Dear Dazzy: This Amazing Life!

45

2009-09-27T22:40:00.002-05:00

Dear Dazzy,

Tomorrow-Monday, the 28th of September-marks what would have been your 45th birthday.
It's the third time your birthday will pass with only those of us left behind to make the occassion; Andrew, me, the kids-all of your friends and family-we don't forget.

How could we?

How could we ever forget the man who loved us so, who worked so hard to make us smile, who insisted that life was mysetrious and wonderful and so worth living?

Tomorrow, I will take a moment, and say "Happy Birthday" to the man who made me believe in true love all those years ago. While life goes on, and everything moves forward-even me-you will never be forgotten, my love. Never.

Love you Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey

its been ages...

2009-08-03T12:22:00.002-05:00

Dear Dazzy,

I still miss you so much I am truely surprised it hasn't killed me.

I have gone through the motions these past two years and three months and assorted days trying to have a life again. Most days now are fine-but some, ah, some sneak up like emotional ninjas just waiting to take me down, and when they do I feel like the universe is spinning the wrong way once again.

I shop and cook and read and can listen to music once again and I travel and laugh with the kids and our friends and I email/FB/etc others and on the surface it seems as if I am going in the direction of my dreams...but I cannot shake this awful, gut-wrenching, soul ripping sadness that makes me think I will be alone no matter who comes along-if anyone of substance ever does-because it will simply not be YOU, my sweets. It won't ever be you. Ever.

I am in a funk because the summer is coming to a close, school starts in two weeks, the kids are looking for jobs, and I feel like I am still just treading water insted of swimming along .

I know it won't last a long time. I know I will occupy my time with things and paperwork and writing but damn, Dazzy-I will never understand in a million years why you are not still here on earth with me, the kids, your friends and family-ugh.

I remember how excited I was to return to school back in 2001 b/c we had gotten engaged and were making plans for our 2002 wedding in Oz. What a happy summer; what a happy time...

This sucks. I have no family left anymore since my Dad has passed; my friends are wonderful but it's not the same as having that one special love by your side throughout your days, no matter how spectacular or mundane those days turn out to be.

I just miss you heaps right now, babe. Heaps. Here's to better days ASAP.

Love you, Dazzy.
Always.
Kisses, Wifey

a random saturday in july...

2009-07-11T15:07:00.002-05:00

...and it's OK.
Have been reading and cleaning and went out with friends last night; today-at dinnertime-I am off to see the movie "Moon."

You would have loved it babe, and I know this would have been our "Saturday night date movie" this week, lol. While I have actually gone out with a few men these past two months, no one holds a candle to you , honey, and I bet it will be a very long time until I can find one who will.

If ever.

Dating is such a stupid activity anyway-sometimes I wish I had parents who would just arrange something for me, LOL. Mostly, I just wish you were still here. I guess that feeling is one that will never go away. I used to think that it would, with time....but now I really know.

It doesn't. I just chose to look at the circumstances differently, that's all.

Mike is out in Cali with Matt. Having a blast for sure. Ash is up in Denton, doing wedding shopping things with a friend of hers who is getting married next spring-Ash is a bridesmaid-and I have had a quiet house once again, the first time since May, :P

It's not awful. I can be in the quite and appreciate it, but I do a much better job of it when I have work all week and bootcamp for three or four days and etc.

I should be writing. I should be shopping. I have to go see my Dad later; after the movie will be good. He never wakes up much now, so I usually just comb his hair and talk to him aloud while I watch some drivel on TV and hope that he dies peacefully in his sleep in the not too distant future.

Jeeze.

I'd like to take the kids to NYC before school starts again por moi and after going to London I'd like to go EVERYWHERE, LOL.

I have this procatination and lethargic-ness that I haven't had before-it's not depression, but it is a settling of sorts in my soul-I think I am finally at the acceptance phase of my grief.

Wonder what's next? Hmmm....

I have dreamt of you so often lately I am surprised. I didn't/couldn't dream of you at all for so long that this is a bit weird. Not sure what you are trying to tell me, other than you will always be in my heart/mind when I make decisions as I navigate life without your physical presence.

So I am really missing you today, babe, as you can tell. Miss doing a house project with you, picking a movie, eating out, walking the dog, watching you shave, checking up on the Tigers, planning our next get-away...planning our life over Sunday morning I-HOP pancakes and coffee. Together.

I know, I know. I shouldn't dwell on what's not to be. I should concentrate on this moment, and how to live in it fully, and appreciate life for what it is, and not for what it isn't. But like the kid who gets a bit chubby before having a growth spurt, maybe my two steps back right now is getting me reading for the next phase of my life-another chapter of the book of my life without you as the protagonist, babe. :P

Here's to happiness and peace in all our souls.

Love you, Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey.

Seeing is Believing?

2009-07-01T11:14:00.002-05:00

This morning, as I woke up, I rolled over to catch a glimpse of the real time on my cell phone-come-alarm clock, and I was startled to see a figure of a man in a dark suit, standing at the corner of the foot of the bed, as if he were watching me sleep-

It was certainly Daryl.

The just-so hair, the suit, the broad shoulders-all of it just a fleeting glimpse, but there is no doubt in my mind whom it was. Maybe it means my dad is closer to death than before; possibly it's for Ranger, out lil beagle mix, who at 16 is going to the vet for what will probabably be his last visit tomorrow @ 3 P.M.

I used to know how everything worked, lol, but now-all bets are off.

Daz would certainly be the one to come get our dog, if that's how things can work on the other side of the cement veil. I guess we'll see-

Love you, Dazzy. Always. Nice to see you today for a sec-
Kisses,
Wifey.

Happy Anniversary

2009-06-23T11:46:00.003-05:00

Seven years ago today I married the planet's most wonderful man.

My grief has subsided and is definately more manageable most of the time, but today-ah, today-it's an endless sadness.

I feel like a crumpled leaf, fallen from the tree of love, decomposing on the floor of life.

Love you Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey.

UP!

2009-05-30T09:15:00.002-05:00

Ok...so since this movie was coming out on my old-arse birthday, I figured it would be fun to see with a bunch of people.

Now I know Disney-they are , after all, the killers of Bambi's mama-and I know there will be some weird/dark stuff interspersed with all the laughs and etc.

Maybe I am overly sensitive. Maybe I have a heightened awareness of death and all that crap b/c of Dazzy...I am not sure if I am becoming Chicken Little( the sky is falling!)or a clearer voice of sanity and reason.

SPOILER ALERT: I am going to talk about plot.
If you haven't see this flick and you want to, stop reading here.

*****************************************************************

The movies centers on a widow. Fair enough.

They do the whole childhood meeting thing with him/future wife...they are crazy happy.

First make me cry moment is when they are fixing up a nursery...only to have a hospital scene with a DR. shaking his head, couple leaving WITHOUT a baby, she sitting in the yard with that look of despair that i know so well-this happened to me in 1984, with my late son, Derek.

OK so, it can't get much worse than that, right?

Oh no. We now move on to the wife dying scene.

Yeah.

That.

By now my kids are looking over at me to see if I am OK; I am not sobbing loudly, but certainly uncomfortable.

It's just an animated movie, but still-

The rest of it is weird.

The bad guy is really twisted, if your kids are younger they will definitely be afraid of dogs when they are done with this flick(!), and the ending is drawn out ( haha no pun intended but that did work, eh?) and a bit sad.

I guess I just thought it would be more funny then maudlin-and for people who live these situations in everyday life, well, there should be a disclaimer, lol

Lots of refrences to "Adventure" and whatnot interspersed in the film too.
Daz once called our love affair a "Grand Adventure," so that was sorta nice.

One page of the wife's explorer scrapbook, that he hubby is tearfully looking through near the end of the movie, has a platypus on it as the camera zooms in; after that he sees all the pix and things she has included that chronicle their lives together.

She obviously did it as something for him to find after she was gone( Think "P.S. I Love You") and when he gets to the last handwritten page it reads ( I am paraphrasing here b/c I read it through teary eyes):

Time for you to go have another adventure!

Jeeze. It could have been written to me directly from the Dazman himself. He would have LOVED the animation, loved the oops that I found-when the ballons are being shown in shadow, the silhouette is rightly grey, but the ballons are shown in color!

Not sure if they screwed up or they were going for a magical feeling....hard to decide.

Nah. I think it's a screw-up. :P

Somedays I'd like my memory to be that of mere mortals, LOL, so that I wouldn't so acutely remember...everything.

Birthday # 3 without Daz and I made it through.

Surely this will get easier/better/different someday?

Damn. Goddamn.

sjw

Thanks for listening. Rant over.

Graduation

2009-05-19T19:39:00.002-05:00

Yes, this past weekend, the twins graduated-GRADUATED!

What a milestone-for all of us.

It was amazing to hear their names spoken aloud and watch them walk across the stage, immediately changing from student to adult pupae :)

I didn't cry like I thought I might; I was aware of Dazzy's absense, but friends texted me throughout the evening, making me smile. I got together with one someone dear to me after the fact; it made the day bearable in ways I couldn't begin to imagine just a few days earlier.

Graduation. For all of us in a way! Once the kids get jobs, I will be making many more changes in my life. When I explained that I didn't know what to do, where to go. etc, I had some good advice-do it all!

Just not all at once-and isn't that what I have told my kids all these years?
That they can indeed have anything, everything... just not all at once?

Wow.

My own words mirriored back to me came from someone whom I haven't seen in a very long time. Amazing. Totally amazing.

Daz didn't call it, "This amazing life," for nothing, eh?

Bring it on-sj

Two

2009-04-19T22:38:00.004-05:00

Two years.
TWO!
YEARS!

Its the blink of an eye and the longest lifetime all at once.

I cannot write much more that I haven't already said these past two years-

I love you. I miss you. You will always have my heart...always.

Heres what Dean Koontz wrote about loss:\

“Loss is the hardest thing….But it’s also the teacher that’s the most difficult to ignore.

Grief can destroy you – or focus you.

You can decide a relationship was all for nothing if it had to end in death, and you alone.

Or you can realize that every moment of it had more meaning than you dared to recognize at the time, so much meaning it scared you, so you just lived, just took for granted the love and laughter of each day, and didn’t allow yourself to consider the sacredness if it.

But when it is over and you are alone, you begin to see it wasn’t just a movie and a dinner together, no just watching sunsets together, not just scrubbing a floor or washing dishes together or worrying over a high electric bill.

It was everything, it was the why of life, every event and precious moment of it.

The answer to the mystery of existence is the love you shared sometimes so imperfectly, and when the loss wakes you to the deeper beauty of it, to the sanctity of it, you can’t get off your knees for a long time, you’re driven to your knees not by the weight of the loss but by the gratitude of what preceded the loss.

And the ache is always there, but one day, not the emptiness, because to nurture the emptiness, to take solace in it, is to disrespect the gift of life.” -- Dean Koontz

I am not dwelling in maudlin sadness tonight; I am dwelling in possibilities and hopefulness and the realization that I can have something that resembles " This Amazing Life" once again.

Thanks again , honey-for you and your love. You rock!

Love You Dazzy.
Always!
Kisses, Wifey

beginnings and endings

2009-02-15T08:02:00.003-06:00

Dear Dazzy,

Hi honey. As you know, I have been toying with the idea of your life story in book for for some time now. This summer may see me finish that task:)

With all that's going on with my dad, and my sister falling apart over it, and work and friends and the house and the dogs and -well, life-I think it is the right time to end my official letters to you, my words of love and longing and mourning.

That my life is full once again is no more amazing to anyone than me.
It has taken 1 year, 9 months, and 27 days for me to really truly believe that I am going to be OK. That life really can be what I want it to be again, and that living in the shadow of your death is no longer necessary.

Wow.

The kids are thriving, my dad has mere months before he gets to see you again, and work is good. My friends and I have a pretty good weekend thing going on, and I am open to all the possibilities the universe has for me-good ones ONLY, please!

No one-ever-will be you, or take your place, honey. I know that. But the thought of being alone for the rest of whatever days I have left on this earth is not a happy one either; so out I go into the world of possibilities-after May, when the kids graduate( I KNOW!) I can choose where to live, whom will I give my time to, where I will teach-and change is coming. I can feel it.

I am ready.

Because of you, Dazzy, I learned what it was to love someone unconditionally, wholly, without thought of mistrust or manipulation. You were my shining star of a husband, and I will be forever grateful that you came into my life-and even though it was not nearly the amount of time I thought we would have, I am still grateful for every fun-filled second that we did have.

You are a unique and beautiful soul, Dazzy. I know you hear me when I talk to you, and I know that I will see you again one day-I know that for sure.

I thought we would have forever, and in a way we still do-your love will be forever in my heart, your kindness etched into my soul, and your story always, always, always told by me.

I may pop in from time to time just to update you on things, babe, but for now-I am ending this so I can begin again. I know you understand what I mean.

Thank you, honey, for everything-everything.
Love you, Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey

OBAMA!

2009-01-20T21:50:00.004-06:00

Dear Dazzy,

Wow-now it's official! Barack Obama is the 44th President of the good ole U.S.A.
I am thrilled that he won the election, happy that he will be the leader who will attempt to herd us out of the messes we are in right now-

Obama is, in Chinese Astrology, an Ox. Like the twins, and Kath :)

In western astology, he is a Leo.

I think he rocks any way you look at it-and I am happy happy happy to call myself an American once again.

Love you, Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey

2009-01-17T22:55:00.006-06:00

Dear Dazzy,

Hi, honey. It's been quite the week as you may know.

Harley-only you called my Dad by his proper name; to everyone else he is Jack-is finally settled in at the nursing home. We have no idea when/how/if he will ever leave and come home.
Dr.'s estimate a 6 month-1 yr time frame for him; I would like to see him home for the most part until hospice is really, really, needed, but I am not hopeful.

It's difficult , but nothing like what we went through with my Mom nearly 11 years ago.
That nightmarish hell is something I do not want to revisit tonight.

11 years ago you an I hadn't met yet! This year will mark the ten year anniversary of our oh-so-fortunate late night( for me-mid day your time) "HI" and subsequent happily entwined lives.

You will forever be a part of me, of what I do, of how I look to the future-my soul mate artist, coloring every page of my life from the mundane to the frenetic, with brilliant hues and interesting detail.

With the long weekend, I have some down time to catch my breath after everything with my Dad ( and my ex FIL-funeral on Monday! ). I knew it would be a good day to go through my closet. I made a new CD from the kids' I-tunes list for motivation, LOL but as I began, I realized instantly why I have procrastinated over this chore for so long now.

Adornment is never anything except a reflection of the heart. ~Gabrielle "Coco" Chanel

Nearly everything that is hanging in my closet was bought :

By you,

(from all my lingerie to the black blouse and hot pink (!) heels I wore to your funeral service that you picked from a catalogue two weeks before your death, saying "these would suit" in your Aussie lingo that I achingly miss to this day)

With you, or

( my lippy-you would hold up the colors next to me and pronounce one "very noooooooooice;" runners/sneakers were always bought with you as well-no real reason, we just did, LOL)

For you

( my red leather coat for my first trip to the land "Down-Undah")

I didn't really think too much about the items in my closet on a conscious level before tonight.
I mean, really, who does?

Since I discovered Feng Shui many years ago, I don't hoard "stiff" of any kind, so it wasn't a disaster or anything like that to cull through my things.

But every time I held something up to pass judgement on it-should it stay or should it go-it forced memory to "seep through my veins" ( thank you, Sarah McLachlan).

Things like-

My pink halter and printed floral op-art skirt:

How can I ever wear this combination again without imagining the sunset as the gondolier paddled us around a faux canal here in TX on our second anniversary, us sipping champers and eating chocolates? We had a great Dallas weekend that year; you were new to the state and we had a blast at all the local joints. We went to the Movie Museum in Las Colinas, stayed at a swish hotel downtown, went on a Cowboy Stadium tour, and romantic dinners out capped off a wonderful three day celebration.

Further back in my cavern of adornments is a cream colored blazer/pants; sort of a suit.

I have not worn both together since 2003. I do wear the blazer occasionally , but the pants are a bit long in the tooth style wise now.

Doesn't matter.

What does matter is that I remember wearing that suit ( that you helped pick out) for our very first Valentine's Day as an official "Hubby and Wifey" couple.
We went to a swanky surf and turf place- didn't even LOOK at the prices-and we ate lobster washed down with bottle of champagne and chocolate truffles. ( hmmm there is a pattern here, eh babe? LOL) We ran into Chuck and his girl, (the guy that has been styling my hair for yonks) and even he made a comment about how happy we looked and how great my "suit" looked!

