Beginnings

My son Steve has a blog about his broken romance. He’s letting it all hang out for everyone to read.

That’s not my route but then I haven’t had a romance of any kind for ages.

This is about my life on my own. I was married to Hal for a week short of 38 years before he died of cancer.

The last year of his life was the most amazing spiritual journey I may ever take. I had never experienced death of anyone I loved and it was astonishing.

I have strong ideas about the leave-taking of a loved one so there was none of that toting the body to the funeral home for evisceration. Instead he was transported to the crematorium and we had a noisy party for him at home.

We quietly planted his ashes in the middle of the city at a place he loved.

Now I’ve been on my own for a few years and it’s the first time ever in my life.

I lived at home until I married, and then I was with Hal and never, ever was I on my own. I couldn’t believe I could manage and to my surprise, I have done very well.

Hal was the kind of person who wanted me to depend on him and I did. Just before his illness manifested itself he used to say to me, “You know it really would be best if you were to die first. I don’t know how you would manage on your own.”

At the time, I agreed with him. I was nervous to be alone at night if Hal was out of town. I didn’t like talking on the phone so he handled a lot of our social calls. The list is endless.

I wasn’t a complete dolt. While the kids were small (there were six in ten years) I ran a cub pack and worked hard to give the kids fun, challenges and diversity. I was on the line of a Distress center for a few years and ran the place for a a few months while they searched for a new director. When drugs were new in the 70’s I joined a small hands-on board of people who tried to figure out ways to handle the kids who were being booted out by their confused parents. Eventually I became a Human Resources specialist in a hospital and tried to keep several hundred nurses and head nurses from colliding too often.

So, as I say, I wasn’t a complete dolt. Just timid I guess.

A new life began when I married. I changed completely when I had kids. And another complete turnaround after the kids were grown and on their own and Hal died.

Some things I found out as a single person. I didn’t have much money (Hal spent most of his working life as a free lance journalist—not a lucrative way to earn a living). We didn’t save much while I worked. I figured out what to do and how to do it, but that’s another blog.

I’m much braver than I believed I was.

And I raised great kids.