Almost 6 months

This Thursday Kevin will have been dead for six months. It sometimes seems like years, and at others as if it just happened. My life has taken many twists and turns in that time. I am living in a place I never thought I would, alone and getting use to it. i thought the living alone would be the hardest. I t is actually the easiest to get use to. If I would have been asked a year ago how I would be doing this soon after Kevin's death, the answer would have been not. I truly did not believe that I would survive it. I am a creature of habit and having my life turned completely upside down was not in my realm of capability. I am far more resilient than I thought possible. Not that it has been easy, by no means. I simply had to force myself to get out of bed each day and do something. What it was did not matter. I simply made myself get dressed and leave the house. This may sound easy enough, but when all you want to do is lye there and die it takes some will. i know now that I can do what I have to through pure force of will. I am feeling more confident about myself and life than I have in a long long time.
Kevin may have died half a year ago but he is still alive in my heart all of the time. i still talk to him and make no apologies for it. I use his memories as a sounding board. i know exactly what he would say to almost anything I asked him so it works for me. I can see a sliver of what my life is becoming, and I am not dissatisfied with it. I have learned to accept that the fireworks and excitement of youth are tempered with age and experience. The bright burning flame of explosives is intoxicating but after we are at it epicenter a few times when the explosion happens we begin to realize the steadiness of electric light is far more desirable. chasing the elusive wish is changed to achieving a maintainable happiness that has few highs but also few lows. Life is a constant give and take, the scales must balance themselves out or order would not be possible. That is the lesson I have learned the best so far in life. Balance is better than Boom Bang, ouch.

Weirdnes of Life

I have had a lot going on this last week. Had a visit with Russ, a friend of Kevin's from 1972. I was not even in school yet! We had a very nice visit and talked a lot about Kevin and ate sugar free chocolate chip cookies. I was able to get some perspective on some things that have been on my mind since Kevin died. I was suppose to be on a date Sunday. I canceled it, just did not feel right. I am not sure if it was him or what. I realized that I am not willing to attempt to see someone who is still semi-closeted. Speaking with a gentleman at Bad Dog while watching the Olympics Friday night allowed me to realize this.
So much for my attempt to reenter the dating world. I have found that I am happy living alone. This has come as a surprise to me. I have never done well on my own in the past, and maybe that is why I have historically chosen the wrong person. When Kevin and I met I was not looking or wanting any type of relationship, yet it came along and was the best part of my life. I am also realizing that I am set in my ways. I still carry a lot of the things that Kevin and I did together with me today. I still sleep on one side of the bed. I never lay on Kevin's side. Weird that I should think of it as Kevin's side, he never even saw this bed. I have been getting the back bedroom cleaned out and that is starting to actually look like something more than a storage room.
I am wanting more of a social life, just unsure how to go about it. I have decided that this summer I am going to take a trip after the intersession classes are over. This is going to be just for me and about me. I am thinking of going somewhere that I have never been before. A new adventure for a new me. What a crock, I do not like change and would not be comfortable in a place that is totally foreign to me. I may just make a trip to KC or New Orleans. I have also always wanted to go back to Savanna. All of these places Kevin and I have been to before! So much for new me. Well I have to get on with reality.

Reflections

The last week has been one of sadness. Deloris, my Uncle Denny's girlfriend of several years Passed away on Friday due to complications of cancer. This has brought back all of the memories of losing Kevin. I decided not to attend the services. I did not wasn't to take away from her family with my inability to cope. This is turning out to be a worse Valentines Day that I had expected. I knew that it would be difficult. Fifteen years ago on Valentines Day Kevin put my ring on my finger. I have not taken it off, other that when I was in the hospital, since then. I even had his cut down and wear it with mine. I am wrestling with not wearing them any longer. I just feel that it is the final way to bury Kevin. I just can not bring myself to do it. Possibly I never will.
Kevin always made sure we went to dinner on Valentines Day. Even after Keith and Doris moved back. Valentines Day is their wedding anniversary. We always managed to find time for us to have our time alone. That was something I always took for granted. The last two years Kevin was alive we did not go out to dinner, he was doing the radiation and was too sick, last year we just were not up to it. i went to pick something up, probably Outback. I can not remember exactly. Kevin and I were together for so long that the time seems to run together, but it was not enough. No matter what we have it never seems enough, the time that was wasted can never be regained. That is the hardest lesson to learn. Waste anything but time.
Time is a commodity that we can never purchase more of or replenish in any way. Time is the ultimate teacher. I think of how little time fifteen years seems now, comp;aired to when I was twenty, then it seemed an eternity. Now I have a much more accurate idea of what eternity truly is. Lessons learned as one ages are the most valuable of all. The are the ones our parents try to tell us about before me have the hardship of learning them ourselves. Strange how the most important things must be learned through pain and loss. I guess that this is why youth is wasted on the young. I heard this so many times in my life and now I know how true it is.
Well I have to get some kitty love tome in for the day. I was gone for a long time today and they need a little extra loving for my tardiness. I get more out of it than they do anyway.