I felt like the chick in the old "Charley" perfume commercials!

Then there are a few OZ t-shirts that you brought over on your fist trip here; your Michael Salmon Tees with your characters on the front; and black shoes of all sorts of ridiculous heights that I haven't worn in just about two years time.

You loved to buy me dressy shoes; I wore a different pair every time we went out on the weekend. I am parting with them tonight, because I haven't been anywhere in nearly two years time or with anyone that would warrant me putting on those high heels, so it's time for them to go.

Of course, the grande dame of my closet is my wedding dress.

It's pale pink, strapless, a two piece number that has beautiful beading and a lace-up back.
It hangs in a garment bag, at the back of all my clothes. sort of a talisman for romance and love and wishes that really do come true.

I will never part with it, but I am moving it into your closet, babe.

I just can't look at that nondescript blue plastic garment protector (with the crocheted hanger that your Mum made) on a daily basis anymore, knowing full well what hangs inside of it.

Sorta like salt in a wound, ya know, honey?
Yeah. I knew you would understand.

It's quite the undertaking, this rearrangement of one's life during grief.

Even with all the hoopla surrounding my Dad this past week, I am still in a good place emotionally, which explains my ability to clean out my closet, rearrange my life just a bit more, and make room for what will come next- whatever that will be.

Life

2009-01-14T21:39:00.002-06:00

Dear Dazzy,

I am tired. Too tired to write much-but

Poppie passed away today :((( he was 88
Twins have to come home and do the funeral procession blues

Dad is settled in the nursing home-knowing
The weather is cold once again, mirroring our hearts-

We are all longing for spring.

Love you Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey

Moonsong

2009-01-10T21:46:00.004-06:00

Dear Dazzy,

I have thousands of things to say and every time I sit down at the computer, I hesitate to start., because I just know it will be the world's longest post...

My Dad is gravely ill.
It's the beginning of the end. Not pretty at all.

Kids are soon back to college-and once again I will be in a very, very quiet house.

I still need to loose twenty pounds. LOL

I find dimes when I need 'em, weird signs from you here and there, and I am 3 months away from two years-TWO YEARS-that count from the last day you took a breath as my amazing Daz.

I'd call it the January blues, but I am not in a funk at all-quite the opposite, really, for the most part-I am taking care of house stuff, car stuff, parent stuff, life stuff-with a minimum of fanfare.

Hmmm...but there IS the largest moon of the year tonight-and full moons are so beautiful...

"It will appear about 14 percent bigger in our sky and 30 percent brighter than some other
full moons during 2009, according to NASA."

So I am off to go look at the moon, like you and I did all those years ago on a night that also held a full moon-foolish romantics, LOL, both gazing at the only thing in the night sky that was a constant on our repective sides of the Earth. Space geeks at heart, you and I :)

Words don't usually fail to form in my brain, but tonight it's all about emotion, and the embrace of the full moon. Here's my new fave song by the Black Ghosts-appropriately called Full Moon.

The lyrics move me to tears, because they speak to my emotional state right now-

When the thorn bush turns white that's when I'll come home
I am going out to see what I can sow
And I don't know where I'll go
And I don't know what I'll see
But I'll try not to bring it back home with me

Like the morning sun your eyes will follow me
As you watch me wander, curse the powers that be
Cause all I want is here and now but its already been and gone
Our intentions always last that bit too long

Far far away, no voices sounding, no one around me and
you're still there
Far far away, no choices passing, no time confounds me
and you're still there

In the full moon's light I listen to the stream
And in between the silence hear you calling me
But I don't know where I am and I don't trust who I've been
And If I come home how will I ever leave ?

Love you Dazzy. Always.

Kisses, Wifey.

Make-Believe Reality

2009-01-04T21:51:00.003-06:00

Dear Dazzy,

After a whole bunch of decent days-wherein I look forward to a future, albeit without you, last night was really awful. I havent cried that much in yonks!

I put a few more wedding pictures away yesterday, rearranged and container-stored more of your art work, cds, etc. I thought it was the "right time" to do so.

And it was; my problem comes from the opposite sides of the fence that my emotions and my intellect occupy.

They are very, very far apart most days, yesterday being no exception.

So I did what I had to do, then took Boomer for the longest walk he and I have ever been on, lol. I walked and talked to you and stopped at the park so I could have a good out-loud cry, sobbing while I sat on a swing in a park that you and I used to visit. It's our local park, the one we used to walk to every night after dinner back when we had our wonderful, comfy, suburban existence.

I was grateful for the amazingly warm night-it was still 72 degrees when Boomer and I took our stroll. The stars were ablaze in the night sky-no cloud cover, no obstructions, just the twinkling and reflection of those thousands of balls of gasses and life-containing molecules highlighted by the ebony blanket of space that covers us all.

Remember making tents out of a table and a blanket when we were kids, Dazzy?
Even though we grew up on opposite sides of the planet, we both did the same things, and I know that was one of them.

I sometimes think about the earth and the solar system and everything that we establish as "known" and I wonder if we are not just silly children, playing under that card table of life, with reality just a blanket toss away. We pretend, we giggle and have fun and never give a thought as to what the grown-ups or the powers that be are doing outside of our own little fantasy world.

Then someone snatches that blanket off the top of our make-believe house/rocket/batmobile and the harsh glare of the much-too-bright light floods our eyes enough to make us blink really hard as our playing is brought to a halt, and we scamper off to find something else to do.

I loved it when we lived under that blanket-covered table of ours, babe.
I really did. I know you did, too.

Now,however, it is time for more changes.
I hate them, but am relieved when I finally do them.

Like yesterday.

Tonight is my last night of winter vacation from school (barring the freezing rain that's coming our way!). I got quite a lot accomplished organizing wise these past two weeks. I still have heaps of photo stuff to categorize and whatnot, but that can wait until Spring Break.
No hurry, really, on that.

I also bought myself new shoes and a sweater; went to the movies and out to eat (both with and without kids) and even got a new plant for the lounge room. The weather was decent for the most part and I actually made it through Christmas and NYE and the twins B-days without throwing in the towel, which is saying a LOT.

I caved a bit last night, but it was because of the upheaval in my heart, not my house, and I know that. I am sure every time I take another step forward that it will feel that way-weird and new and shaky and scary and OK all at the same time.

I am excited to go back to work and dig into the methodology of teaching once again-but tonight I will dream of our simpler days, when you and I were together under that blanket-over-the-table house. I miss you, sweets. Heaps and heaps...

Love you, Dazzy. Always.
KIsses, Wifey.

2009 Has Arrived!

2009-01-01T00:31:00.002-06:00

Dear Dazzy,

It's now 2009.

This year will mark ten years from the day we first met-and what would have been our seven year wedding anniversary.

It will see the twins graduation, and our lives moving in different directions.

It will be the Chinese year of the Ox( just like the twins).

It doesn't matter what the calendar says...we still miss you heaps.

Here's wishing for peace in our hearts and calmness in our souls-today and everyday in this hope-to-be wonderful new year.

Love you Dazzy. Always.
Kisses (and happy new year,babe-) Wifey.

Should old acquaintance be forgot,
and never brought to mind ?
Should old acquaintance be forgot,
and auld lang syne

CHORUS:
For auld lang syne, my dear,
for auld lang syne,
we'll take a cup of kindness yet,
for auld lang syne.

And surely you’ll buy your pint cup !
And surely I’ll buy mine !
And we'll take a cup o’ kindness yet,
for auld lang syne.

CHORUS

We two have run about the slopes,
and picked the daisies fine ;
But we’ve wandered many a weary foot,
since auld lang syne.

CHORUS
We two have paddled in the stream,
from morning sun till dine† ;
But seas between us broad have roared
since auld lang syne.

CHORUS
And there’s a hand my trusty friend !
And give us a hand o’ thine !
And we’ll take a right good-will draught,
for auld lang syne.

Treasure Boxes

2008-12-29T23:09:00.003-06:00

Dear Dazzy,

Today I found a box of "stuff" in the garage-your stuff from the car place; all your "SOLD" files and cold call info and training manuals and whatnot.

It was a surprise find-I have always assumed it was Chrissie trinkets-and it made me smile that heartbroken smile to see your great photo-shopped postcards, read some notes written in your beautiful, artistic handwriting, and look through the scribbles on the backs of busio cards-all written in that shorthand that was so typically cryptic Daz!

I even found a cigar still in a wrapper; pens, paper-nothing spectacular, just everyday items last touched by you.

I recycled what I could, then sorted the office items into things I will use in my classroom and things that I will donate. I kept a few scribbled notes to go into the special box in your closet, but the amazing thing was that I didn't cry about any of it.

I mean, it's just stuff-even if it was yours, it's nothing that will make my life better for having found it.

Or maybe I'm wrong?

Finding things like this box of ordinary life remnants reminds me how full-on you were in your career, always striving to be the best/do the best for your clients, and in turn, for us.

You never did anything halfway, LOL, and I grew to love you for that after a short while.

Your drive and determination were second to none, my sweet Aussie roo-boy. I've got proof!

The contents of the box may not be special to anyone else, but the handwriting, the trinkets, the collection of pens and paper-your friends and colleagues are laughing right about now, knowing how you "collected" pens from everywhere you went (very unintentionally I might add)...all of the seeming useless things that I had to sort through today are like another little "hi" from you, a reminder that you are still a part of this family-so much so that your junk is still cluttering up the garage of the ole MelYork. :P

Love you Dazzy. Always.

Kisses, Wifey.

Happy Twin Day :)

2008-12-26T19:14:00.017-06:00

Dear Dazzy,
23! Wow! Hard to believe that our munchkins are 23 today!

I know you are/would be as proud of them as I am , honey. Graduating in May!
Making a life for themselves that includes friends and family, generosity and courage; using all the life-tools that we gave to them as parents, they embrace change wholeheartedly day after day. In your words-they ROCK! :P

Tonight they are out with friends, back home later to have cake and champers.
Yes, I made their cakes, like always-M has strawberry with a Yankees logo and A has vanilla/confetti with a Twilight theme-way too cool! Pix to follow...

So, the kid's b-day was easier this year than last; X-mas sucked the life out of me again ( and probably always will) and I am sure NYE will fare about the same.
I have heaps of decisions to make in 2009 regarding my Masters degree, where we all want to live after the twins graduate ( Wait-do I hear Oz calling? hmmmm) and what kind of care my Dad should be getting. Sister and I argue over that one all the time; that's an ongoing thing that eventually will iron itself out.

Eventually.

Dad is ill with various maladies-took him to urgent care place today, wasn't too bad of a wait, he's got some new meds, so we'll see what's what in a few days.
Mr P. is not doing well either, and the year 2009 looms with the "...waiting for the other shoe to drop..." promise that I would love to ignore.

Sadly, none of us ever get to do that.

I heard Savage Garden today while waiting at the CVS, getting my dad's scripts-it amazes me how our brains are so wired to connect music or smells with feelings;
I was instantaneously transported to years ago summertime, walking around the neighborhood at a good clip, for exercise, with my walkman on (LOL no mp3's back then yet!) and the sweat dripping while I anticipated getting on the cpu to "talk" with you @ 9pm MY time, 2 pm ( next day)YOURS. That was our permanent time setting for quite a while, and it brought a good deal of structure to our long-distance relationship.

You once asked me what motivated me to go and exercise like that every night at
7pm and I said something flip like, "I like to stay in shape..."
Since your death, I have not worried about being in any kind of shape, sorry to say.

Maybe I'll find some motivation again-surely it's buried underneath my Australia sized grief, eh babe? I'll just need to look harder. I know it's there somewhere.

Meanwhile, I am grateful for the 75 F degree day on the anniversary of the twins arrival into human form. I am so glad they got to have you as their Dad for so many years-they know how much you cared about their every decision, and they loved you for it. You know that.

I don't have to restate it, really, but it feels good to see it in print.

So we made it through another round of Diamond commercials, hokey holiday movies, pressie buying, card store perusing and eating too much holiday food. I decorated the house but skipped the tree; lights were strung but not enough so you could see it from outer space, and I made spritz cookies more than once.

I have found dimes twice when I really needed some solace from your arms, and that "D" in our holiday piccie cracks me up. Music and the radio coming on all by itself and etc all keep me wondering about where you are , what you are up to, if you really can watch over us at all.

Sigh. Now I know why I loved Spock all those years ago-these frigging emotions are so pesky to deal with all the time!

Next year, forget X-mas. I am taking a cruise. :P

Christmas Wishes..brought to you by the letter D!

2008-12-22T20:33:00.008-06:00

Dear Dazzy,

It's Christmas in Australia already, and Chrissie Eve here in TX-so here is this year's offical Christmas Greeting from the W family...

Ok, look to the left of the tree-right above Mike's head-see that letter?

It's about ten feet high up close...Yes, honey, it's a "D"-for "Daryl," no doubt!

We all know it's the first letter in the name of the store on the second level in the mall -Dillards-but I couldn't help but smile when I saw how this pix came out.

You were the family photog, Dazzy; always had your camera in hand, even when some of us bitched about photos taken too early or too late or without make-up. Now, I try and remember to take that random odd photo that will make us smile in years to come.

Like this one... :)

We were at the local mall the other day, kids shopping, me wandering around with them, LOL, just to get out of the house because it was so cold-freezing temps in TX the week of Chrissie are not usual-and I stopped us all by the Santa display( he is on the other side of the tree), handed a random teen Mike's camera and then we all smiled as we said, "Happy Christmas!"

When I looked at the pix on the computer, that "D" jumped out at me like Rudolph's nose in the middle of a blizzard. What are the odds that the kid taking the pix would be at just the exact angle needed to capture ONLY the letter "D" in this shot?

Or that the three people who miss you so dearly would be standing just so in front of that decorated tree so only that letter would show up? Hmmm...

In Shakespeare's Hamlet, the following lines are said to Horatio, who doesn't fully believe that Hamlet has indeed seen/talked with his father's ghost-

"There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy."

I like to invoke this quote when I sense that people are thinking "Um, yeah...riiiiiiight" when I point out something weird like how I find dimes all the time when I am especially saddened by my acute loss, or when the radios/TVs/phones come on out of nowhere, or when a song comes on the radio as I try and drive through a waterfall of tears-like the other day, driving home after classes were done for the break when reality kicks in; c'mon, how many times do stations play bloody "Funkytown" in their December rotation?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CUm6TCbEK0g

And yet that was the song that came on last Friday while I began to fall apart; immediately I started to laugh-through a runny nose and crying eyes, babe, that is no mean feat!

You named "Funkytown" as a fave in some online survey thingy you sent to me way back in the day( circa very early 2000). You said you liked it b/c you "loved a good beat..." I thought it was way too Disco for me, but I liked the whole, "gotta move on" lyric.

Applies to us still, doesn't it honey?

So when I see things like the big letter "D" next to our Team Daz family in a picture that so obviously is missing their captain, babe, I just smile and think if anyone could pull this stuff off, lol, it would be definitely be you.

Happy Christmas? I don't know about that one...but while it is Chrissie, we'll remember the man who delighted in playing Santa every day...our "Big D!"

Pssst-our secret Santa covert operation was a total success-Mike and Dave delivered it, Ash helped organize, and I wrapped-it really made me feel like Christmas a bit. As always, the anticipation is always worse than the actual day!

Tonight I am off to MaryLou's for her annual open house. Yeah, I should be getting all spiffy to go out with YOU, I know, I know...and that really does sadden my heart.

All those good times we had-it's a wistful nod to the past that we shared as I get ready to go out tonight-alone.

I will be fine, though, because let's face it, it's a choice of fine or a finale- and that's not going to help anyone. I am strong enough to do this alone because you loved me so.

I know my worth because of you, sweets, and that's the one present that is truly priceless.

TA, Dazzles! Here's to Christmas wishes of love in our hearts and peace in our souls.

Love you, Dazzy. Always.

Kisses, Wifey.

20 months

2008-12-20T20:16:00.007-06:00

Dear Dazzy,

TWENTY! I didn't realize it straight away, but became aware of the date when I had to write something else on the calendar in the kitchen. TWENTY! It's all starting to take on the speed of a runaway fun house train. Widowland! Not for the feint of heart or the puny in spirit...

What I did get to do today, however, was play Santa :) and shop with Mikestar.
We got a few pressies, shopped for food, ran errands and out and about chores-all before the big chill comes back tonight; brrrr. It's been nice for a few days, and will be again after the next two; cookie baking is on the agenda for tomorrow and so is a sorting of all this Christmas Tree related.

