Life 101....again

July 31, 2014
Decided to change the title of my blog.  Not sure if I did it correctly...technology is not a user friendly animal. More like a saber-toothed tiger. Vicious and formidable to amateurs such as myself. But I understand it's a sweet kitten ...if you know how to push the right buttons. But I'm an amateur and probably will not get past the "nice kitty"-nervous stage with technology. Nuts & bolts remain unseen, unwelcome and misunderstood. But I am persevering in this whole blog attempt...hopefully I won't totally mess it up.   
   The reason I changed the title...too many thoughts crowding in.  And they're not always about this horrible journey of widowness.  So I will write the ones about grieving and being a widow...as well as my other mundane, extraordinary, ordinary and uniquely-Suz....thoughts.  But ...trudging through widow-ness  remains the focus of this entry.
    Today...it's been 10 months and 6 days since Mike died. And it remains absolutely horrible. Awful. And painful. Crying and hurting. And then....done. For sometimes hours. Going through life neither terribly happy or terribly unhappy.   Sometimes even laughing one moment and the next...spears of sadness might pierce through as my eyes light on something or my ears hear something ...that reminds me of Mike. I never know when, where or if it will happen. People around me don't even know when it happens. Only God is aware of the piercings....usually. Sometimes they're so deep and serrated that crying erupts involuntarity and potently...too potent to hide it from the girls.  Other times,  only the dog sees. Other times...only God. I sing songs.  To Mike.  To God.  I make up the words.  I push the curtain (its invisible but its there and it isn't a chasm...it's simply a curtain that the human bodily eye cannot see but...it's there.  Dividing me from Mike.  Me from God.  Me from Heaven. Hell on the other hand. It exists much further away than a mere invisible-to-the-human-eye curtain.  Which is good. Cause I don't see it in my minds eye.  But I do see the one dividing me from Mike...and from God.  And I see Mike parting it and Jesus with this kind and understanding look in His eyes watching ...and allowing ...Mike to do so.  And we talk.  Me mostly but Mike answers.  And I cry...and ask why?  Why?  Why Lord?  Why?  It's so not fair. It's so wrong.  And today....today was a bit different that the other days and the other questioning.
      Today...I had it imprinted upon my heart that I was to forgive.  Forgive the hospice nurse who was so incompetent and uncaring and awful in managing Mike's pain. Forgive her boss...also incompetent and cold when the whole visit and dying of Mike was all around them and so hard to get through...yet they were awful..cold and indifferent. Forgive them.  Forgive Mike for not quitting work before it was too late to have truly one on one time together.  Forgive myself...for everything I didn't do well enough to me for Mike.  And for putting grocery store runs and business stuff ahead of just dropping everything in life and spending every moment I could with Mike.  I just thought we'd have more time. I just....and that is what is hardest.  Forgiving God for not giving us more.  For snatching Mike. Snatching...not waiting until we were more ready to let go and give him over.  We knew we were going to have to.  But I wasn't done holding tightly onto Mike yet....not ready to let go.  And God snatched him from me....like a kid in a 2 year-old church nursery snatches a toy away from another 2 year-old who'se been talking with the teacher about why they should share...and let this other child have a turn with the toy.  And I was like that little child...almost... ready to let go. But not there yet.  And then God, You snatched him!!!!  You grabbed him right out of my hands! Like some mean little bully-like kid in a church nursery.  Mike was Snatched! Not given. And you were to wait until we were ready to "give".  And so I've done what every 2 year old does when a beloved toy is not let go of voluntarily but snatched from their hold...I've cried and screamed and yelled and stamped and begged for it back.   I think about how I used to lift my hands and sing to Jesus, "I surrender all".  And in my heart...I was willing to give everything I had to God. Everything...including Mike and the girls..and even my life.  But I was to "give it" eg: hand it over. Not have it or any of the it's I was willing to surrender...snatched!!!  I look at those singing the words to such songs today and shake my head at how they (and I) are so unbelievably naive as to what "conditions" we actually place upon the words we are singing.  "Conditions" of just how the "surrendering" is to occur.  We sure have them.  And don't even recognize that we do as we blithely sing away.  Naively unaware of how un-ready we are to truly surrender anything unless God handles the "taking" of it in our not-even-recognized-by-ourselves-way-He-should-do-that".
