talk. Always talking about something, that girl. There were many nights that Coleen wouldn’t leave until early the next morning. Bars closed in Buffalo at 4:00 AM and I think that was her excuse with her parents. I loved everything about that time in my life but I could hardly call it living alone.
So now I’m trying to remember what my life was like living alone before I knew her. It was great once we met but not so great before. I remember drinking a lot of scotch then. I didn’t cook anything, eating mostly frozen convenience foods or pizza. I came home from work and listened to records. Of course on most days I didn’t come home from work right away, stopping first for cocktails with Norm and Steve from work. I didn’t do anything closely related to exercise or healthy living. I smoked and drank and didn’t come home at all. Spent what little money I made recklessly. I wasn’t happy.
Living alone today is very different from living alone in 1980. In fact the only thing similar in living alone then and living alone now is that there is no one else in the house. Everything else is so different. This time around I have a whole house, retirement, the internet, DirecTV, Netflix, MP3′s and my iPhone. Technology and information abound. I have better books to read, more movies to watch and home theater equipment. I have knowledge, experience, maturity. I have children, grandchildren, family and friends and a whole history of life right where I sit. And I have my memories. That’s pretty different. And you would think it would be easier.
But back in 1980 when I was living alone and had none of those things, I didn’t know anything about Coleen. I didn’t know that the end of my loneliness was near and I was soon to meet my soul mate. The way I look at it now, that was an advantage to today. Then I was living alone before her. Today I am living alone after her. Even though I was without her in 1980, I didn’t know that. I didn’t know what I was missing because I didn’t know she existed. I didn’t know what good was lying ahead for me, what would make me safe. Things are very different now living on this side of her.
I guess it’s probably me that’s the main difference between 1980 and now. It’s what I’ve learned, how I’ve been loved, what I’ve lost, what I remember. It’s me taking all of those things, taking all of everything, and forming it into the new me. It’s me being on the “before” side of my next chapter. My next adventure.
So how many more days until Christmas? However many it is, I don’t know if I’m going to make it. I think I might be more anxious for Christmas to come this year than any other year since I was about eight and heard the bells on the reindeer flying over the roof of my house. I’m not anxious because I’m excited about Santa or getting gifts or giving them. I’m anxious about Christmas Day being here so I can take on whatever emotions and grief it presents me and then move on. Right now though, I wish I had one of those advent calendars that counts down the days backwards until Christmas.
Every time I turn around, every place I look, there is a reminder. A song, a decoration, a memory. Something that says “Christmas” to me and reminds me of my sadness and sorrow and loss. I was at the Hospice seminar last week about grief and the holidays and they talked about Christmas as a day of the year. I couldn’t help but point out to the speaker there that Christmas isn’t just a day, it’s a whole season of events and activities and that is the part that I am trying to deal with now. The activities and traditions leading up to Christmas Day. In all the years leading up to this one, Coleen and I would share in all that and we would somehow manage to enjoy it. This year I am doing my best to uphold whatever it is that we would have done before. I made a gift list, I did the shopping, I talked to my daughter Lindsay, who is hosting Christmas Day dinner, about the menu. I was never extravagant about decorating the outside of the house, but I put up a few things on our porch and front door. I wasn’t sure at all what to do about a tree and inside decorations until a couple of days ago.
My granddaughter, Samantha had been hinting around about having a sleepover at my house. She did that a couple of times before with Coleen and me and liked being with us plus it was just her and she had all of our attention without sharing any with her little sister. Samantha has been talking about spending the night at Grandpa’s house for a while and she brought it up again just last weekend coming back from the North Pole. I told Lindsay that we could do it this week and we made plans for last night. After the plans were made I started thinking about what Sam and I would do together and I had a brainstorm. Maybe she could be my secret weapon and help me with the tree and some of the decorations around the house. I knew it was going to be very hard for me to do that alone because I’m such a basket case and uncontrollable sentimentalist lately. I thought having her around might numb some of that. I was right. It did numb some of it. But even adorable, four-year old Sammie, with all her sweetness and innocence, even she couldn’t numb it all. She did a pretty good job though and I got a lot more accomplished with her than I would have without her.
One of the Christmas traditions in this house that has always been dear to me is something that nobody else has ever known about until I told Sammie last night. In 1981, my mother bought Coleen and I a Christmas tree ornament. It was a little white bell with a red ribbon and it was inscribed, “Our First Christmas Together, 1981.” As the father of the house, I was always in charge of the annual Christmas tree installation, stringing the lights and unpacking the ornaments. I didn’t put all the ornaments on the tree, that was usually done by the kids and Coleen until more recent years when we have been empty-nesters. Then I did a lot of the ornament hanging, too. But all through the years, every year in fact, I made sure that the little white bell from 1981 was the first ornament on the tree and that it was placed in the most prominent spot, front and center, about a foot down from the top. Right where it would be noticed and seen. It always seemed like the most important ornament we had, the beginning of everything. And every year as the tree came down, I made sure that ornament was the last one removed from the tree and I carefully wrapped it in paper towels and put it away safely for the next year.
This year, even though I wanted Samantha to help me with decorating the tree, I wanted some privacy with the little white bell from 1981. So the day before she came over, I put up the little artificial Christmas tree I inherited from my mom. And the day Sam came over, before she got here, I brought the Christmas boxes up from the basement and opened the one with the ornaments. There was one right in the middle, right on top, wrapped in paper towels and very well protected. I unwrapped it and looked at it and held it to my lips. I thought of all the years, all the memories, all the love, all the laughter that bell has seen from its mount so prominent on our trees. It was right there, front and center, year after year and had stories to tell even I couldn’t recall. I am not ashamed to say how hard I cried with that bell in my hands, kissing it, making it wet with memories streaming from my eyes.
Eventually, I got it on the tree. It’s in the same place it is every year, but it’s on a different tree. We always had real evergreens. This year it’s a table top artificial. I have learned a lot about things being kind of the same but in different places. Like new branches, like my life, like same things in new places. It seems to make sense about my bell from 1981, too. As I was hanging it, I was having some trouble getting it to face out the right way so I twisted the branches of the tree to let the bell be seen and read properly. As I was fussing with the branches where the bell was hanging, it suddenly started ringing, seemingly by itself. I admit to jostling things around there a little bit, but not enough to cause that kind of commotion from a little white bell. It rang though, almost like it was being tickled, almost like it was laughing, almost like it was alive.
When Samantha came over later, she had a gift for me and it is now a new tradition. Lindsay had ornaments made with Coleen’s picture on them to give to family members and I got the first one. It was in special wrapping paper (a white bag that said “I love you Grandpa” with beautiful artwork) and came with a hand-written note from Samantha. She helped me hang the ornament on the tree and it’s beautiful there. I then showed her the little white bell ornament and explained what it meant to me and my secret tradition. I think she liked knowing that.
I admit to having lost my way a little bit with this post. The bell represents so much to me though, always has. It is just one of the many activities and facets and days of the Christmas season and there are so many more. They will come at me, sneak up on me, surprise me when I ‘m not looking. But they won’t be ignored. I will not hide from the things that made holiday seasons special for my baby and me. I will make the lists, do the shopping, wrap the presents, help with dinner and play the music. I will do it without her. I will do it with her. I will do it because of her.
In a room full of suffering people, in a room full of sorrow, I saw more light. Yesterday I attended a seminar hosted by Hospice that focused on grief and the holidays. Hospice offers several options for bereavement counseling and I have participated in some individual sessions but this was my first experience with a group.
I got there a few minutes early and took a seat in the front near a box of strategically placed Kleenex. As I waited for the seminar to start, I looked around the room and realized that everyone there was a survivor of someone no longer surviving. Everyone there had recently lost someone very dear to them, just like me. It seemed that most people were older than me although I noticed two girls, probably sisters, who were much younger. We were all on our journeys to find peace with the fact that we are building new lives that don’t include the loved one we lost. We are all looking for ways to do that. I didn’t do a head count but I estimate maybe 50 people were there, five of which were men. How is that interesting? Is it because more men die before their wives or is it that they don’t attend events like this if their wife goes first? Men are like that, you know. We are tough and strong and can fix things without the help of others or counseling. At least that’s what some of my gender thinks.
I guess I shouldn’t assume that everyone there had lost a spouse because that wasn’t the case. Many people were present because they lost their mother or sister. One woman had just lost her 17-year-old son and that was probably the saddest story of the day. It’s impossible to rank loss and sorrow, to say that one person’s is not as bad as another’s. I do have a hard time with some of the people who have lost a parent at an older age. One woman spoke of her pain at losing her mom who was in her early 90′s. I am not saying that her loss is not important and significant to he but we can not expect people to live forever. 90 years old is much longer than most people get and a celebration of that life is much more appropriate than an extended mourning. Certainly nowhere near the impact of losing a 17-year-old son.
The speaker for the seminar, Bob, was a chaplain in the Hospice organization and he had visited with Coleen and I and a couple of occasions. Once in the Hospice facility and once in our home the day Coleen passed. Bob offered us comfort then through some very kind and thoughtful words and prayer and I liked him. That was one of the reasons why I was interested in attending his talk. Yesterday, he focused mostly on grieving and how it can be more complicated around the holidays but also how it doesn’t have to be. Bob told some stories of how other people handled things and said there is no blueprint, just to do what seems to feel right. I liked some of his suggestions, especially the ones that I was already doing. He stoked some sadness but was very optimistic and encouraging. There were three things in particular he said that I liked enough to write down and share here:
He quoted a Rabbi whose name I did not catch, defining grief as “love not wanting to say goodbye.”
He told a story of a woman explaining some of her sorrow and hurt. “I’m no longer somebody’s one and only.” That statement hit very close to my heart as it was exactly the point of a post I had put up the day before, Being Loved. Exactly the same message except it took her a lot fewer words to say it.
He talked about having the holidays without our loved one and making it a little different, because it is different. He said “You’re making new memories.” That was also very endearing to me as it was a variation of the Ricki Lee Jones quote “You never know when you’re making a memory,” which Coleen loved so much and we have framed in our bedroom.
At the end, they told us we were brave to have attended the seminar. That it took a lot of courage for us to come and confront our pain and grief like that, to put ourselves out there. My friend Barb told me the same thing when I mentioned to her that I attended that. I guess that’s true, it took some courage to go. But the value of sharing yourself with other people in similar circumstances to mine and to be both encouraged and encouraging was immense. I listened, I watched, I learned, I contributed. It was a good experience.
I took much from the two hours I spent there. I was able to speak some of my thoughts on the Christmas season and grief and healing to the attendees. That felt good to me to have something relevant to say and express it somewhat intelligently to people who were interested in hearing it. People who actually seemed not just interested in hearing it, but enthusiastic and anxious to hear it. And that got me to thinking about this little project I have been working on. This daddyojones.com thing where I write about my journey in finding peace and comfort with my loss and where I discover how to make a new me from the gifts I’ve been given. I wonder if any of those people in that room, any of my fellow survivors, would get any comfort from my words. If maybe I could share some light with them. If maybe they could use a little bit of daddyo in their lives.