I have decor in the dining room and on the mantle and in the kitchen and out front, but I just cannot bring myself to put up the tree. I think it's time to sort all the zillions of ornaments we have and start boxes for both kids.

The ornaments you and I collected-from where ever we traveled-might get put up next year. Maybe . That's a long time away, so I don't have to decide right now.
I have no way of knowing, at this point, if they will bring a smile or a tear, so we'll just let that sleeping dog lie for now, OK babe?

I also picked up my prints from the camera store-the ones of the baby pix I found of you back at the house in Box Hill. They were slides, from the early 60s, and I had ten of them put into photos. There is only one pix of a person I can't identify, LOL but that's fine. The rest are you as a baby/toddler, sooooo cute and cheeky!

I'll have to scan them all, but the golf one is probably my fave-you and your dad, "playing" golf; sadly both of you are now gone. Maybe you and Sam are still golfing a bit? That would make us all happy in a very small way.

Knowing the sports freak you grew up to be, it's a fun little foreshadowing, isn't it honey?

How could anyone have known that the adorable little boy in these pix would morph into the most loving man I have ever had the good fortune to meet?

While life is never fair, it really can be amazing, can't it, Dazzles?!

I am happy to have had a few chapters of amazing with you, sweets. Some people never even get one.

So I am enjoying the photos a bit, taking care of Smashers- glad we didn't go to LA with Pats and her daughter, that would have been awful with her sick-and deciding what to do with thwe rest of my two weeks off. I have the luxury of time, with no love to make the spending of it worthwhile. Damn!

Love you Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey.

Home for the Hoildays

2008-12-19T22:48:00.005-06:00

Dear Dazzy,

After being held captive at school until 4:45, I finally was allowed to go- and I did! LOL
We can't go home until grades are verified, ya know, but oh yeah, if you gave a test in your last period of the day and you got your paperwork in earlier than most, well then it sat at the bottom of the pile now, didn't it?

HMMMMM...I like to think that I can learn to work smarter, not harder, so NEXT TIME, I am holding all my grading till the last minute-and plopping it down on the TOP of the pile!

There has to be a better way to get grades verified. Since it changes every year, it's never a done deal at a decent time. This year was ridiculous to say the least.

So now it's officially the "Holiday Season" for us. Kids are home, dogs are confused, I have run way too many errands this week that I normally don't have to do, but all seemed to creep up into the "ihavetobedonenow" realm; add to that our stupid Ice Storm of one day and well!
It's been a full week to say the least.

Great thing-reading my students' essays; only a few refuse to get with the program.
Most are ready for any assignment that calls for an Essay! Yea!

This year, as I put away the tiny, tacky, dollar store X-mas tree from my desk, and took down the holiday themed writings from our hall bulletin board, I didn't cry. Improvement? I guess...This time last year I was running out of the building, stifling my sobs; I was going home for a two week break and you would not be around to help make it so much fun.

There would be no Chrissie shopping, just us two; no wrapping late at night with an adult beverage, LOL, no convertible ride through Deer Field to see the Griswold like decor, blazing like an 80's neon t-shirt under a strobe light. No photoshopped cards sent to friends and family, no obnoxious yearly letter to friends-
no Christmas.

The worst was Christmas Eve. With the kids off to the grandparents, you and I used to go out to eat someplace where we could get all dressed up; a romantic time where we could just unwind and appreciate the holiday spirit.

I don't have that spirit anymore. I feel-nothing.

I am happy with the kids home though, and we'll have a good time for sure.
I will visit with friends and that will be fun, too.
I''ll run around to the grocery store ( kids are home, remember? lol) and the mall and the movies and out to eat.

I am planning on culling through all our X-mas decor-time to pack away some things-writing more of your bio, and organizing stuff around the house like I do. I'll get to read, and it will be fine. Much like summer vacation.

But there will be no happiness at my good fortune and yours in our finding one another; no planning of futures over tiramisu and great coffee, no long weekend at a place we've never been to before; no midnight giggles or I love yous said in whispered kisses.

All of that is gone. I can't believe that some days I can live without all of that affection. It's live breathing shallowly to conserve energy.

The hardest thing about the holidays is sadly realizing that hope doesn't work, peace is fleeting at best, and awe and mystery are held only by small children and fairies.

On the BB for ex-pats that I still frequent is a thread that asks, "What do you really want for Christmas?" I want to write, I just want my hubby, but that would upset the apple cart a bit, so I have refrained.

But still, I mean it, babe. I do.

Love you Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey.

Ice Storm

2008-12-16T10:29:00.003-06:00

Dear Dazzy,

Yep we got hit last night-and with all the school district that surround the place where we are CLOSED, I was shocked to find that my place was still OPEN!

Someone dropped the ball big-time here. The roads are treacherous, the sleet is coming down again this morning, and I almost wiped out in my lil convertible as I attempted to go to work early this Tuesday morning. YIKES!

After sliding through an intersection and seeing the crawl of the traffic, I turned around at first chance and chugged my way back into the safety of the Melyork's garage.

I called my boss-whose hubby took her to work in the SUV with 4WD-and said "Sorry, I can't make it in..."

I never take time off at the last minute like this. That damn puritan work ethic -or my narcissism, can't decide which-makes me feel really guilty for leaving my students in the hands of others. I know more than a few teachers probably called in as well, which doesn't help the overall school situation. Since I am NOT in charge, lol, I just have to roll with it.

My motivating factor now is that I am all my kids have-and my car is the only one "home."

If I have a wreck, and I have to have the car repaired, or me repaired, how do I do that alone?

Who would take care of our dogs? How would I get by on disability?( quick answer-I wouldn't!)How would I get to work w/o a car for a long time( Ok, rental, duh Susan, but you know what I mean, babe...)

I know you would have driven me in had you been here. Have to cancel an appt that I had for this arvo, and I will miss a meeting as well. No bank/grocery run either, but those can wait.

Remember when you first moved to TX in '02? We had ice that first winter on Valentine's Day

( it was '03 by then) and school was out for two days. You loved slip-sliding around in it all and took heaps of picture. We don't have those pix on this computer; the photo here was taken on Long Island during out NYC trip-while we don;t have as much snow, it certainly conveys the feeling outside today!

After the initial guilt, I am much more OK with the big picture of me not going to school today-the school will run just fine, my students will be fine, the universe will still expand with it's om-like cosmic breathings of expansion-and I know that it's not a big deal in the snapshot of my life.

Maybe it's good that I feel like this-it tells me I still care about something outside of me and the kids.

Good news is the kids got all their grades in-Go Ms Smashers and her 4.0 self!

Mikestar hits the boards with a solid 3.0 this semester, and a 3.5 overall-I know you are as proud as I am today, honey. May will be here before we know it-and BAM! They graduate!

Life will change drastically once again when that happens. It will be interesting to say the least.

I now have a whole day in which to do nothing, LOL; can't go anyplace with the weather( good thing is tomorrow will be in the 40s so this crap will melt by then) but I should be able to get through some filing and ( gasp) maybe a Chrissie card or two.

The kids are home ( yea) so I don't have to worry about them, lol, and I just know that the dogs are thinking, "Wait-is it Saturday already?"

Hot chocolate is calling my name, Dazzy. More weather updates later!

Love you, Dazzy. Always!

Kisses, Wifey.

Wondering Why

2008-12-14T20:41:00.003-06:00

Dear Dazzy,

All I really want some days is for someone/something to tell me WHY.

Why you are not here anymore with us-ME, your family, your friends- enjoying life.

Why. An eternal question, eh babe?

I know there would never be a good reason why you had to leave us so abruptly, but still I ask-WHY? What's the point? The purpose? The reason?

All your dying did was create this gaping hole in the souls of those of us who loved you, and were loved by you in return. It caused such unhappiness and pain, attested to by countless tears and way too many long, lonely stretches of time.

I thought, naively enough, that the passage of time would bring a sense of healing.
Foolish woman. I don't think there will ever be a measurable amount of time that would equal any semblance of healing within my heart. Some days I don't think that the scar tissue that is forming will be strong enough to hold my emotions is check day after day, week after week, year after bloody freaking year.

Today, I am as sad as I ever was. Christmas doesn't really make it worse, for I will miss you on December the 30th just as much as on Nov the 30th or May the 30th or...I am sure you get my drift, sweets.

It still hurts, and I want it to stop, but it never does.

CS Lewis wrote A Grief Observed after the death of his soul mate, Helen, in 1960.

As a couple, they remind me of us, honey :)))

Here's a quote from that book that rings true for me with icicle honed sharpness-

Part of every misery is, so to speak, the misery's shadow or reflection: the fact that you don't merely suffer but have to keep on thinking about the fact that you suffer. I not only live each endless day in grief, but live each day thinking about living each day in grief.

Even with all the wonderful things that still exist in this ephemeral world-the kids, our friends and family, the amazing synchronicity of the planets as they traverse time; really, the endless list I could make that would say, "See? I get it. I appreciate it all- and have for quite some time now- with wonder and amusement and knowing; I only really want the answer to that one unanswerable question-Why?

I know you would tel me if you could, babe.

It wouldn't matter, though.

I'd still hurt-

And you would still be gone...

Love you, Dazzy. Always.

Kisses, Wifey.

Holy Freakin' Crap!

2008-12-14T00:34:00.004-06:00

Photo: Daz and David Campbell-1998

Dear Dazzy,

Went out with friends tonight to celebrate one of them turning 40. Yeah, she's the baby of the bunch....but still we had a good time; all of us back to the MelYork for wine and Tim Tams, lol, and playing with dogs in between conversations and laughter.

Once everyone left, I checked in on the computer to see what's going on at Perez, then my fave Aussie ex pat place, and finally check my email.

At my Aussie stop, I wanted to add a few words and a pix that I brought home from my Oz trip (found it in Daz's desk) to a post about David Campbell singing at Carols by Candlelight-a program that goes on every year in Melbourne for X-mas-and as I was taking this pix out of the stack that is in my closet ( waiting to be scanned over x-mas break)...

...the clock radio came on in our bedroom!

Funny thing is, I do not have it set at all-I use my cell phone for my alarm-and I always have it on KERA, the local hi-brow station, LOL

What came on was the religious Christian station ( like a few stops down the dial), with some Chrissy song, that talked about, "...finding my way back home..."

It startled me, of course, and then I got really still, and sat down on the wing chair to listen to the rest of it. It was some sappy thing that I have never heard before, on a station I never listen to, by a band that would never be in rotation on my Ipody-mp3 player.

It came on at the exact time I was walking past the radio with this photo in my hand.

I can't even begin to explain this one. If the kids weren't here to hear it/see it..I'd be calling the boys and girls with the white coats to come on down and get me already!

Dazzy, I am not sure what the holy freakin' crap just went on, but if that WAS you, honey, then wow.

Amazing.

Love you Dazzy. Always.

Kisses, Wifey.

Now THIS is how I REALLY feel this year...

2008-12-05T19:06:00.002-06:00

Dear Dazzy,

Yeah. What Oscar said...

Love you Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey

Season of Light(s)

2008-12-02T20:52:00.005-06:00

Dear Dazzy,

Oh honey-walking the dogs tonight, seeing all the houses with Christmas lights up-well, that did me in. I have had quite the stretch of "HappyHappy," recently, but absorbing the optical impact of the neighborhood's seasonal lights, all twinkly and flashing, did nothing but make me cry.

Haven't done that is a good long while!

But seeing the eletronic rainbows up and down the street made me realize that gone are the December days of the MelYork, done up ala Griswold, LOL

Even if I could do it myself, it just wouldn't have the same impact driving down the street and seeing our house all over-the-top blinged out, knowing that the guy who was responsible for that isn't here anymore in the flesh.

Right now I feel nothing but a hollow melancholy for the Season of Light-and after being at this grief BS for a while now, I also know that this empty feeling will probably soon pass.

Sad to think that having these kinds of stuttering emotions during the holiday season will now be my new normal, though. In case I haven't mentioned it before, widowhood S-U-C-K-S, big time.

Big time with a halftime show! With fireworks :(

You should be here,Dazzles; buying crazy blow-up X-mas decorations( I WAAAAAAAANT A SNOWMAN! Remember? LOL, LOL, LOL)and overloading the fuse box with a,"Susie...just one more,'kay?" ugly neon-orange power cord, plugged into a zillion twinkly lights that play the Chipmunks's version of Ave Maria or whatever...

I have tomorrow off-planned it months ago, so I could decorate and shop a bit as well. The weather promises to be nice, and I will be out and about in the convertible-probably the last time I will have the top down this season.

I know I will think about Christmases past more than once as I go through the storage boxes in the garage that hold all our holiday gear. I wonder how much decorating I will actually get to do.

I also wonder, when I am out of sorts like tonight, if you could ever truly know how much I miss you, honey. Actually, I wonder if I will ever know the true depth of my emotions for you. Every time I think I have reached my zenith, a new benchmark appears on the horizon, like a new star just waiting to be discovered, with its brigh and flashy twinkly light...

Love you Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey.

Attention all Boomer Fans

2008-11-29T14:02:00.004-06:00

Dear Dazzy,
Just thought I would share a lil snip of video starring that dog you sent to me, lol, with all his "fans"-It's BOOMER,right before T-day dinner :)

Thanksgiving Redoux :P

2008-11-28T23:41:00.007-06:00

Dear Dazzy,

Well-T-day over, and it was-dare- I say it?-it was O.K.

Of course we missed you heaps, but talking about you makes us laugh sometimes now- we KNOW you are jazzed about the HUGE Cowboy football win on Turkey Day- but I also know you are ticked off to some degree because you did not get to eat any of my famous stuffing

( thanks Mom!) or the dessert of the day-my cherry/strawberry pie with Aussie cutouts! LOL

Of course, since you are not encumbered by your human body at this point in time, I guess food is one thing NOT on your happy list anymore-hmmmm....that's just not right, eh babe?

You know we lit the squirrel candle, you know we watched the Macy's parade-I have watched that thing since I was five or so-and you also know how low keyed but fun it was this year for us-sad, always, without you, but on more of an even keel this time around. Wow. It amazes me even to think about writing those words, never mind believing them.

You also know how bad my Dad's health has been, and he isn't even in one photo op this year because he was asleep for most of it-in between bites of turkey/dressing/etc/and of course, pie.

Hard to see him like this; the only thing that makes it even a little bit OK is knowing that you will probably be the first one to say "Hiya, Harley!" when his time to cross over comes.

I have a hard time lately doing the "I am thankful" thing sometimes.

Which is weird, because you know I was always the queen of gratitude-I knew full well what you and I had, and how rare it was, and how lucky we found ourselves-and while I truly am grateful that I had you in my life at all, and I know I have many other things to be grateful for-our kids, my job, a home-sometimes I just can't spit it out and mean it.

Sometimes I am just so pissed off that whatever caused you to leave us-rotten luck, divine intervention, or bad DNA-I just can't help but think what difference would it have made, in the time scheme of boundless infinity and black hole warp drive, for you to stay with me-with us-until you and I were BOTH old and crotchety, saying "HUH" between every other word

( too proud for hearing aids, LOL, LOL, LOL just a small private joke eh babe?) me typing some drivel on my laptop while you were updating one of you zillion Dazworks websites...

I don't make wishes like that anymore. I know they will never happen, and that's heartbreaking, so I stopped doing it a while ago. I guess I will call that progress?

We still have two more days off this weekend. Today I got to go through some of your Dazworks items( just felt like the right time ) and I shredded many many docos pertaining to you web business. I kept the VIP ones, but sacked all the rest.

What we deem as necessary in this life, is not always so when it comes to crunch time, eh babe?

I guess that's where that gratitude comes in....

Love you, Dazzy.

Always.

Kisses, Wifey

Thanksgiving Eve

2008-11-26T22:59:00.002-06:00

Dear Dazzy,

Our college kids are home-

The Obamas are on TV-

Pies are just ready to come out of the oven-Cherry ( YUMMO) and Pumpkin( bleh, but Dad and Smashy like it)-

Dogs are settled down now( too much excitement when the kids come home!)-

I saw "Australia" this morning-the perfect way to start my T-day weekend-

I am not crying tonight-

Life goes on....

Love you Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey

BRRRRR

2008-11-24T22:19:00.002-06:00

Dear Dazzy,

While it's been in the 60's during the day, the nights this week will be in the 40s-BRRRR weather. This past weekend I switched the bedding over-washed the mattress covers, the down comforter, the doona covers and slate blue sheets, etc.

I put the electric warmer under the mattress cover and the bed is all ready to go now for the winter that will be here whether I want it to come or not, LOL

It sports the doona cover that you picked out-a brown and blue quasi-brocade-ish number; it was not my first pick but the colors work well-and now it reminds me of fall and winter. It belongs on the bed with the puffy down comforter all tucked away inside; Ranger and Boomie and I really appreciate it when the wind is blowing and the temps drop in late January/February.

You used to be my heater, honey-all that testosterone! You were NEVER cold. Ever.
We all know that I am a different story...:P
It's winter number two coming up without you-still don't remember much of winter number one, but I know I went through it because I have my blog entries. Reading some of the ones from that period of time helps me see how I am scarring over. Day by day the scar becomes less visible, and eventually one will have to squint hard to see it.
Here's to that day.

I am looking forward to food shopping big time tomorrow night for T-day and the week that the kids will be home for-woo-hoo! It will be a great week with them around, and I have some things planned with friends so it looks like a busy, productive time will be had by all.

Of course T-day will never be them same without you sitting at the head of our table, but your candle will be lit and we will talk to you and about you like we do now. I believe we will be fine in the end, but the day is sure to see a few tears. That's fine, too.

Now its off to bed with the silly dogs and my book-I love the fact that reading is something I can care about once again-and we'll say "G'nite, Dazzy" like we do every night.

Love you Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey

Twilight Mania

2008-11-23T20:36:00.005-06:00

Dear Dazzy,

The frame on the right is one that Smashers made for a friend for

X-mas-in honor of their fandom for Edward, the vampire in Twilight who has skin that "sparkles and dazzles, " LOL

Of course when I see or here the word "dazzle," I think of YOU!

(Daz, Dazzy, Dazzles, you were called everything but your given name, Daryl, sometimes, LOL, but it was so-YOU)

Twilight, in a nutshell, is a quartet of books-so far-written about very 21st century type vampires and the people who fall in love with them :P

You would have loved the story line, and even though it's now a chick-flick, I have no doubt we would have gone to see it together. It's a movie that everyone is going to see-it will have that cult following of a Star Wars or a Star Trek as the books are made into movies; it did $70 million plus ( yes, honey USD!) in its opening weekend!

The woman who wrote this story has a pretty decent way with words. There are some very good quotes from the characters that can be applicable to my life right now, and this may just be my favorite-

"Time passes.

Even when it seems impossible.
Even when each tick of the second hand aches like the pulse of blood behind a bruise.

It passes unevenly, in strange lurches and dragging lulls, but pass it does.

Even for me."

Even for me. Indeed.

When I look at the calendar and think that it has been 19 months since that awful day that turned our life together into dust, I realize that this is truly how time passes when one is drowning in grief-unevenly, in sharp lurches forward and boring-beyond-measure lulls, but
pass, it does.

When W.H. Auden wrote "Funeral Blues," he starts with the line,
"Stop all the clocks, block out the sun..."

He knew all about those lurches and lulls, didn't he? He didn't want to be able to measure time anymore, because without the love of his life it didn't really matter.

I understand his despair. I live it every day. I don't want to see time as the enemy, however, because it really isn't. It doesn't matter, really, how much time we had together; what matters is how we loved each other so.

In that vein, I'd like to revere the time I still have on this Earth and not look for it to pass quickly; I'd like to savor all the days I may have left and still call them my own. Ok, mine and the kids' and the dogs', LOL.

This is quite a departure from this time last year, and I am grateful to be able to realize that fact in itself. The long climb out of that hideous black hole of grief has begun, hasn't it honey?

Here's to days filled with peace and contentment, for even just a moment or two, and to the slowing of time's breath back to a normal and regular pace once again.

Love you Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey

Exactly

2008-11-22T09:30:00.007-06:00

Dear Dazzy,

Since it's the weekend ( woohoo) I get to sleep in a bit later. When I get up, I get to stay in my PJ's and make a cuppa and read newpapers, magazine articles, and do puzzles on-line. I have brekky at the computer desk and I encourage my brain to expand a bit.

Not having to be anywhere at a certain time allows me that wonderful luxury of reading anything and everything, if I so desire. You know what the written word means to me, honey; to me, there is nothing that compares to a well written article/story/poem/song/novel and yes, even blogs.

I have always loved to read, and it was something that I thought that I had lost when you died so suddenly-my ability to concentrate on the subtleties and nuaunces in any kind of text was simply gone for a very long time.

Happily, it has returned in force.

I just plowed through the first two Twilight books ( everyone is reading them, lol) and look forward to reading the next two. The author is not going to win any Pulitzers for writing, but these books have a story that is intriguing and characters that make sense.

I can see why all the college/high school kids love the series- how being true to oneself while dealing with life's elements that are beyond one's control opens a Pandora's box of situations. Exactly!

My magazine pile is growing once again, and on Saturdays (or as you would have said, SAT-day, lol-Oh, how I miss that accent around the house) and Sundays I can linger at the computer for an easy hour or two reading things like the New York Times editorials regarding Obama's cabinet choices, PerezHilton and his scathing celeb nonesense, the blogs of fellow widowers, gardening ideas at Martha Stewart, NASA picture of the day, and etc.

How could I NOT love the wonders of the internet?
After all, it was the conduit for our finding each other in the first place!

One article I read this morning had an interview wiht Michelle Williams-Heath Ledger's love, once upon a time. She is, like anyone who has lost someone dear, forever changed, and she is starting to realize it. My heart breaks for her and her daughter.

Here is a paragrah or two from the article at Newsweek:

Williams is jovial and chatty, until the conversation turns to Heath. You can see it's still difficult for her to talk about him, and she hasn't done so publicly until now.
The first time Ledger's name comes up, she bursts into tears. "It's so sad," Williams says. When she's asked about how she's been doing in the past year, she's silent for a very long time.
"I guess it's always changing," she says. There's another pause. "What else can I say?" Her voice is breathy and fragile, and she takes a few gulps of air.
"I just wake up each day in a slightly different place—grief is like a moving river, so that's what I mean by 'it's always changing'." She stops again.
"It's a strange thing to say"—her words unravel slowly, her eyes tear up—"because I'm at heart an optimistic person, but I would say in some ways it just gets worse. It's just that the more time that passes, the more you miss someone.
In some ways it gets worse. That's what I would say."
That's what I would say too, Michelle. Exactly.

Love you Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey
PS-The picture above is of the Yarra River, in gorgeous Melbourne. We walked along it many times when I was in OZ, and if grief is like a moving river, then my river is in OZ...

Catching up

2008-11-16T21:40:00.003-06:00

Dear Dazzy,

Woohoo-Updates!

Weather here has been C O L D for one whole day,LOL, then thankfully back to normal-but it reminded me of the Winter-to-come, and how I don't have you to snuggle with, but I do have Rangie and the Boomster, so I'll be fine :P

Lonely for you, babe, but fine still the same. I think.

As you know, Kath was here all weekend!( Friday-Sunday)We had fun like always.
She will be back sometime around Chrissy, and I'll go back to Austin with her and then fly back after a few days. The kids will be home, so they can hold down the fort with the dogs and etc. Should be fun, and I am looking forward to it already.

I am at a new place in my journey of grief that is somewhat weird. I am always looking for some shade of normalcy-whatever that means now-and every month that passes brings to me another piece of what might be called my soul.

I am not sure how many months or years or decades or eons or millennia it may take to find all the fragments that it shattered into after your death. I am aware that I may never find them all, and at this point I am OK with that-because I am forever changed by your departure, sweets. Forever.

The pieces DO indeed float by, however; I latch on to them as I can, hopefully rebuilding them into something stronger than what was there before.

Grief is a powerful mortar-mixing the tears of sorrow with the grit of reality.
It's not always pretty, but it does hold the bricks of one's life together.
I'm mixing up a new batch of this goop every single day, babe.

It's sometimes exhausting, but at the same time, it's good exercise.

Like I said, weird eh?

On a more mundane note, it's only one more week and two days until Thanksgiving break-woohoo!The long awaited Australia movie will be released as well-cue the kleenex!

When Hugh Jackman says, "Welcome to Australia..." in that movie trailer, it breaks my heart. He sounds exactly like you did when I got off the plane at Tullamarine that first time, and you found me in the crowd of people coming through customs. You put your arms around me and said those exact words, follwed by "...baby." I remember smiling enormously simply from pure happiness. It was such a heady emotion, felt only when I was in your arms.

I know I'll need the entire box of kleenex during this movie.

The kids will be home, though, so that will be fab. I miss them, the dogs miss them, even the house misses them! It's just so full of life when we are all here-it's only missing you. Like the rest of us, the little Melyork will always miss you.

One good thing about having houseguests is that frantic and crazy cleaning that takes place beforehand. The Melyork is sooooooooooooooo clean, its almost scary, LOL

I cleaned every nook and cranny, all the closets(!) all the laundry, all the stuff outside, and even-can you believe it-shampooed the carpets( thanks for lending me that great machine, P!) I love when all the house is together like this-it's calming in a very weird way to me.

So the house is ready for the holidays. Maybe I will follow. It's certainly not like last year-last year I could have pushed fat old Santa and his stupid elves off a very high chimney and had not one iota of guilt. :P

This year I may even put up a wreath.

Or two.

Love you, Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey.

Fired Up! Ready to Go!

2008-11-04T18:53:00.008-06:00

Dear Dazzy,

I know you are loving that fact that the kids and I had a hand in making HISTORY in the USA with the election of out first minority President!

Hopefully I won't have to edit these words later, LOL, but I think Barack is going to really run with it tonight if early voting is any indication.

I love this speech, given right before the election-Fired up, and ready to go, indeed!

This would have been the first time you could have voted in the USA had all things gone according to our plans. Sadly that didn;t happen, but I know you and I would have voted the same, babe, so my vote is not just for me, but for you, too-

Love you, Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey.

2008-11-03T20:48:00.005-06:00

Dear Dazzy,

Nine years ago tonight, NOVEMBER 3,1999-at about this very time, 10:45 Central/USA-you and I said, "Hi/G'Day!" for the very first time via ICQ.

I had come home from a movie with KathUSA, but I wasn't tired. I had ICQ newly installed on my computer. I fooled around with the chat feature and found a few things to check out-I picked Australia because I figured the people there spoke English.

Little did I know! LOL

Then I narrowed it down to people in their 30's...didn't need to be chatting to some snot-nosed teenybopper type. I found your screen name-Blackhawk- in a list of people that were online at the same time as moi.

Next thing I know is I am reading a profile of a person who says they are into "Low-fat cooking, 18th century art, and who works at home as a Graphic Artist in Computers."

After I sent you a hesitant "Hi", you took over the conversation and had me add you to my friends list. Of course you added me to yours and we were off and running!

In all our time together, we never stopped talking. :P

Even now, I keep talking to you in this blog, out loud at home like a crazy woman, and in my head when something serendipitous happens since you have gone on.

Sometimes I feel like you are not that far away.

I get this calm, peaceful feeling like all is right with the world, and I know I'll come out of this sadness one day.

Other days?Well, lets just say those days are still rough to navigate.

We were a couple right away. We really fell in love in a very old fashioned courtship kind of way-talking about what was in our hearts, meaning what we said, being direct in our discussions and getting to the point!

We loved a good chin-wag on any topic. We were always on that same wavelength, weren't we honey? It was nothing short of magical. Even when we disagreed, LOL we would spit words at each other that were biting, but we would wind up laughing not too far into it-none of our fights ever lasted a long time and grudges were never held.

I miss our conversations , babe. Almost as much as I miss the essence of you, and you know how I still miss you heaps...

How lucky we were on that fateful night nine years ago-I found my prince, you found your princess, and we did indeed live happily ever after, even if it was far too short a time.

Tonight, Jupiter is all peachy-pink in the night sky, just to the east of the crescent moon.

I stood and looked at the two of them when I went out to throw the rubbish in the bin and take Boomer for his walk. It's a crisp night, not unlike that one nine years ago.

Life, however , has changed so much that sometimes I feel like its not even mine any more.

It is mine, though, so now what? Hmmmmmmm....

Love you, Dazzy. Always.

Kisses, Wifey.

We have a winner on aisle 6!

2008-11-02T21:13:00.007-06:00

Dear Dazzy,

Tonight, I went food shopping at our old stomping grounds-the local TomThumb store-because they have just finished the renovations and they were giving away food samples and coupons for real food ( like prawns!).

Mikey is here so he came with me before heading over to Bill's tonight, and we took our time and I got what I needed. I sighed thinking of all the times you and I walked up to this particular store, so close to our MelYork house, and how we always goofed around in the aisles, etc.

You wouldn't recognize the place honey! Its spiffy and upscale now, LOL, or at least trying to be...and when I checked out, the lights and buzzer went off, LOL, and the checker told me that I was the winner of an I-Pod shuffle!

You know me-I never win anything. Everything in my life has come from hard work and goal setting; nothing-NOTHING-has ever just dropped in my lap and said, "Here I am, Howyadoin?"
So yeah, I was pretty surprised. You know that I already have a shuffle, but it's from back in the day-when you helped the kids buy it for me ! It's older but it works fine; this new one is sleek and silver and clips on instead of using a ropey thing to hang from.

Since tomorrow is the anniversary of our first meeting via the Internet, I'll just think of this as a pressie from you, babe.

Thanks! :)

Love you Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey

All Hallow's Eve

2008-10-31T22:11:00.004-06:00

Dear Dazzy,

It's Halloween!

One of your favorite days of the entire year.
You would put up a ton of decorations, and dress up to the nines in your costume-always spending too much on the perfect get-up, wig, makeup, etc whatever was needed to make it "real."

They year you left us, I couldn't bear to decorate. The house sat silently, bleak and dark-exactly like my emotions. I hung a black mourning wreath and let it go at that. No candy to pass out, no fog machine in the kettle, no garish black light shining in the faces of would be pirates, Jedi knights, princesses or whathaveyou.

Nothing.

This year it's a bit different. I put up your prized halloween decoration-Homer Simpson-the 12 foot tall blowup monster Homie, LOL. It was the first thing you bought over here for Halloween, and it's so you, honey, that it felt good to put him up again. It almost felt like maybe you would once again be in the bathroom tonight, putting the finishing touches on your oh-so-cool-costume before we went out to a party or hosted one ourselves...

Instead, I walked around with a friend and her third grade daughter-she wore a princess fairy costume-and we traveled all over the place. We went on lots of streets that you and I used to walk on every night, babe-all by the golf course.

As we strolled through the perfect nighttime weather-70 degrees on Halloween is not a shocker here at all, but we have not had good weather like this on a holiday in quite a while-we all saw a shooting star! It was massive and lasted a good "one Mississippi, two..."

I take it you were winking at us,LOL, happy that Mikey was in town, happy that I had put out some decorations, happy that Ash was off at a party with friends.
Happy with our lil family unit-TEAM DAZ-that we are able to go into the holiday mode just a tad and not have a meltdown over the oh-so-large absence of you.

I have so many fun memories of this holiday-when the kids were little, and trick-or-treating was an Olympic event, when I made costumes for the twins that matched and made ghost cookies and decorated fun, not spooky, so the kids would not be scared, lol!

Then there were the years you and I spent together; the year you threw a party for the kids and their friends-host of the year that you are :) The year you dressed up as ME-complete with my PISD badge and a great blond wig, and I was a car salesman that wound up looking freakishly like Tom Cruise-EEEEEEK!

The best was we took that look and went to the high school football homecoming game!OMG I still don't know how you found the chutzpah to pull that on off, babe, but it was a classic.

I loved doing Halloween with you-seeing it through the eyes of someone who didn't get to celebrate it as a kid, well, it was magical. Thanks, honey. You always did rock, ya know?

So it's all over for another year, and next week is our anniversary of sorts-Nov 3, the first day we ever connected via the net-then Derek's b-day on the 9th, and soon after Thanksgiving and then X-mas will arrive and before we know it YIKES! Another new year-2009!

I'll just take it one day at a time, thanks.
Today?
Well, today was OK. Missed you heaps, but could find more fun memories than tears. That's a good thing in my world, honey.
A very good thing.

Happy Halloween, Dazzles.

Love you Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey.

October's Full Moon 2008

2008-10-24T23:55:00.012-05:00

Dear Dazzy,

Love this full moon-just put the pix up into Picasa. Love the shot of Boomer at the end. too! Spooky-eyed twilight zone dog :P

I can't believe that Andrew finally had a visit-type dream of you. Sitting at the foot of his bed, the two of you talking like old times-about life, love, friendship, and everything in between.

We all know that Andy does not have my belief system in how those who have passed on can still reach us mortals at times ( the TV going on/off , the dimes, the orbs...I know they are you, babe) BUT-he told me that his dream was SO REAL, the conversation so normal for the two of you, that when he woke up he searched the house for you , convinced that you were really and honestly and truly there.

I believe you were, honey. I hope he knows it in time as well.

After talking to him on the phone, I went to bed-only to be awakened by YOUR giant TV , the volume BLASTING at 25(!!!!!) and on channel 1009.
1009 is new to our lineup; the Setanta Sport Channel...which carries AFL footy. We used to have it when we had the Dish network, but we went to Fios and they didn't; carry it. You watched Footy on the computer that last year you were with us, but its better on your gargantuan TV.

The channel isn't showing anything AFL until November again( just missed the GF, damn!)and I have the Tivo set up to tape a few highlight games.

It woke me at 4 AM. ( YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAWN)

L O U D doesn't begin to cover it!

I was so asleep I didn't have time to freak out, I didn't pick up the "weapon" I keep
under the bed or anything like that-I just stumbled into the lounge room and turned off the surround sound and the TV and the cable box. I believe it was you at Andy's, honey; LOL, you didn't have to convince ME!

An insipid infomercial was on, and it was hawking oldie tunes- "Stand By Me" was on.
The lyrics were so spot on, I had to copy them here so I don't forget them:

Stand By Me

When the night has come
And the land is dark
And the moon is the only light we'll see
No I won't be afraid, no I won't be afraid
Just as long as you stand, stand by me

And darlin', darlin', stand by me,
oh now now stand by me
Stand by me, stand by me

If the sky that we look upon
Should tumble and fall
nd the mountains should crumble to the sea
I won't cry, I won't cry,
no I won't shed a tear
Just as long as you stand, stand by me
And darlin', darlin',
stand by me, oh stand by me
Stand by me, stand by me, stand by me-e, yeah

Whenever you're in trouble won't you stand by me, oh now now stand by me
Oh stand by me, stand by me, stand by me

Darlin', darlin', stand by me-e, stand by me
Oh stand by me, stand by me, stand by me

I know you will always stand by me, babe. I knew that when we said I love you for the first time, when you took the kids under your wings as your own-true blue, sweets. I will also stand by you, honey, and keep you memory for those who love you. Love the song, babe, love the reference to the moon and stars-such an inside remark, eh?

Love you Dazzy. Always.

Kisses, Wifey.

18 and counting...

2008-10-20T19:31:00.003-05:00

Dear Dazzy,

Today, October 20, 2008, marks the 18th month of your passing.

I know every time I/we mark another milestone in my journey of grief, Iwrite something completely moronic, like, " It doesn't feel like______ ( fill in the blank with a number)years/months/day/minutes/seconds have gone by..." and yet at the same time it feels like an eternity since I have felt your lips on mine, your hand brushing away my hair from my neck, or any other myriad of nuances that told me wordlessly how much you cared about me.

Eighteen months!

The number 18 has some intereting qualities.
The Hebrew word for "life" is חי (chai), which has a numerical value of 18.

In Chinese tradition, the number 18, normally (shí bā), can also be read as (yāo bā), which sounds like (yào fā), meaning that one is going to prosper.

So 18 , to me, should be kind of an OK number to deal with. That works for me :)

I was a mess around your birthday last month, babe, you know that.

Today, however, I am calm, relaxed, almost content.
I took the day off from work-smart move-and I put up your beloved Homer Simpson inflatable, in time for Halloween at the end of the month.

I decorated the shrubs out front with neon spider lights, and the mantle over the fireplace has white pumpkins and my black twigs/etc that I used to always put up, but not last year.

Last year I just couldn't do it. This year is different, which is a good thing.

Today, I decided to see how that would feel, and while it is twinged with a bit of sadness, I feel like we have turned yet another corner-- I mean the kids and I--with the placement of these silly garish lights and plastic cartoon character blow up doll :P

I was able to look through our pix today; I was able to think of all the fun we had during the Halloweens we did get to celebrate together-and it was OK. It was enough.

For today.

Mostly, the day was beautiful because the sun was shining, the temperature was perfect, and I did things that I wanted to do- hung wash outside in the sun, thought about the book I just finished ("Twilight;" thanks DeeDee!)and how the movie version will be as compared to the written words that are all typed into paragraphs and pages and chapters and finally a novel. Like I said before, I decorated for fall, enjoyed our photos as I had lunch outside and, well, I guess I really just embraced the day.

I was acutely aware of the ticking clock, however-"Oh, it's 11 AM, you were still here with us 18 months ago, I just left you a voice mail at work..." and so on, so I busied myself with some yard work and then took my watch off and went to the grocery store. I parked out front when I came home-by habit, not on purpose-to bring the groceries in and that's when I saw it was 6 pm.

By 6 PM , that fateful day in April, I was well and truly numb. I don't remember who called everyone, yet I know I lied to the kids on the phone, thinking that they wouldn't get into a wreck as they drove home from college if I didn't give them all the details just yet.

I remember being wired in that weird blood-goes-cold kind of way, feeling as ethereal as you must have felt, babe, wanting to know: HOW THE F**K DO WE FIX THIS MESS ?

Of course this is something that will never be fixed.
I can never be fixed to be as good as new, either. I know that now. I am forever changed.

I can, however, be open to what's going to be next in my life. I think?
I mean if it's more crap, then I'll pass, right?

I would like something positive to breeze my way-and the kids' way, too-pretty soon.

We all need it.

I did have lots of funny little reminders of you throughout the day, babe. Made me smile.

Mikey took some pix yesterday of my now "feral" garden, LOL; it's got tomato plants as tall as I am, and before I take them down in a few weeks, I wanted a record of their size-I felt like Don Corleone in The Godfather, running through that maze of a garden...:P

Anyway, in one pix there is an orb-plain as day.
Since we took these pix at night, that was pretty cool, honey. (See above for the pix)

I also had a stateside friend send me a copy of the AFL GF-complete with Aussie commercials etc . I will watch it in its entirety tomorrow. I mean, I know how it ends, LOL, but I want to see the halftime people and all that jazz. A slice of Aussieness, some "G'days: and :Mate!" and "what a maaaaaaaaaaark!" things like that that I well and truly miss.

One day soon I will be able to watch the GF LIVE again at the MCG! WooHoo!

As I am typing here, I have Dancing with the Stars on inside on your jumbotron of a TV.
It's being TIVO'd, so I can watch it later with no commercials; lo and behold what song do I hear? Funkytown by LIPPS INC!

Wow, what a blast from our past, huh babe? I remember when you sent me this three page(!) questionnaire and it had all the "What's your fave color/food/whatnot" kind of Q's, and you had put this in the slot of fave new song on the radio. I like it as well, and we liked the lyrics, too.

It was pretty apropos when it came to you moving to the US, too, Dazzy, as the kids and I were part of that "...Gotta move to a town that's right for me....gotta move on!"

So that made me smile, for I can see you dancing to this silly song in our house here in TX, doing you lil white boy with rhythm dance in the bathroom as this came on the radio one spring day, when we had first moved in. I always thought I would get to dance around the house with you, honey, until we were older than dirt and greyer than the old grey mare, :P

Sadly, that was not to be. You know I will always always always carry you in my heart; your memories are mine and that line between Sue and Daz blurred so long ago that I will always be Suedaz when I sign into things on the 'net.

I will always be a whole person made up of part me, part you, babe. Forever!

Love you, Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey.

Saturday Stillness

2008-10-11T23:32:00.009-05:00

Dear Dazzy,

In the nearly 18(!) months since you left this earth, I have busied myself at nearly every opportunity-finishing the kitchen renos, working, traveling, taking care of the dogs/kids/house, adopting Boomie(!!), putting in a full-on garden, etc etc etc-but finally today, the first day in a very long time, my brain is still. Amazing, isn't it? I thought so too.

Oh I did the usual running around today-supermarket, yakking on the phone, home repair( or should I say Boomner repair? Yesterday it was the lamp in the lounge room-Boomie wanted to get to the varmint that was outside of the glass; that damn lamp was just in his way...)computer fun, all the ho-hum mundane chores and routines that feel good now in their familiarity.

My movements today were slower than my normal reckless( at times) pace and were also very deliberate; spending heaps of time outside in the yard always makes me happy-wow, is that a relative term in my vocabulary now-and I loved how I could almost feel the blue of the sky as it enveloped the earth.
It was both an ordinary yet magical day.

Mikey's in town so we went to the Tom Thumb-we walked-and laughed because we bought way too many groceries to walk home with comfortably, LOL. We did manage, however, and it was great to exercise, talk , and get a chore done all at the same time.

We shared the grass cutting as well-with my funky old-time reel mower.
That thing is pretty amazing, and I especially love the workout. We cleaned up that garden/yard a bit and then I threw chicken and salsa in the crockpot with a zillion veggies and he and I shared that for dinner.

I could just hear your voice saying, "Smells good honey!" :)

We would have eaten outside, but Mikey and I chose to watch the baseball playoff game instead. It's still going on as I type at midnight-12 innings, all tied-jeeze! Close games are always fun. Go Tampa Bay!

However, stillness is not what I expected today.

In fact, I never expect it anymore.
I know I need heaps of it, but I push it away-with to-do lists and chores and organizing and filing and writing-afraid that my grief will settle into the very cells that make up the marrow of my bones should I stay still long enough for it to really find me.

Today I have made peace with Sir Grief just a tiny bit more.
(And yes, I believe grief would be male-it could never be female, there is too much suffering involved) I know, sweets, that you will always be my first and last thoughts in my waking hours. That's a given.

I am not going to fight that battle anymore, for to quote one of our fave Star Trek movie lines, "Resistance is futile." (pronounced prop-ly, as Few-Tile)

Stillness itself is a Zen koan; an unanswerable riddle that makes one think. It's not the kind of thinking of an over-scheduled mind crammed to the brim with the flotsam and jetsam of everyday life, but rather that delicate introspection that comes when one looks deeply into the soul's mirror.

You were my mirror for such a long time, babe, that I forgot how to gaze into one alone. I believe I did that today, however; looking into the blue sky and the clouds beyond and later, looking up at the stars tonight-and as I see the universe, I see myself. Expanding and contracting at the same time; bursts of energy and places of ghastly black hole death; orchestrated atoms dancing to the tune of life itself.

Is this like the quiet that comes before a storm? Or is this more the calming of the water of grief, the settling in of the life that is now mine? Hmmm...

"Speaking comes by nature. Silence by wisdom."
Not sure who said that, but I remember it because it always made sense to me.

Maybe I am FINALLY gaining some kind of concrete knowledge about our situation.
I know that if tears are the IQ of grief, then I am Einstein's illegitimate twin :P

Watching John Edward always does me good. It makes me think of you as still approachable. Right or wrong, it helps. That's all that matters, right honey?

Stillness. I hope to find more of it everyday.
I wish it for all of us whom you left behind on your journey through forever, for I believe it is the beginning of peace in our hearts.

Love you Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey

Birthday Slideshow

2008-10-05T23:00:00.003-05:00

Dear Dazzy,
You know I had this slide show ready to go the other day-and frigging blogger GRRRR sometimes it just doesn't work with other apps!

I don't like Flikr, honestly, its not a great site.
It's no rock-you that's for sure!

So here they are-no music this time or fun stuff; I will save that for next slide show; I have heaps of photos to scan and etc. Will need some time off for that!

Kids were here this weekend and I had a reading last night(!) that was pretty cool; I always feel calmed after them for whatever reasons.

After the week of sadness that preceded your birthday on the 28th, I have come to a nicer place-got heaps done this weekend, kids helped, stayed close to home but still enjoyed our time-and I feel better for it all.

Its pumpkin time here, lol, and people up and down the street are starting to decorate- it's sometimes tortuous and sometimes brings a smile. I know you would have benn tweaking all that stuff at our house here in TX this weekend-but I will be putting out just a few things this year. In honor of you, and me and the house we loved to call our 2nd home,:P I bought spider lights and new webby neon string. You're gonna love it, sweets!

More later. Tonight, I am happy to have great kids, wonderful friends (on both sides of the big pond) and family who support me, fabby weather, and memories of you and me and "This Amazing Life," that will live in my heart til I see you again.

Love you, Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey.

TV

2008-09-29T19:07:00.003-05:00

Dear Dazzy,

Yes, I wanted a sign. Yes, I was hoping for something yesterday...anything really.

Just something from you that would mean, "Hi, I am OK , honey, and life will get better for you soon, Susie Q..."

So when I got up this morning and found the TV ON ( but no sound,hmmmm), tuned to

"A Wedding Story" on TLC-my first thought was how did I manage to leave the TV ON with the sound off -not muted, off on the surround-sound thingy?

Then it dawned on me-I didn't.

The light from that behemoth 60" TV being on would have kept me awake.

I mean, that thing's got it's own zip code, it's so big. :P

It was your 40th birthday pressie-and I remember renting the truck from Lowes to get it home from the Sam's Club warehouse store. As soon as we were loading it , it started to POUR .

It was all bubble wrapped, so it was OK, but we were all soaked by the time we were back home.

At first, I hated the hugeness of it, but I knew you loved having life-sized footy players on the screen-both gridiron NFL and Aussie Rules- so I tried to keep the griping to a minimum.

The night you left us, the kids, Ranger and I were huddled on the couch, numb, crying, just trying to settle down a bit, when the TV shut itself off.

And on.

And off once more...and when it came on again, it was on a Wachovia commercial on a different channel!

Funny how that was the place you worked for, eh babe?

Weird. Or not?

It's never scary, it just amazes me when these kind of things happen.

It always involves your TV, your phone, your stuff.

Always electrical. Well, except for the dimes, anyway.

Always around an anniversary of sorts...

Thanks for that contact yesterday, honey. I really needed it.

Love you, Dazzy. Always.

Kisses, Wifey

Daz Birthday #44

2008-09-28T01:43:00.003-05:00

Dear Dazzy,

Today-September 28th-is/was/will always (to me, anyway) be your birthday. You would be turning 44. I would be razzing you about your hair treatments, LOL, and your age-hurtling toward 50, :P as we used to say.

You would say, "Doesn't matter, Princess-I'll always be younger and PRETTIER than you!" and we would collapse with fits of laughing, red faced and all by the time we were done.

I don't know if anyone in your life except for your dearest of friends knew the way we gave each other crap like that and how we both always laughed because we always, always, always knew that it was just snarky fun-not intended to snidely knock the other off their ego or anything like that.

To others it may have smacked of cynicism, but we knew better. We really loved one another, and because we did, it gave us a freedom in our lives that many people never get to experience.

Thanks for that babe.

Thank you for the million other things you did for me and the kids in the name of love over the years, Dazzy. We were so lucky to have one another.

I wish I could write "Happy" next to "Birthday" for you on a card this year, but of course I can't. It is not happy anywhere today-not for our friends, not for me, not for the kids-not for anyone who knew you and loved you or had been loved by you.

Rangie still sleeps under your desk.

Boomer...well, Boomie channels your inner larrikin spirit, that's for sure!

Mikey notices funny things on TV or the internet and says, "I know Daz would have liked this-"

Smash ponders if you knew how much she thought of you, knowing how you took care of me-and how happy you made me.

And I still sleep in an empty bed, wondering why the only man I ever truly loved isn't here next to me anymore.

On your birthday, I will light a candle for you, to remind us of your glowing spirit.

We'll have a toast, and I'll say out loud how grateful I am that you are-and always will be- the love of my life, the man of my dreams, and the joy in my heart.

We will laugh a bit and cry a bit more, but most of all- even through our sadness-we will remember you.

Forever.

Love you Dazzy. Always.

Birthday Kisses, Wifey.

2008-09-24T17:33:00.006-05:00

Dear Dazzy,

Updating your/my blog is not a chore, but you would think it is from the way I sometimes let it go here. I talk to you all the time in my head-well not all the time, but you know how we used to talk so easily and freely about anything and everything-and I find myself missing that level of communication that we had over and over again, along with the myriad of other things I miss about you ever single second that my eyes are not shut from sleep.

From Shakespeare's Hamlet:"To sleep, perchance to dream-ay, there's the rub."

Indeed.

Even though Hamlet was really talking about the sleep of death, I would pay for a regular, eight-hour, good night's sleep sometime soon. My natural body clock just does not jive with fall.

Until DST ends, I will be at odds with morning.

I have been exercising, taking the fish oil, the vitamins, yada yada yada , and still I don't fall into anything that feels like deep sleep until somewhere near or past midnight.

Then my phone alarm jingles-jangles-jingles at 6:30, and the fun begins.

While I don't have any small kids, I DO have an aging dog-"Ranger, the Wonder Dog"- who needs to be carried outside( arthritis means he takes longer to get going in the morning that I do, :P)

The young whipper snapper, Boomer, the "I wonder WHY" dog, lol, is mopey in the early morning before the sun comes up as well. He can be encouraged to go outside with the questions "squirrels?" and " birdies?" They both get fed, and I take care of moi, and I am usually on time for work.

Without a good nights sleep, though, I am forgetful.

Afternoon duty, morning meetings, collecting papers and returning those graded- aarrruuuugh.

I have had paperwork for the Aussie lawyers for a week now in my drawer at school( where it still sits) and maybe tomorrow I will remember to post the damn thing, :P

If not. well, then not. So be it.

Nothing much matters anymore that doesn't have to do with our children.

I throw myself into the work I do with my students, but on a personal level, I have no life.

Oh yeah, I go to moves and dinner with friends, but I might as well live in a Zen monastery.

I do the same thing over and over, like Bill Murray in Groundhog Day, with no one to connect with heart/soul wise, and no one else with whom I would WANT to do that, anyway.

You are it, babe. Always.

I used to think that once I was a year away from your death I would be somehow better.

What a fool I was. Better is never going to be used in this equation. Ever.

I know I am in that funk that comes over me before an anniversary of sorts-and your birthday, on Sunday, is what's triggering this mess. I know it is. Last year I had a heap of Aussies here to celebrate(fun in a weird kinda way , ya know babe?) but this year I just want to be by myself, or with the kids.

I will buy you another card-like I did last year-and write my thoughts in it and put in into the memory box that sits in your closet. We will donate again to the Heart Association.

I will cry and curse god, or whatever is out there holding all those random molecules together, sad to the core of my being that you are gone-gone-forever from our lives.

I know that the day will come and go, and then I will have that uptick and I'll be grand until Halloween, and then Thanksgiving , and all the other nonsense that comes during the crappy weather and shortened days of winter. The roller coaster called grief is a ride no one ever gets off, like a twilight zone episode complete with weird music and shadowy special effects.

Tonight I will lose myself in TV and dog walking and phone calls to friends and kids-all good things, really-and I will lie down at 11:00 pm and attempt to, once again, fall asleep like normal people do.

Maybe tonight I will be lucky.

Maybe I will even dream. Wouldn't that would be grand? Hamlet sure thought so...:)

More importantly, I'd like a normal life once again. Sigh.

Maybe one day, eh babe?

Love you Dazzy. Always.

Kisses, Wifey.

************************************************************************************

PS- totally OT-if I have to listen to Sarah McLaclan's "In the Arms of the Angels" ONE MORE TIME in a friggin' grocery store, outlet kiosk, or on T.V., I am going to personally strangle the play list manager that scheduled it. I mean c'mon, surely there is another tearjerker of a song that they could be playing? Jeeze....

The Ballad of Boomer and the Coyote

2008-09-17T23:39:00.004-05:00

Once upon a time

In in little town in TX

there lived an elegant yet silly dog

whose name was Boomer

Just like the 'roos he was named for

Boomer would bound over the prairie

Every night on his two mile walkie

with his Mum

and adopted doggie brother, Ranger

Tonight-like every night

as Mummy said," SIT" ( and he did)

and "STAY" ( and he did)

he at least waited until his leash was unclasped

before he bounded off

into the bush surrounding the local golf course...

to chase a COYOTE!

Mummy had never seen one

up close and personal

in all her years in Texas

so naturally she was CONCERNED

Boomer would not listen to her

as she said his name-VERY LOUDLY-over and over and over again

while his adopted brother, Ranger, was in his doggie stroller

yawning the entire time that Mummy was calling for Boomie-

Rangie was surely thinking, "Finally! I may be rid of that doofus..."

Boomer didn't know what the big deal was

he just wanted to play with the beige colored, exotic looking, long-legged dog with the cool name-funny how everyone knew it-

COYOTE! COYOTE! COYOTE!

Mums took their kids inside their yards

while Boomie chased his new friend

and they rustled through the leaves and the brush

and when they had had enough of that

Boomer ran as fast as a jackalope out of the woods

and soon he sat next to Mummy again, really still (like she taught him)

so she could clip his leash back on

but Boomer wondered why

they had to walk SO FAST

all the way home ( especially when Mummy usually says, "SLOW DOWN BOOMIE")

because he thought he had already gotten enough exercise

playing with his new friend,

COYOTE! COYOTE! COYOTE!

The end-for now...

2008-09-09T20:21:00.006-05:00

Dear Dazzy,

Just a quick post tonight-wishing, always, that you were here.

Had someone say to me today, "You seem better this year, compared to last..."

Ya THINK?

What a thing to say. Some people just don't get it.

Last year when school resumed it had been only four months since you had passed away.

Four months! Jeeze, what was I thinking?

I was always on the verge of tears and couldn't talk about you to anyone without breaking down. Lunch was a chore, the hallways were mine fields-the pity type of eye contact with people was something I really tried to avoid-and I felt disconnected to life in every way imaginable.

Looking back, I should have put in for disability and stayed home the entire year. Every single day I cried as soon as I hit the parking lot, ducking into the Sebring ASAP, and driving home with only NPR on the radio-music was still verboten to me; every nerve raw.

This school year I am in a much better emotional place.

I am excited to teach again, and I want my students to do well-and I will show them every day how to accomplish that.

But I want to tell people that I am not better.

This is not an illness that one recovers from.

I am not over you, or past you, or accepting of your death.

I just put it away better, tucking my emotions more deeply into the recesses of my

forever-broken heart. In that way, I can stand the sunlight , and can hope that maybe the word happiness can find its way to my soul once again.

I doubt it, but then again, stranger things have happened in my life before...

Oh, BTW, thanks for the change, babe- while I was stressing about $$$ and whatnot as I was paying for my groceries at the Tom Thumb last night, there on the counter in front of me were a shiny new dime and TWO pennies!

I thought wow, another dime from you, ; surely the pennies were from my mum-you both must have heard me griping about the cost of living, LOL

That makes 21 dimes over 17 months. They make me smile when I find them now.

Like I said, just a quick post tonight-its raining out, I had soup and fresh bread for dinner, Boomer went to doggie-care today and both kids called me( yeah OK so Mikey needed a baby pix for Italian class, but still, LOL, he does call just to say HI at times ).

I have done the dishes, taken out the trash, touched up my roots ( shhhh don't tell Chuck! :P) and cleaned one bathroom. Tea is up next with a look at anything TIVO caught for my perusal.

Life may not be the way I wanted it to be-but just for tonight, it's O.K.

I can sense hope flitting about, like a skittish dragonfly darting up and down, not quite sure just where to land .

But land she will, and soon. Right, honey?

Love you Dazzy. Always.

Kisses, Wifey

Autumn

2008-09-07T09:48:00.003-05:00

Dear Dazzy,

Fall.
Autumn.
However you name it, it means change.

I used to see the approach of winter and think of death-the death of the summer, of my free time, of the lush and green surrounds of the earth as she embraces life so fully and beautifully-but then, one autumn night nine years ago, I logged into an IM service (ICQ) and found the man of my dreams. That was some good change, alright!

September.
Kath USA's b-day, your B-day, the anniversary of the September 11 attacks and the anniversary of Michael Christopher's passing as well. Leaves turning rainbow colors.
Cooler temperatures. Winter flowers and veggies letting out a sigh of relief now that the heat of August has left.

Good and bad.
Yin and yang.
The natural order of the universe, all jam-packed into a single month.

By September of last year, I could not imagine living life without you anymore.
More days than I will admit to, quite frankly, I wanted to be with you.

This year is vastly different-I was actually happy to see the Halloween decor in all the stores way too early. If you were still here I know you would be beside yourself with decorating ideas for the MelYork exterior.

In your honor, babe, I bought a box of neon colored spider lights for Halloween!
They are fugly as all get out, but I know how you would have gone crazy for them.
I bought one box; you would have probably gone for six or seven, and made the front door like the movie set from Arachnids, LOL

I LOVED that about you-how over the top you were in most of life's situations.
I miss that enthusiasm for celebrating any and all of life's moments-miss it heaps.

But Halloween's next month. Still have to get through September...

Your 44th birthday comes on the 28th.
This year it's on a Sunday, so I don't have to take off from school.
Last year we named a star, donated to the heart association and arbor day foundation, and had all the DFW Aussies over for a "Matesfest," where we toasted the man who always made everyone smile.

It was awesome and sad at the same time, but I believe awesome won out.

This year I am still working out what I want to do-I think I want it to be more private; not sure why, but that's how I feel. Last year I also had the medium reading; not sure if I want to do that again or not.

At the time it helped tremendously; this year, what else could they add?

You are gone.
Still.
Always.
Forever.

You know I would sell my soul to the devil and his nasty sister if I could have you back where you belong-with me, with the kids, in OUR home-but that will never be.
I look, then, for reasons to make life worth living-like helping the kids, going out with dear friends, even snuggling with the doggies can bring me some measure of happiness, albeit very small compared to the kind of happiness that you brought me.

It's more bearable now-most days. Every once in a while I have that blue funk that descends upon me, and I wonder how anyone bears the loss of someone that they truly love.

Thankfully, it passes more quickly than it used to, so that's a step in the right direction, eh babe?
This past week I bought a snazzy new doormat-all brightly colored fall leaves; purple, red, orange, yellow-all your faves in there, honey.

It's vibrantly colored and really puts a different spin on autumn for me.
It's almost a happy little thing, if I wanted to wax poetic, anthropomorphising a coir doormat.

If it could, I know it would ask the same question I ask my students every fall:

"Why do leaves change color at this time of year?"

Its fun to watch their brains thinking. Most get close to the facts: sunlight lessens, earth tilts, weather gets colder, etc, but the real reason is the reduction of chlorophyll.

Chlorophyll is what makes leaves green.

In summer , it is made in such abundance that it actually covers up the true colors of the leaves. Those purples, reds, oranges or any mosaic combination of such are always present in the leaf except in spring and summer-when the sunlight and the temperature and all the other mitigating factors coincide to make chlorophyll slipcovers for the newly forming leaves.

If I am going towards the autumn of my life, with the chlorophyll receding, exposing my true colors after all I have been through, I wonder-will they be vibrant and richly hued, or just an icky mush of that murky brown that no one can live with?

Hmmm... with you in my life, Dazzles, I always knew the answer. Now I am not as sure.

Being able to notice the colors in the first place made me smile just a bit, and to think that I am may be getting closer to the end of this horrible tunnel of mourning and away from the beginning-that is nothing but good.

"Autumn is a second spring when every leaf is a flower."- Albert Camus

Here's a wish for my second spring.

500 Days

2008-09-01T00:12:00.002-05:00

Dear Dazzy,

Today, August 31, 2008, marks the 500th day that I have lived my life without the warmth of your body, the kiss of your lips, without YOU-here in the flesh-without that love for me, the kids,the dogs, your friends, co-workers and family that raidated from your very soul.

Five hundred mornings of waking up-alone; without hearing, "G'day Princess, cuppatea luv?"

Five hundred arvos of driving home from work or friend's places, watching until the clock ticks past 6:30, and with it that sad realization that no matter how I bargain with the universe itself, you will not be walking through our garage door, removing your tie with one hand as you sweep me into you with the other and kiss me hello...

Five hundred nights of going to bed without you. Without you!

Five Hundred times a day I think Why and Whatfor and How come. I haven't come up with a good answer yet. I know I never will.

All I can say today is it-my life- goes on. Thats' a good thing.

By the time I post this it will be Sept 1st, and I will be into the next block of five hundred days of counting how far away from me you are.

Or, should I count by how much closer I now am to you?

Five hundred-and one-days closer to seeing your face once again. Wow.

I long for the day when I no longer need to count.

Love you Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey.

Life imitating art?

2008-08-25T20:47:00.004-05:00

Dear Dazzy,

I am laughing out loud at this pix you drew of me on the whiteboard from my first classroom-#815-back in 2006. Mr Parker had come to visit, and we took this pix because HE wanted a copy of one of your goofy lil drawings of me-aren't I glad I took it now?

It was to warn the kids NOT to touch the fan/light switch, LOL

I think they got the hint!

Last year, they let me move rooms, and while it wasn't my original idea, I embraced it. I couldn't imagine walking in there every day, knowing how you helped me set it up; seeing you at the board drawing a kid or two during Career Day; or putting the kid books with your illustrations in them on my bookshelf-it was heartbreaking enough to come home to our house every night, let alone repeat that awful emptiness within the confines of work as well.

So now room #715 feels right; after a whole year in the meat locker-it's waaaaaaaaaaay too cold in there LOL-I know what works where and I have adjusted accordingly. I feel comfy in it, and I know I will have a good year here. I didn't cry when I came in this morning-even without flowers on my desk from you.
I didn't cry as soon as I got in the car after school-not like last year at all. There's progress, eh babe?

I was even amazingly fine when I came in the house after school.
Boomie and Rangie were champs today ( phew!) and nothing was wrecked, pooped in or vomited on. :P

It's those lil things that make me happy some days...

But tonight when Boomer and I went for our usual walkies-around 9 PM-it's dark by then and if I need to cry a bit I can, without people thinking I am a nutcase-there they were.

As Boomster and I turned the corner, the couple from way down the street were walking, water bottles in hand, same black shorts on, the both of them engaged in the animated chatter of two people who like each other, and I had a huge surge of heartache.

For me, for you, for us as a couple, for the twins without their only real Dad...:(

Like the kids at school say, it's not FAIR!

I can recognize that I am not as sad as I was this time last year-but I also know now that I will never be "cured" of my grief. I am not sure what's worse-knowing, at 16 months after your death that I will always have this unfillable black hole in my heart, or being only a few months away from your passing and thinking that, "...next year I'll be so much better..."

It's a question I wish on no one-no one. I won't dwell on it, though, and by tomorrow morning I will be past it. I know pretty much how this goes now.
It just sucks.

So, Dazzles, when I am teaching this year, I will again be thinking of you every time I see a kid touch the fan/light pull. I will remember the heady feeling of walking into my first classroom-knowing the challenge that it was bringing to me, but also knowing that you would be my biggest cheerleader no matter what happened in room 815.

I like to think that in some ways you still are cheering for me from the sidelines. I just wish- as I probably always will-that you were cheering for me here in the flesh, and not from the other side of life's veil. Here's to wishing.

Love you Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey.

P.S.

On a side note, Obama picked Biden as his running mate-sad that it's not Hills, but hey-and in reading about Biden's past, I found out he was widowed at the age of 30-his wife and daughter killed in a car wreck; his two sons hospitalized with severe injuries. He was a single parent for a while, raised his boys, held a job in government, grieved and mourned and went forward. I applaud him.

I would have voted for him just because he was part of the DEMS ticket-but now that I know he is one of "us," that secret society of people in different stages of mourning, trying to carry on with our shell of a life-well I KNOW he would be a great V.P; he has already, as we say, been bitten by bigger dogs-and nothing much should rifle him. We posses that fearlessness that some never can grasp.

Joe Biden is my new homeboy :)

Pale Blue Dot

2008-08-17T12:44:00.006-05:00

Dear Dazzy,

Tomorrow is the first day of my new school year-wow.
I have done heaps of stuff this summer-gone to our home in Oz, visited with people who truly love you and have some leftover hugs for me; planted a garden, visited with Kath both in Austin and here, cleaned out and organized all the nooks and crannies of the house, the garage, my life-wow.

I feel like Michael Phelps in the last swim, LOL

Go Team Daz!

I have had a good week or so after my meltdown over the musical-I did the DMA with friends on Friday night and we went to an Irish Pub afterareds; we took the train in and on the way home it was packed-and not one guy offered any of the three of us women his seat.

I noticed it b/c I know you would have given YOUR seat to any female around-it's the way you were built. Generous and kind ( at times to a fault!), you very polite as well.

I can hear your voice in my head saying, "C'mon mate, let these ladies have a seat! Weren't you taught better than that? " LOL

But sadly you were not there to intervene on our behalf. I had a good time-really had some fun-and I was even OK in the museum. I stood next to your fave Monet in the permanent exhibition-the one I have a pix of with you standing next to it-and while I was full of memories, I didn't cry.

Go figure.

I couldn't get past myself when it came to Jersey Boys, but I was OK at the DMA.

So today I have some gardening to do and the a manicure and massage for later on. I am happy with my progress with regard to my "list o things to do" that I had for this summer, and I will be starting a new list tonight-the continuation of the "list o things to do" but broken into more manageable chunks of time for my limited after school time.

Miss you more than words, Dazzy. I bought two new dresses for school and didn't have my fashionista hubby here to give the thumbs up :(
I bet you'd like em if you could see em :P

I look forward to the challenge of a new school year. I am happy in my job-you know how I love it-and it will be better this year than last; I have not moved classrooms ( had to move last year too many memories in my old place) and so I don't have a huge set up to do-I will be ready for the kiddoes next Monday without too much of a sweat.

I haven't decided what pix I want to take with me from this year-surly kids and dogs and a few Mikey took in Italy and I took in Oz-and always the one of us, wrapped in the Aussie flag, with the SHB in the background.

And when it gets a bit much I just try to think that I will see you again in the future-I have to believe that-and that anything I think is monumental is , well, just human ramblings and whatnot.

Here is my fave Carl Sagan piece that helps me realize that we are part of something so much bigger than insignificant things like school schedules and house repairs all the way up to the biggies like chronic illness and death. It's called Pale Blue Dot, and it rocks.

PS- thanks for the two dimes yesterday-I had the dryer out, Mikey helped, doing that yearly maintinence things on it-vacuuming the exit hose, the lint trap, etc etc .

Not fun stuff but part of the ongoing house thing, which included fixing the screen door again ( Boomer sometimes doesnt WAIT until we slid open the screen, LOL).

When we moved the dryer we were talking about you-about the Olympics and watching with you and how hard it was barracking for BOTH the Aussie and the US swimmers, lol-and there on the floor under the dryer were two dimes, side by side...

like a lil HI from your side fo the universe to us.
I added it to that 21st tankard that sits in my closet-and of course now I have 21 dimes that I have found in various weird places or after interesting times in my journey of grief.

It would probably be 25 or 26 had I paid attentiosn right away; I had no idea about the dimes until you passed away, sweets. It's not enough , but it's all I get, so I'll take it eh?

Love you Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey

Freefalling

2008-08-13T22:16:00.003-05:00

Dear Dazzy,

I know, I know, I haven't written in here for a bit-that's both a good and a bad thing.

Good thing-means I am having a bit more of a life

( movies with friends, dinner out with kids that are home for two more weeks, great weather and whatnot) the bad thing-I am at times hurting in different kinds of ways, and some days I just can't even put it into words.

I heard Tom Petty on the radio though-"Freefallin'"-and I thought, that's it- EXACTLY.
That's how I feel-like I am freefalling.

Pulled by the gravity of the soul, to an impact point the is hurtling towards me-
I am accelerating without a parachute to be found and hoping for a friggin' miracle.

On amusement rides, the designers build an exit track for those crazy roller coasters/rides. That's what I need now-an exit track!

This week I fell apart over going to see "Jersey Boys" at Fair Park Summer Musicals.

Kids got me the tix for my b-day back in May; my tears started when the sky turned cloudy and we had a summer downpour-I mean honestly, when's the LAST time it rained here?
Oh yeah, about three months ago...so it had to rain the night that we had tix for. Right.

Exactly like the night you and I went to see Phantom, all those years ago in 2000. It was just like then-the rain, the heat, everything; the very molecules of air were matched atom by atom from the night you and I went to our first musical together.

I remember getting ready -"Don't Call Me Baby" was a popular techno-driven disco-y dance tune that was popular then, and we had just bought the CD when we were out shopping, so we popped it on and jockeyed for position in front of the bathroom mirror in my cute lil apartment. We each had a glass of champers and laughed and carried on as we got ready.

It was the first time I got to see you in your Tux!
I wore a dress that I had made just for this event-a sleeveless sheath, very chic in black-and my hair was short and more red than blond.

We made a striking pair and while we got a bit wet and were a tad late we had quite the evening. We had cocktails and nibbles at intermission, and since it was also your Birthday, the kids put out a cake I had conveniently made the day before and set up the table with Power Puff girls party things-just to be silly.

You loved it.

We loved you.

So here I am all these years later, heading out into the rain to go to Fair Park to see a musical-and it was like a Twilight Zone Episode. I cried and felt a heavy wave of sadness that I have not experienced since I returned from our home in Oz. I was with Ashley, our dear Smashers, LOL and she was amazing the whole night. We are so lucky to have her and Mikey-we really, really are. Where would I be in this mess without them?

My grief blindsided me though and I had a very hard time with it.

I tried to control it but grief kinda won this time. All those memories flooded my mind the way the streets were filling up with that heavy rain-moving much too swiftly and filling up all available spaces. We came home early. It was awful.

I didn't sleep well later that night, either, and the entire next day sapped me of any energy or will to do anything constructive. After sixteen months, I thought this kind of thing would have be over.

But I know now that grief can be sneaky.

It's just like freefalling - it lulls you into that "Hey, this is not so bad "

feeling, and then BAM!

you are hitting the ground with too much force and there is no exit track in sight.

Amazingly enough, babe, there are "survival methods" that one is encouraged to read about before doing any kind of free-falling, like free-base jumping, falling by accident, or parachuting.

Supposedly, more people survive when they hit the ground sideways-letting their entire body take the brunt of the fall, rather than breaking all their bones going feet first, or sustaining even worse injuries going head first.

Sideways-not a bad idea. Will have to remember that for next time.

Love you Dazzy-Always.

Kisses, Wifey.

Whys and Whatfors

2008-08-06T23:29:00.014-05:00

Just a Dazzy Pic w/his "Squerrrrrrrel" cap!

Dear Dazzy,

Only eleven days separate me from my new teaching year-and while I am excited at the prospect of getting back in my classroom again, I am not happy about seeing your birthday roll around again next month, followed by the fall, and before we know it the roller coaster time warp wave that is Halloween-Thanksgiving-Chrissy-NYE and OMG it will be 2009 before I can finish exhaling...

But for now, I can still get up whenever I feel like it, I can still eat when I am hungry instead of by some artificial time on a clock and I can walk the pooches and pet them and talk to them when the mood strikes. I can visit with M and A and go out to eat and to a movie and talk on the phone and hang out with my friends.

What I wish-what I always, always wish-is that I was still maing dinner by 6, putting it on the big serving platter so we could eat outside as soon as you got home, and then on to the pool at the old apartment ( shhhh they never changed their gate code LOL) and back to our house for something silly on the TIVO or a game of chess or whatever before bed and our nightly talks.

I loved our talks in the dark-punctuated by burps, LOL, or worse;
Rangie trying to get "comfy" and all the time licking someones feet/arm/etc (ewwwww, why do dogs DO that ?);
sighed words-"did you set the alarm?" and "do we have any water bottles in here?"
( in the linen closet, because, damn, that walk to the kitchen was just TOO FAR after 11PM :P)

We talked about everything-the weather and footy and art and sex and love and how we hated GWB for taking us to war and the good VS. bad of both our countries and where our next trip would be and how amazing it was that we found each other and how we would always be Team Daz.

That's one of the many, many things I miss honey-that day-to-day talking, the juggling of ideas with one another, the what ifs and the whatfors and the WHAT were they thinkings?!

I would give anything to have a two-way conversation with you again, babe.
Anything, anything, anything.

While I have accomplished much this summer-my trip to my home away from home, being with Kathy for a while, clearing out and cleaning out like I do every year;
the Feng-Shui fixes and the writing-always my writing, not just on this blog, but anytime I am putting thoughts to paper, whether virtual or not-when I look back on it as a whole, then yes, I am happy with my progress and accomplishments.

But I still want to know WHY- Why are you not here buggin' me about playing tetris to late, LOL, or asking me what we are going to do on the weekend, or what time Smash has a show on next month, or hinting about what you would like for your birthday....all the myriad of things that we would talk about.

All the why's.

While my life is really OK right now, I cannot stop wondering why you had to be taken from us when we were so very happy, when you had so much to give others, when you were poised to rise to the top of your game in every area of your life.

I have a feeling I will be asking why for a very long time to come.

I am sure I will never have an answer that satisfies me.

Love you Dazzy-Always.
KIsses, Wifey.

Fun with Boomer

2008-08-03T18:34:00.000-05:00

Carrying the Torch

2008-08-02T18:11:00.001-05:00

Dear Dazzy,

How Alanis Morisette got inside my head is a mystery to me, babe-but if I could have written you a song today, my sweet Dazzles, this would have been it-it is exactly how I feel.
Exactly how our life was.
Exactly the way I miss you so.
"Laying my torch down for you-" exactly like the song says.

Torch Lyrics:

I miss your smell and your style and your pure abiding way
Miss your approach to life and your body in my bed
Miss your take on anything and the music you would play
Miss cracking up and wrestling and our debriefs at end of day

These are things that I miss
These are not times for the weak of heart
These are the days of raw despondence
I never dreamed I would have to lay down my torch for you like this

I miss your neck and your gait and your sharing what you write
Miss you walking through the front door documentaries in your hand
Miss traveling our traveling and your fun and charming friends
Miss our getaways
And to watch you love my dogs

These are things that I miss
These are not times for the weak of heart
These are the days of raw despondence
I never dreamed I would have to lay down my torch for you like this

One step one prayer I soldier on, simulating moving on

I miss your warmth and the thought of us bringing up the kids
And the part of you that walks with your stick-tied handkerchief

These are things that I miss
These are not times for the weak of heart
These are the days of raw despondence
I never dreamed I would have to lay down my torch for you like this

These are things that I miss
These are not times for the weak of heart
These are the days of raw despondence
I never dreamed I would have to lay down my torch for you like this

I know it's because I went to see Smash perform today that my emotions are very near the surface. I know it's because I am so very aware that you aren't in the chair next to me; that you aren't taking pictures of all of us, that I'll be driving home to an empty house...damn.

Missing you today big time, honey.

Love you, Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey

August!

2008-08-01T08:28:00.012-05:00

Click on the Pic/ Quote by Rumi:

"Let yourself be silently drawn by the stronger pull of what you really are..."

Dear Dazzy,

Wow babe-how did it get to be August already????
I swear it feel like just last week that I was on OZ with friends eating a pie floater with a lammington chaser, LOL

Now it's the month that sees horrid temps

( like 103 tomorrow? YIKES)and in 17 days-another school year begins.

This will be my SECOND one to start without you coming home from work asking me about the newest kids in my classes; the second one without flowers from you on my desk before that first bell rings; the second one in which I have to hear about everyone else's summer vacations/time off spent with their husbands/wives/significant others...sigh.

I cried last year when I had to listen to all of that.

I cried when we had to break into groups and tell about ourselves to the newbies. Pretty sure I'll do the same thing this year, because no matter how much time ever goes by, I STILL miss you, Dazzy. I know I always will.

I won't sob like I did last year, though; I know a few tears will escape the gravitational pull of my emotions, for sure, but with a bit of luck it will be O.K. I look forward to teaching my retuning kids and the newbies as well. It will be a grand year for learning., that I know as well!

July was a blast-I went to Kath's for a bit, and she just left this morning from a few day's stay at chez MelYork. Our visits are so good for the soul-I still wish she lived here in P-ville. I miss her heaps, too. We did the movies twice, Tarjaaaaaa, our fave lil store, lol, and watched reality Tivo.
We walked dogs and had a good time doing things together.
We talk everyday still, so we don't have to "catch up", but just going and trying on new clothes etc at the same time was fun.

***MOVIE SPOILER ALERT-"Tell NO One" PLOT GIVE-AWAY FOLLOWS!***

When we came home from one move-"Tell No One" a great thriller about ( of course) a widower who is accused of his wife's murder-I was thinking out loud, talking to you, honey, about the plot twist of the wife not really being dead a after an eight year stretch-its convoluted but worked perfectly in the film. The end shot, when the hubby and wifey see each other again, and it's in the flesh-well, you can imagine how I was feeling. As I was wishing that that could happen to moi, I heard music-very faint, but music still the same. I though maybe I had left the radio on, but nope, that was off completely. It wasn't coming from Mikey's room, or even from the TV.

FINALLY-I tracked it down. It was my MP3 player, which I keep in my pocketbook. It's all by itself, in a lil makeup bag thingy; funny thing is I haven't turned it on in weeks.

Taking it out, I realized it was playing these lines from Del Shannon's

"Sea of Love" :

Do you remember when we met?
That's the day I knew you were my pet
I want to tell you how much I love you ...

Wow. I just stood there, put the ear piece in and listened for a minute, then turned it off. It made me cry, but that was OK. I felt you close by. I tell no one ( except for those who read here) because some people don;t believe in "signs" or in the healthiness of my believing in such signs.

I don't care, I know what I feel. Thanks honey-that was very, very good timing, :P

Ash performs all this weekend-tonight, two shows tomorrow, one on Sunday-she will be a tired puppy come Monday morning, your lil Smashley. But trooper that she is, she will do a marvelous job, and I cannot wait to see her dance tomorrow! I know you will be there in her thoughts all weekend as well, honey. That's a given.

Mikey and I will be up to no good today-LOL-just chillin' and looking through his Italia pix; he still has a bit of jet lag almost a week later but he's getting there. I love all the references to OZ that he encountered whilst in Italy-you are still a cheeky thing Dazzy, aren't you? :)

So August has rolled in with thunder, lightning, and clouds-but no rain; two eclipses will take place this month- one solar, one lunar; the star that we named for you-in the constellation Pavo, the Peacock-is visibly brighter, on its way to its best showing in late September-your birthday month-and I am settling into the thought of yet another season of the heart without you by my side.

The rollicking up of the heavens seems to match the turmoil I feel of leaving behind yet another summer and reluctantly going into autumn.

Last year at this time I was totally numb.

This year I am much more observant and knowing within my emotions.

I will take that ability as a good thing and count it as a positive step forward.

In the Finnish language, August is called Elokuu, meaning "month of reaping" or literally, "month of life".

My August wish for every widow/er, or any person suffering through a loss:

Here's to a month of living, of finding some measure of peace in our hearts through good deeds, quiet reflection looking up at the stars, or whatever works for you.

'Soon enough, the summer will be gone, and we will be father up the road on the grief journey, time dragging us along whether we want it to or not.

I like the idea, though, of a month of LIFE-so here's to August.

Enjoy as best you can.

You too, Dazzles-I always wonder what you are getting up to in the next incarnation of "this amazing life-"

Love you, Dazzy. Always.

Kisse, Wifey.

My Secret Ring

2008-07-29T21:43:00.004-05:00

Dear Dazzy,

Hi honey-I don't have to tell you how busy I have been lately, haven't be posting etc with all the commotion-Mikey is home from Italy with 800(!) pics to peruse through; Ash is performing this weekend and she and Chris were here to see Mikey, along with Mike's friends, so it was Pizza all around on Saturday-and a house full of people! You'd have loved it...

I also went to the movies with Marylou, cleaned out all the household closets/cabinets etc etc, and even did a bit of your closet today-I donated all your jeans(it's back to school here soon) and jean jackets.
That was all I could part with for now-but it was a good feeling to do a small bit.

I put away more of the things I came home with of ours as well-cards, wedding mementos, CDs etc-I am on a roll!

The best news is that I got our rings back from the jewelers-and now your wedding band, my wedding band and my beautiful diamond solitaire are all intertwined to combine into one ring! It's sized for my RIGHT hand, and I can wear it everyday without the sadness that wearing all three of the other rings brought lately.

I always loved our wedding bands; full circles of pure polished gold, the symbol of our eternal love for one another. We never went without them. The last thing I did before they took you from me was I demanded your wedding band.
The EMT's were a bit hesitant, but I did not want them cutting it off later or losing it or anything else. Funny how I remember thinking, "I need his ring!" in the midst of that hellish scene, but shock stands in for logic during times like that, and I'm kind of glad it did-for now, when I look at my new/old ring, I know both our rings are really intertwined forever.

Like our love, our souls-the essence of who we are.

I call it my "secret" ring as well-no one will think its a wedding set. I will always know, but the outside world will not be looking at my left hand and assuming things anymore. It really hit home when I went to OZ, I wore all three rings, and it felt like I was wishing, or pretending, just not being truthful-with myself.

Everyone else can sod off for all I care, I would have worn my rings until the end of time if it had made ME happy-but after about a year, they just didn't. They made me sad, and made me miss what we had-a loving marriage-all the more.

So now I have a secret ring, I adore the way it turned out, and I will be wearing it every single day with a smile and a tiny-dare I say it-bit of hope for what is to still come in the next chapter of my life.

No matter what, my Dazzy boy, you will be along for the ride-as evidenced on the third finger of my RIGHT hand, through that two-carat sparkler that you were so happy to give me.