      But then there was today.  And today.... in the midst of raw, hurt and while wiping at tears...God thrust the thought into my mind that I was to forgive.  Forgive the Hospice nurse and nurses plural was the first thoughts that came.  Why I don't know. I wasn't particularly thinking about them even but just about missing Mike. But the need to forgive them was suddenly just...there. Then...the need was imprinted on my mind next that I was to also forgive God. Next...Mike. Lastly...Myself.
     So I talked it out loud.  Thought about it throughout the day.  And now...realize I am closer to Jesus through the understanding and attempt.  And that closeness to Jesus...that is what brings me closest to contentment.  I don't know when I'll get to actual joy.  But contentment....is good. So now...mixed in with the piercings of pain...are piercings of contentment.  Between it all...is neither terribly happy nor terribly sad.  Not exactly an indifference.  Just...not joy.  Which is actually something I used to have often.  Joy in Mike. Joy in the Lord. Joy in life. Joy in my daughters. Joy in Creation. Joy.  Crummyness too.  I wasn't living in utopia...pain, hurt, misery all mixed in there as well.  But I knew joy.  I did.  And I knew contentment.  So far...all these mentioned emotions are felt in life these days...but not joy.  So...at least I'm finding a bit of contentment poking into my heart at times.  That is good.  I know joy will come.
     Because another emotion I hadn't felt since Mike died came very very VERY briefly while I was driving down Abercorn Street a couple weeks ago.  It was like a vertical slit appeared in the view ahead of my car....and it separated open about 5 - 8 inches wide.  And as I looked at it...I felt well up inside me....optimism about my future!  I felt optimistic! For the first time since Mike had died.  An emotion that hadn't been felt was suddenly and vibrantly in me and I was so aware of it. And then...the slit closed and the feeling vanished.  But...I had felt it.  It was eye-opening. First, to recognize that I hadn't felt the emotion called optimism since Mike had died was a whole epiphany in itself.  Then to understand that I had felt it....and that it was now gone.  Was another.  Last...to realize that I felt the whole experience was a God given little sliver of hope.  Cause it hasn't returned.  But the memory remains...and the hope that it will...is (sigh)...well...it's helpful.  Good.  It is a good thing to have had happen.  I mentioned it to a friend who had lost her husband two years ago (they'd been separated for many years beforehand).  She shared that when she looked at the expanse of her life ahead of her..she just felt bleakness.  It was good to know I was not alone. For whenever I thought about my future without Mike....I too had seen only bleakness. Bleak is painful.  The definitiion of bleak according to Webster is "cold; cutting; unsheltered; harsh; not cheerful; gloomy; dreary; pale; treeless; bare and wan; not promising or hopeful. "  THAT is what losing half of your heart is like. What life is like as you go through it... walking and breathing. Looking normal to those about you...yet with this gaping, oozing wound. This raw stump existing where half my body used to be.  And my future .... as I walk through the present feeling that wound...seems so very very very bleak.
     So yes... incredible hope sprang into me when I saw that slit and felt that pang...and recognized it as...Optimism!   Wow.  To again view life ahead optimistically. Wow. This is good.  It hasn't reappeared again within me but I have hope.  As I look ahead at a bleak future...I have hope.  And I have spears of contentment that shoot through here and there.  And I feel myself held more and more in the Lords hands.  So...10 months and 6 days...this is where I am.  Whether my next entry will be about grieving or ...just thoughts.  I don't know. But maybe..I will, down the road, realize I've written an entry completely overflowing with both optimism and joy.