Life as it is now

I am well into school, getting the condo under control, getting kitty love, and getting past putting the house up for sale. I have come to realise that my life with Kevin was not in the house or even about the house. The house simply was the room under which it took place. I have been attempting to move forward with my life, but some days I am right back to the ER at Barns on January 17, 2008. That was the night we got the news that Kevin had the mass in his brain. I now understand that this will always be lurking in the shadows, waiting to come out and darken the day. I have come to accept that this is my life.
The days are full of things that have to be done, the details of life are taking my time. For this I am grateful. The days have a continuity that sooths me. The time I spend at the house is less and less, most of the time I do not even go inside, simply pick up the mail and leave. The house no longer reflects any of Kevin and my life there. It now is a neutral, open, empty building. it in no way reflects my home of 14 years. I can accept that as the condo becomes more and more mine. I have brought Kevin here with me but he is not prevalent here, this is my house and I alone reside here. I am getting more comfortable with this. I am feeling my independence returning. Strange how much of it was gone for so long. I relied on Kevin to take care of the things I simply did not want to, I could rely on him for everything I needed. I gave up my independence happily to him as he did his for me. We depended upon one another, and knew this was an absolute (not the vodka). I made a joke!
laughing is something that i use to take for granted, I mean truly joyfully. I had to fake it for so long. I am finding that happiness is not an unattainable goal. I am making decisions that were once made by us now I am feeling a confidence that I have not known for years. I am becoming more sure of myself and the things I choose. I am allowing myself to take risks that Kevin would have been comfortable with. Personal decisions that just effect me can only bring me satisfaction or dissatisfaction. Life is now about what makes me happy, I no longer have to worry about the implications, or replication's to others. I am finding my footing and making steps out on my own. I no longer set and wait for life to come to me, I go after it. The disappointments and successes are mine to live with. I am feeling more whole than I have in many, many months. I know that I am missing peaces and always will, without Kevin, but I can be as close to whole as possible, and that is not too bad.

The past 5 months

Kevin has been gone for 5 months in 2 days. I am amazed at how much in my life has changed, both voluntarily and involuntarily. I can not believe that things would take on this shape. I am completely out of the house and it should be listed by this weekend. I can go in and leave now without crying or feeling utter devastation. Thinking of Kevin does not always bring me to tears. I can look at photos of us and of him and simply remember the good times. I am starting to get my memory of the weeks following his death back. How accurate they are I am unsure. I am even starting to think of a future for myself. I have even given thought of what the possibilities with someone else could be.
The past is no longer a stone around my neck holding me down. It is what is should be warmth and happy memories that lift me up. I have days when the sadness sweeps over me without warning, but they are fewer and fewer. I do at least know as it is happening and can sometimes calm the storm before it is out of control. I actually have days when I am actually happy at times. I would never have believed this was possible a few months ago. I have to say the grief counseling I went to helped me more than I ever thought possible. I have learned to let go of resentments that do nothing but hurt me. I was told by one of the grievers in the group that Wasted emotion is not something we can afford to do at this time. I am actually a calmer person as a whole now. I still have not the patients that my mother always said were important.
I am getting my life under control as a whole and the outward sign of this is my home. I am making headway in getting things put away and making the place functional. I always was an organized person but that was lost with Kevin. Now that I am taking control of things and not just letting life carry me I feel as if I am finally living again and not simply existing. So maybe that is the sign of my recovery progressing I am once again living. I feel as if I am part of the world and not just an outside watching it all happen. I am giving myself permission to be happy again and to look for that happiness. Kevin will always be the love of my life and I would give anything to have him back, I know this will never change. I can not sit and let everything he did to make sure that I could go on living was in vain. That would be a travesty, and dishonor to his memory.