You will always be my Prince. I will always be your Princess ( LOL-you know just what I mean, too, eh babe?)and now I have my jewels back again to prove it!

More updates later this week-Kath comes tomorrow for a visit, and you know how much fun that will be!

Love you, Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey.

Transformation

2008-07-23T22:47:00.003-05:00

The night you gave me my fabby ring!

Dear Dazzy,

On my never ending list of things to do and/or get done this summer, having our wedding rings and my beautiful solitaire reworked was always on there, but just not at the top. Yesterday, that changed.

In the 15 months since you have been gone, I have worn my rings and yours, taken them off, put them back on, worn only mine, then only yours , then all three again; and now its to the point where it just makes me feel sad to see them on my left hand-wedding style. I did wear the trio of rings back to Oz on my trip in June, so that anyone who didn't get to see 'em could do so. But now that I am back in TX, it's time for a permanent change.

While in Oz, I loved wearing my diamond again, pretending sometimes( at the airport, on the plane, in a city where ver few really knew me) that all was well-just a wife out shopping, picking up groceries at Safeway or gardening things at Target...

Well, once I got back to the MelYork, after the jet lag wore off, I had some post traumatic vacation blues followed by weird email and a general malaise about the whole entire meaning of life-but finally I got a grip. :)

I had to look deep inside for that woman who used to call the shots, who was feisty and didn't take crap from anyone. The one who had a life and goals and ambition and who cared about life in all its forms. It took hanging around Austin to accomplish this, but when I came home I got to work again, pronto!

I am happy to say that I have now crossed many things off my to-do list, the latest and most important of which is the transformation of our wedding rings.

I took them to my fave local jewelry place and pored through books of settings. Finally I found the one I knew would work. It will take my band, your band and my diamond and remake them into a right hand ring, and change the setting to bezel
( no prongs) so it looks less "wedding-y."

I love wearing that two carat sparkler. You surprised me with it on Valentine's day years ago, and you were so proud that you could sneak it by me, babe-that made you so happy! I cried when you gave it to me-not because of what it looked like but because of the PLANNING that went on, unbeknownst to moi, in giving it to me!

I never needed a ring like that, but once I had it it was fabulous to wear.

You know I loved it.
Still do.

So now, it will look a bit different-but I will know its history, I will know how much love is contained inside its brilliantly cut facets, and how whenever the light strikes it, that love makes those little rainbows appear-proof that love never dies.

The bands will be melted and used in the modern design, and I should have it next week! I am, of course, a bit sad that I had to do this-but keeping it all in my jewelry box is silly, yet wearing our rings makes me feel like I am wishing for something that will never come true.

This made sense to me-taking something that causes me to feel grief over the loss of you and transforming it into something that will make me smile.

Isn't that what you and I are both doing now, going through a transformation in our lives? I am not sure really whose is harder, yours or mine. Neither one of us wanted to go through this, but here we are-you over there, me over here. Although Andrew isn't quite sure where you really are honey, LOL

Speaking of Andrew, he is 50 today, babe! Your best friend of almost 27 years is surely sad to mark this birthday without you. To think that ten years ago, you were throwing him the bash of a lifetime for his 40th-Phil Scott performing, food and drink and all sorts of shenanigans happening at the Second Ave house-and I am still sorry you didn't bring that tape with you here to TX.

Anyway, I sent him a card and etc., and if you can, sweets, why don'tcha make the lights flicker again in his house like you did when he was talking about/to/with you, LOL

That was waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay cool, LOL :P

Andrew knew about the whole ring thing while you were planning it as well; your confidant across the big pond, eh babe? He never let on at all when he talked to me in the weeks before as you planned your surprise. A true blue friend, that one!

While our rings are such a small part of the whole transformation process, it's the symbolism behind them that bings a lump to my throat.

When we slipped those wedding bands on each other's fingers, it was with the intent of forever. It was with love, and with promise of a full life together-I am so sorry it couldn't be-but in reforging our rings, it will make what we had even stronger.

Strong enough that I will be able to put away another part of our shared life, and every time I look at my new ring, I will smile, knowing that you are still right here with me, pushing me to transform everything around me, in order to have some kind of happiness again during whatever time I have here on this earth.

Who knew that a piece of compressed carbon could come to symbolize life itself?

Love you Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey.

Austin! Mama Mia...

2008-07-21T09:07:00.005-05:00

Dear Dazzy,

In light of all that has happened to our family, I try now and just seize the moment a little more-not like we didn't before your passing, but we planned a bit more and were not as spontaneous due to jobs, kids, dogs, etc.

So when the chance presented itself for me to go visit Kath USA this weekend in Austin, I didn't just say "yeah, OK," I said, "HELL YEAH!" It was that kind of mini-vacation with the right person that helped clear my head and made me feel almost normal again, whatever my new normal is...still working ont that one.

We had great burgers, gelatto, and Mexican food. We walked throughout the neighborhood, went antiquing, drove downtown to sight see, and just enjoyed being able to talk and eat and linger over our discussions.

We also had a lot of fun going to see the movie, "Mama Mia!" It was a hoot. It was funny and silly and uplifting( if a bit implausible) and different somewhat than the stage play, but it was endearing just the same.

While ABBA was cute in their time, it's funny how some of those old '80's lyrics are very relevant today. This song is one of my faves from back then, and very appropo for me in my days without you now. I now "believe in Angels"-indeed.

Angels like you, babe-my Aussie Angel. (Yes, I still have the card that you signed that way...)

Song lyrics | I Have A Dream lyrics

I needed this short break, especially after my jaunt to Australia-which was fabulous and heartbreaking at the same time-and now I am once again home in our MelYork abode, ready to eat brekkie and feed and walk the dogs, and on to the next thing on my never ending list of things to do/accomplish/experience-and it's all good.

I think a lot of what boosted my mood was being engaged with other adult humans, LOL. Sometimes here my other friends outside of school have jobs without my summer vacation perks, and that means we do things on weekends only.

That's OK, I have time for house stuff and writing, but before the fall settles in
I will do my literacy volunteering stuff. ( how can the Grand Final and your birthday and Halloween be creeping up so soon, and how can they be on their way knowing YOU are not here to enjoy it all with us? Time really IS another name for death isn't it, sweets...) This will keep me engaged with other adults as well as my friends. Should be a win-win there eh, honey?

This week will see me -drum roll, please-finishing the side garden, washing/detailing the car, taking my Dad to the Dr for his ongoing "stuff," movie with MaryLou and lunch with Barb and writing and working out and who knows what else! My next "project" that I can afford to do (and that I can do some of on my own)is the crown molding down the hallway and in the little bathroom. It will look nice when that's finished, and I know you'll be proud of me, honey, using the mitre saw like a pro :P

I miss you heaps, babe. You know that. I always will. I like these "up" times because I can see a life for me and the kids that is a happy one, albeit one that doesn't include your physical presence-but will always include your spirit. Your love for us still surrounds us, I can still feel you here, and I know you will always be there.

Maybe that's why I have this calm about traveling all over now that I didn't have this past year-I know that I really do carry you with me, in my heart, everywhere I go. Maybe THAT'S the key to being one with grief-that Zen like position of just leaning into it, rolling with the punches, and righting oneself again.

It all comes from the heart, doesn't it, Dazzy?
The mind just overthinks and jumbles it all up with knots of logic, which never can be untied.

In that light, I love this idea of this Abba song-that I still have a song, a dream, a life to live-even if its a bit out of tune and a tad unfinised; I am making progress, and that's what counts, right babe?

Love you Dazzy-Always.
Kisses, Wifey.

Feng Shui-Move your stuff, change your life

2008-07-18T20:48:00.006-05:00

( psssst-click on the photos for a closer look)

Dear Dazzy,

Ahh, I procrastinated a bit about finishing the annual clean out of my closet, but finally-its DONE.

You know how I love my Feng Shui rituals, babe, LOL

I have been holding on to some things that I know will fit me again-well maybe not in this century, LOL, but....

Eventually I did the honorable thing, though, and now they are all bagged , ready to donate tomorrow in the AM.

It always makes me feel good to go through my things, to pare down , to make the journey lighter-and it has taken me a full two weeks plus at home after my jaunt to our house in Box Hill to even care a whit about doing this-but I am happy that I felt like doing it, and that I dove right in.

Since my closet is fairly large, and we retrofitted it when we moved in ( you and your built in drawers and chrome hangers- woohoo, LOL) I can keep all my clothes, my hamper, etc., in there, as well as my "visualization board" and my journals ( like most bloggers I have been keeping a journal of some sorts for yonks) , my spare electronics, and an odd assortment of pocketbooks and quilts.

It's interesting to see some of the things I had put away in the back of the closet, and to rediscover some treasures I hadn't seen for awhile.

I packed away the nightgown/robe set my sister gave me for our honeymoon-can't bear to look at it hanging in the corner anymore. Then I have the outfit I wore to your service-what the heck do I do with that? You bought me the top and the shoes only days before; those hot pink heels were one of many small tributes to you from that emotional day that is forever seared into my memory. How could I ever wear them again and not think about that April day?

Other things from happier times are just as hard to look at-the pink halter and printed skirt that I wore for our 2nd anniversary, when we went into Dallas and hit all the fun spots, including a gondola ride through the mini-canals in Las Colinas; The AUS sweatshirt that was too small for you to wear anymore and became mine to walk the dog in by default :P, the shoes you loved-all my high heels were shoes you had a say in picking out...

I could just donate it all, and start fresh, but it wouldn't remove any of the heartache. The memories that the clothes embody are embedded so deeply in my brain that I could conjure them up at any time, even without the visual triggers. Besides on teacher salary, I wouldn't get too much new stuff, LOL, now, would I?

After going through the clothes, I went through some photos (all in a nice box now, and later this summer I will whittle those down/scan/etc)and I came up with one that was behind some bigger ones that I always keep in my basket on my shelf.

It's small, so it tends to slip down a bit, unnoticed until I clean out the basket. It used to always make me smile, and fill my heart with that "awwwwwwwwwww" sighing, but today it just made me catch my breath in my throat and flood my eyes with hot tears and weep.

It's the pix that you sent me, BEFORE we ever met in person, with you in a gorgeous pale blue shirt. You are so handsome, with such a cheeky smile-a smile that always made me melt!

When you sent me this photo, you wrote across it,

"I love Susan"

and signed your name, Daryl, with two XX's.

On the back , however, you wrote the most touching thing:

"Soul mate"

I remember getting that picture in the mail. I honestly do not remember which card it came in , ( for it would have come in a card, that's for sure) but I immediately put that picture in my wallet-so I could show people a photo of the man I loved- and it stayed there until we had wedding photos to pass around.

It goes back in my wallet today; a visible reminder of the love we shared. It doesn't have to be front and center, but I will know that it's there, and I will carry it with me just like I carry you in my heart. Why? Just because I can. Doesn't change anything, doesn't bring you back, doesn't make me any happier or sadder-it's just something I feel right in doing.

Like the song says, I knew I loved you before I met you-and visa versa.

Continuing to clear out/clean up, I rearranged a few more things on the shelf, and put away my Internet love/travel/wedding journals. I then found the perfect use for your silver mug from your 21st that Andrew gave me to take home-it holds all the dimes, both American and Aussie, that I have found since you left this earthly plane. ( Yes, I keep them)

Funny, but when I counted them, there were fifteen-the same number as the number of months you have been gone!

Since it's a leap year, today makes fifteen months exactly.

Odd?

Nope, these things are not Outer Limits stuff to moi anymore...just interesting. Thought provoking.

Curiouser and curiouser, eh babe?

Moving one's stuff around inside a closet may not seem like a big thing, but for those who deal with grief and mourning, sometimes it's like climbing Everest.

I felt good doing it today, and look at the treasure I came up with, right babe?

There you are, telling me you love me-STILL...

Love you Dazzy. Always.

Kisses, Wifey-AKA Soul Mate!

Just Tuesday

2008-07-15T14:59:00.004-05:00

Dear Dazzy,

I am starting this post in the arvo-it's just a Tuesday here in TX with me and a list of a few things I need to get done; later on it will be walkies with Boomie and dinner alone tonight-not a bad thing really, but I miss you so when summer is here.

You used to come home from work and start taking off your tie in the car, LOL and once you were in the door and into shorts, we would eat grilled fish and veggies or a chicken salad and watermelon and enjoy a cold one-a stubby of Corona, usually-while we sat out on the back deck.

After we cleaned up, we would put on our swimsuits and go visit at our old apartment complex-they still have the same combo for the pool, LOL- then we would enjoy swimming in the warm water as the sun went down. We would goof around a lot and swim a bit for exercise and enjoy each others company without TV, phones, or the Internet around.

After darkness crept in, we would drive back to the "MelYork" house and you would settle into the computer/office space and I would read/etc, and all would be right with our small corner of the universe.

I am going back there tonight to swim-I am in the mood to go-but it will be another one of those "what's wrong with this picture" moments. I had my grief counselor today, and we talked about doing the same things you and I used to do seasonally, but how its OK that now I do them alone.

I told her I am really making peace with that, but it is still sad.
Those things will always have that tinge of sadness, I am sure.

We also talked about that Vitriol -filled email that I received this week-and how, as the saying goes, "Those who sling mud lose much ground..." (Thank you, Confucius)

Indeed.

I hope that when this person faces you again in the hereafter, that they are proud of the words they have written and sent with such hate.

Even after all that BS, I am in a much better mood today-jet lag is gone, I have sorted some more of your things now that they are back here with me, and I am hopeful about the future in a tiny,tiny way.

I know my trip was cathartic and therapeutic, even while it was heartfelt and hugely sad, but it was the right thing to do. It's not closure, but more of another chapter finished in my mourning of you, honey.

If my mourning is a book, then it is encyclopedic in volume.

It may never be finished, and if not, so be it.
I will always be the one to tell your story, Babe-warts and all-because you would want it that way.

So later tonight as I relax in the pool, I will say, "I love you, Dazzy" out loud.
I hope that the fireflies, who come out as the sun goes down, lighting the sky like portable stars, will hear me and take those word to you-just in case.

Because words are such powerful things, they should always be used with good intention, for they can make all the difference in someones life. Or afterlife :)

Love you, Dazzy-Always.
Kisses, Wifey

New Layout/colors/etc!

2008-07-13T13:02:00.002-05:00

I like the freshness of this color scheme-and it's good to embrace change that I can control, LOL
Watch for new widgets and pictures in the days to come.
SJW

July Heat

2008-07-11T22:12:00.004-05:00

Dear Dazzy,

This past week I had babysitting duty for a teacher I worked with-and today was a TGIF kinda day. The kids are young but sweet, and I had fun with them all week-but I am also happy it was only for a week's time, LOL

Marylou called to invite me to her sister's house/pool tonight but I am really just wanting to sit, enjoy the alone time with Boomie and Range, and chill out. I walked Boomster before -almost all the way off leash(!) and he was fabulous. What a great dog he is shaping up to be...you would be so happy with him, honey.

He was a mess when he "found" me ( thanks again for that prezzie, babe)-but with heaps of love and a firm hand he is really turning into a good dog. He is trusting and loving and always honest with his emotions ; too bad more humans aren't like this canine version of you , Dazzy.

Mike is having a wonderful experience in Italy. Tonight he got to play a set on stage at a local bar; he cranked out "Sweet Home Alabama" among other songs with-GET THIS-two guys from Hawthorne in Aussie shorts and Carlton Jerseys!

They talked a bit about Oz and the US and Mikey filled them in about us.
Turn out one of 'em lived a mere two blocks from Box Hill North! Small world.

Oh yeah, and the bartender, who knew these guys, had on a tee shirt that had a big "4-20" on the back !

Usually it is a reference to smoking pot, but with the significance of that date-well, we decided it was you showing up to say G'day to Mike and watch him play again-just like we did that last week of your life.

They all had a drink to you, babe, and although it wasn't Jim Beam and Coke, it was heartfelt just the same. I know that had to make you smile-our Mikestar raising a glass to ya-in a bar in another country with a bunch of traveling Aussies. (Thats a pix of the flatmates in this post)

You rock, dude.

Love you Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey

Color Test Results

2008-07-09T22:15:00.003-05:00

I took the free ColorQuiz.com personality test!

"Intense, vital, and animated, taking a delight in ..."

Click here to read the rest of the results.

Dear Dazzy,

I have heaps to say and no words to deal with my emotions right now.
Hence the color test-it's was a bit too on the money, which is why I put my results on here-they are very much the way I truly feel. Ouch.

Just a sad day with music that touched me( