I am confident that this new week will be much better than the one I just had. Last week was full of challenging situations that I got sucker punched by. A couple old wounds got reopened but I managed to stop the bleeding pretty quickly.
Things started with a road trip to NYC to see Patrick and meet my new daughter-in-law. Then I attended a wellness seminar and listened to a brilliant man say stupid things. Two days after that, I was a guest in a Catholic church for a memorial service in Coleen’s honor and I heard a woman who I didn’t know talk about the departed and say Coleen’s name. I heard the same thing the next day at my church when our priest listed the names of people who had died last year. Not only did she say “Coleen M. Jones” but she also said my mom’s name. At both services I heard several references to “the light” which was always Coleen’s driving force and at my church, there was much mention of change, which I have been doing a lot of. I had dinner with family and friends where Coleen was remembered and toasted and I talked about her and some of my memories. There was even an episode on a show I am watching where a man loses his girlfriend to an overdose and keeps dialing her number so he can hear her voice mail recording. I’ve never done that but I still have Coleen in my phone.
So it was a weird week in that I kept coming in contact with Coleen. Driving to NYC, I was on the same road we traveled many times and was reminded of conversations and eating apples and just being with her. We made many road trips over the years and Coleen’s conversations and observations made them all more fun. Last week on the way to NYC I kept looking over at the empty seat next to me. She never rode in my car, never met her daughter-in-law. Everything now is new.
At the wellness seminar, the main speaker was a guy from the Hippocrates Health Institute which is where Coleen went for alternative healing last year. She was there for two weeks and was very dedicated to their program although she hated the raw food diet and got sick from the wheat-grass juice. Many people have better results there than Coleen did but she brought home a lot of good habits and enjoyed her time there. She did not however, experience the same success as others and I left the seminar that night saddened by that fact. Why not her? Why not us, our family? Call me naive, but I didn’t see that sadness coming. I was annoyed with the speaker who spent most of his time pontificating about the merits of his logic and that we have control of our own health. At first I was annoyed, then I was mad.
Hearing Coleen’s name spoken with reference to death like I did in those church services is unsettling to me. I know she died but I guess I don’t want to hear about it or acknowledge it. Or admit it? I don’t know, it is pretty silly. Maybe that’s why I haven’t selected a gravestone yet. Truth is, I just now paused before typing “gravestone” wondering if that was the right thing to call it and summoning the nerve to type it. To admit that we need to buy that thing, whatever it’s called. To need a gravestone, there has to be a grave. To need a grave, someone had to die. Did that really happen? Sometimes, even now, it’s hard to face that reality.
When talking to friends after dinner two nights ago, we spoke of how our memories are not as clear as they once were. We all agreed that something has happened to us that has diminished our ability to remember as well as we once did. Some blamed it on age and some of us thought it had to do with medications. One guy once told me he thought it was the vodka. The whole conversation reminded me of one my greatest fears and that is me forgetting some of the memories Coleen and I made together. Without her around to remember things I had forgotten, it’s all on me to preserve them. She was much better at remembering than I was.
Not everything that happened last week made me think of Coleen, it just seemed that way to me. This week is already starting better. I decided to learn a lesson from that speaker at the wellness seminar. He said that most of our ailments are self-controllable and can be managed or reversed by our eating and health habits. I don’t believe all of his theory but I’m man enough to meet him halfway on some of it. I decided that maybe I can control some of my emotions about Coleen if I better prepare myself spiritually. In other words, if I work harder on things like yoga, meditation and self-healing, I can put myself in a better place to accept some of the surprise reminders that I am bound to encounter. I can’t just count on reiki and massage for my healing, I have to contribute on my own, too. I am going to jump-start myself with daily yoga and meditation activities. I have been doing them sporadically but need to get more consistent. I did them today along with a gym workout and feel pretty great right now. And tomorrow morning there is yoga class I will be attending. There is no reason I can’t make myself healthier in body and spirit. There’s no reason for bad weeks.
When Coleen was first diagnosed with breast cancer in 2007, I was like most husbands. Lost and helpless. I didn’t understand the disease, diagnosis, treatment or the future. I was scared for Coleen, for us and for our family and I wanted to fix her. There had to be some answer on the internet or hidden somewhere that could provide a cure for her. There had to be something I could do to make a difference.
Coleen was always very interested in food. Even as a child she would sometimes read cookbooks and that never stopped for her. She loved to find recipes, make them and serve them with love to her family and friends. It was one of her many ways of showing love. Of course, Coleen loved to eat good food too and I always thought that was why she liked to cook so much. During her initial rounds of chemotherapy, Coleen didn’t always have much of an appetite and sometimes struggled to take in the proper amount of nourishment. It was important for her to maintain her strength and eat well and I tried to help with that.
Never an active cook, I consider myself underrated in the kitchen. I learned early with Coleen that we worked best together with me helping her with menial tasks like chopping vegetables and opening wine. She was best left alone with her art of cooking while I provided conversation, a willing appetite and after dinner clean-up duties. But when she was in treatment, she didn’t always feel up to the task and had to assign me some cooking responsibilities. She found easy recipes that contained healthy foods that were considered cancer fighters and when she wasn’t feeling up to making them herself, she trusted me with them. One of the those was cauliflower soup. It was easy to make, tasted good and required little clean-up. To this day, those are the three key ingredients to any recipe I make. The soup required cauliflower, chopped onion, chicken stock, some seasoning and a touch of pepper jack cheese. I chopped, sautéed, boiled, and lightly pureed at the end. Then served the soup with a sprinkle of the cheese on top. Coleen liked it, I liked it and I felt that I had made a contribution to her care.
Now that I live alone, buying food and cooking for myself has become a challenge. I enjoy it, I just want to get better at it and buy the right amounts of the right ingredients so that I can cook and eat well while minimizing waste. That’s probably a goal of most cooks I guess. Coleen certainly left me with enough recipes to last a long time but I could not find the one for the cauliflower soup. Admittedly, it had been a long time since we made it but the recipe had to be here somewhere because she always kept the good ones. I couldn’t find it so I consulted my friend Google and found hundreds of recipes for cauliflower soup. There was one that was similar to our original and met my required standards of easy, good and quick clean-up.
I love that recipe and I love that soup. I have made it three times now during the past month and it keeps getting better. I learned from Coleen to never be afraid of modifying a recipe when you figure a way to make it better. She did that a lot. When I made the soup yesterday, I added a pinch of crushed red pepper and a potato and instead of pureeing it at the end in a blender, I used a potato masher and did it by hand. That left the soup with small chunks of the vegetables instead of creaming it all. I liked it much better that way.
The past week wasn’t without its share of challenge for me and it all caught up to me yesterday. I was feeling out of sorts and like I had lost some of my traction. After a very healing reiki session and advice from Lindsay and Rebecca, I was feeling a little better. Tired, but better. I stopped for groceries and the first thing I saw in the store was cauliflower and even though I had just made the soup two weeks ago, I bought another head. It just felt like I needed it.
Can cauliflower soup be therapeutic? In my case it mostly certainly is. It takes me back to Coleen and her fight and reminds me that I helped her with that. I think of her when making it and I know she would be happy with my interest, effort, and hopefully, the results. My cauliflower soup provides the perfect diversion for me. It gives me a task that is easily performed and completed and leaves me with warmth, comfort and satisfaction. I can put on some music, open a beer, and have homemade soup within the hour. It’s not the exact recipe as before, but it’s close. That’s okay though, because nothing is exactly the same anymore. It’s like that branch falling off the tree and a new one growing to replace the fallen. Same type of branch, different spot, different shade. Same type of soup, different recipe, different taste. Different me.
I have anticipated a lot of what my future would look like. I knew that there were difficult days ahead, days that would be triggers for sadness and reminders of my life before losing Coleen. Some of those days had already happened and I managed to get through them somehow. Days like my birthday, Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year’s Eve had all come and gone. Each of those days and occasions brought its own set of tears and emotion and I know they always will. Just like the full moon and 18th of every month will never go unnoticed by me again. There are many more milestones ahead for me and I am particularly concerned about Valentine’s Day, Coleen’s birthday (March 8th), and our anniversary (June 6th). I know those days are coming. They are on my calendar of grief and I anticipate them.
What I can’t anticipate are days like I had three days ago. I know that I will forever encounter new people, places and things without Coleen at my side. I know that my memories of her will have to last me now. I also know that I will always think about her missing those new things I am discovering and how I miss her being with me as I discover them. I still want to share all that with her and expect part of me always will.
Three days ago I met our brand new daughter-in-law. Her name is Semra and she is a very sweet and very beautiful woman. Semra and Patrick met in New York City a year and a half ago and were wedded last month. In keeping with his tradition of not doing the ordinary, Patrick never said anything about Semra or a wedding until he told me last week. I was happy to hear that they were not pregnant. Patrick as a husband is kind of shock to my system. Him as father could do serious damage to me.
I was very excited to meet Semra and welcome her to our family. But I was very sad to do it alone. Before I left for New York I thought about how special that event was going to be. To meet the girl who your son fell in love with and married. And I thought that Coleen and I should have been meeting her together. Coleen would have been so excited. I’m sure that she and I would have started packing for NYC right after Patrick’s phone call and we would have been there within 24 hours. This was one of those extra special life events that were so important to Coleen and I.
Coleen worked so hard on Patrick and worried so much about him. She had such love for him and sometimes over-mothered him with advise and guidance. And with his personality, the more she did that , the more he rejected her advice. Coleen always wanted him to settle in to the mainstream of life. Get a good job, get insurance, get married, have kids. She didn’t get to see any of that. She was patient with him and realized all of that would happen when he decided it was time. She often wondered about the woman who would someday fall in love with him, quirks and all. Coleen said that woman was going to have to be a saint or at least someone very special to love Patrick. I never argued with that point.
When I arrived at their apartment three days ago, Semra was out shopping so Patrick and I unpacked my car and carried in the stereo equipment I brought for them. We had started to hook it up when she came home and Semra and I introduced ourselves. She held out her hand and I took it but quickly pulled her into a hug. I told her I was happy to meet her and as my daughter-in-law, she should expect to be hugged. We settled in, talked a lot then all went for a walk, stopped in a pool hall for some ping pong, then on to dinner. It was a fun day.
As excited as I was about meeting Semra, she must have been just as nervous about meeting me. Patrick would have told her not to be, that I was friendly, but she had to be a little anxious about meeting her husband’s dad. Parents can always be a little intimidating. I think she was comfortable with me right away. I say that because I was comfortable with her right away. She was very sweet and charming. She is very pretty with dark hair and big brown eyes and she has a wonderful Turkish accent. Semra and I had a few moments to speak alone and I could tell how she loves Patrick a lot. I talked to her some about Coleen and showed her some photos and I know Semra will want to know more about her. I will be all too happy to tell Semra about her mother-in-law.
Coleen would have loved Semra. They would have talked about food, family, NYC, books, restaurants, Turkey and lots more. Coleen would have seen the love in Patrick’s eyes and the way he looked at his wife and she would have been very happy about that. She would have seen his wedding ring and it might have made her laugh a little thinking that was something she would never see. Of course Coleen never did see that because it all happened after she died. That last paragraph was just me playing make-believe because it will never happen. Coleen will never meet Semra or hear Patrick say “Mom, this is Semra, Semra this is my mom.” And then break into a huge smile and give her a big hug. They will never cook in the same kitchen or dote over a baby.
Lots of people have asked me if I’ve gone through the “being angry” stage of grieving. I haven’t really felt too much of that so far although some things have angered me along the way. Generally, I have not experienced an overwhelming amount of anger. But this just pisses me off. Much like our granddaughters being deprived of Coleen’s love pisses me off, this does too. These are the things about grief and loss that sneak up on you from behind. These are the types of things you don’t anticipate until they happen to you.
I was very happy and very excited about meeting Semra. I like her and look forward to seeing her often and to her being a very important part of our family. I can’t wait for her to meet Lindsay, the girls and Aunt Karen and I think everyone will love her. I can’t help it though, the emotional impact of meeting Semra without Coleen. Of having the discovery of a new daughter-in-law without Coleen with me to share the experience. I couldn’t plan for my sorrow of meeting Semra without Coleen. I never anticipated it. That day wasn’t on my calendar.
Seems that my head is clearest in the early morning hours. I’ve always been better in the mornings than later in the day. More productive and aware. I’m starting today, a Saturday, at about 6:00 AM which seems to be my normal time these days even though I no longer leave for work. But this morning, I’m not sure if my head is clear or foggy.
I’m beginning today knowing what the number is. I have full awareness that today is January 18th. I lose track of the date sometimes now that I’m retired, but I always know when it’s the 18th of the month. I know that days before it happens so I can start preparing myself for the eventuality of it. This is the fourth time it has been the 18th of the month since my wife died. I’m convinced that every month for the rest of my life, I will be saddened when the calender hits that date. I will pause for reflection and wrestle with the emotions of such love lost. I tell myself that it will get better as time moves on and as I move on. And I believe that. This healing thing is frustrating as one day one moment, I feel like I am making great progress only to have next moment destroy me.
I’m thinking now about events that have happened while the date became the 18th for the fourth time since September. I’m thinking about the life that’s continued without Coleen being part of it. What she’s missed. Actually, it’s what we’ve missed without her being here. Coleen was such a life force and catalyst of activity that she had a way of enhancing even the most uneventful events and making them more memorable. I was with my granddaughters yesterday and felt Coleen’s absence very strongly. Being their grandmother was a role comfortable to her, a place where she belonged. The happiness she felt being with those girls was always evident in the big smiles she wore around them. I miss her being with me when I am with them. I miss her being with me when I am anywhere. As much as I felt Coleen’s absence yesterday, I felt her alongside me. I was holding Claire and she felt Coleen’s rings underneath my shirt. She asked me, “What’s that Grandpa?” I told her they were Grandma’s rings and showed them to her. She liked them, thought they were pretty. I don’t know how much she understood but I told her I wear them so I could always be close to Grandma. I always feel close to her, and feel her, when I’m with our granddaughters.
Each day is a slice of life happening that she is no longer part of. Little events take on more meaning when we realize that we don’t have her to share them with. Like when our niece passed her driving test and got her license, she would have called her Aunt Coleen to tell her. Coleen and her sister Karen would have been on the phone chatting about the details of that event and other things for an hour or so. Instead, everyone misses out on that. Karen told me about it, but that’s just not the same for her, or me. Tonight I will be going to a party alone that she would have very much enjoyed. And the people at the party will be sorry that she’s not there because they would have enjoyed seeing her.
Much bigger things have occurred in the last four months that we have not had her here for. Events like my 60th birthday, my retirement, buying a car, Christmas, and a wedding. I am planning a trip to New York City this week to meet someone new to my life. Someone who will become very significant to me. Someone who Coleen should know. We made that trip to NYC together three different times including once in 1981 when we got engaged. I will miss her tremendously, so badly in fact, when I return there this week without her to meet our new daughter-in-law. That is a special event that I would much rather we did together. Coleen worked so hard on Patrick and fretted so about him. She, of all people, should have the privilege of meeting the woman who Patrick fell in love with. Not exactly part of everyday life, more like a once in a lifetime experience. For me, not for her. Not unless I can somehow summon her to be with me. Which I may not have to do. If Coleen’s spirit ever felt the need to be present for something, this would be it.
Today is the 18th of the month again and tonight the waning moon will be 95% full. Tomorrow I will wake up to the morning of the 19th and the cycle will begin again. I’ll be a little stronger by then. Still weakened, still fragile, but stronger. I just know it.
I was with Coleen today. No, really I was. We met at Maureen’s where I go for massage therapies. Maureen knew I had an appointment today and asked Coleen this morning if she could come too. I don’t think Maureen knew for certain how many guests to expect this morning at 11:00 AM until she started my massage. Then she found out pretty quick.
As for me, I wasn’t expecting anything out of the ordinary. When I first started getting massages, I was silent for the entire session. I wasn’t sure what the protocol was as far as talking and I was comfortable without words, so I did that. But the last few massages with Maureen, we have chatted almost the entire time. I enjoy talking to Maureen and don’t have many opportunities so talking during a massage seemed like a good idea. I was looking forward to a conversation with her again today but something happened to sidetrack that.
Maureen and I spoke briefly at the beginning about some product that makes your back feel better. I wanted to follow that up with something else but suddenly fell silent as if I was muzzled. It was almost as if someone was telling me to stop talking. That nothing I had to say could be as interesting as what was about to happen in the silence. Coleen used to tell me that sometimes, “Stop talking.” I shut up and listened.
Maureen’s hands and touch were familiar to me but felt different. It was her hands on me yet it wasn’t. I felt Coleen touching me through Maureen. It was Coleen’s soothing way of comforting me and she was using Maureen as her channel, her conduit to reach me. It worked. Oh My God! I have felt Coleen’s presence before but never this strongly nor for this length of time. It was a very emotional experience and I was happy to find a box of Kleenex Maureen kept under her massage table.
When it was time for me to roll onto my back, I asked Maureen for a minute to compose myself. I told her that everything today so far was so emotional. She said, “That’s because Coleen is here.”
I was glad Maureen told me that because I certainly felt it. I liked the confirmation from her that it wasn’t just my imagination. I felt Coleen all over me today. I heard her voice through Maureen’s hands and I felt her love and protection keeping me safe. When Maureen leaned into my back with her forearm, it felt like Coleen was climbing on top of me. I told Maureen that this place, the room we were in, was where it all started. This was where I came three days after Coleen’s passing. This was where I first felt her presence. This was where Maureen first said the word “safe” to me. I will never forget her telling me, “It’s alright Rob, you’re safe here.” I was safe here, and I am still safe here. Coleen knows where to meet me.
Maureen finished my massage and it was every bit as mystical on my back as on my belly. Every bit as emotional. She placed my right hand over my heart chakra, then put my left hand on top of that. I felt my own heat transfer from my hands to my heart. It was reiki.
Maureen explained to me afterward that she had asked Coleen to come today. She said sometimes she has a way of influencing spirits but it doesn’t always work. I’m certainly glad it worked today. I don’t know how many people are as fortunate as I am but I can’t believe its more than a handful. And it might be none. I mean, just look at me and the blessings that surround me. I have a team of talent, encouragement, understanding and support that world leaders would envy. I am enveloped by love and compassion. I am so humbled.
Maureen has been with me on my journey since before it even began. She helped Coleen through various massage techniques to comfort her body and soul as her earth journey neared it’s completion. The bond that she and Coleen developed on her massage table remains strong enough for them to communicate even now. She once said to me how much she wished she had known Coleen before Coleen gat sick. I wish they had known each other too because I know they would have been very good friends. Maureen is one of the special ones who understands people and spirituality. She is one of those sages I am so fortunate to know and have in my corner.
I told Maureen today that I loved her and I meant it. I can’t think of a better way to say how I feel about her. It’s the perfect expression. Love doesn’t have to mean being in love. But there is a larger emotion than “like” and for me it’s “love.” And I love Maureen. She brought Coleen to me today, setting us up like it was a blind date. She comforts me and makes me safe and gives me gifts and counsel unimaginable. How could I not love her?
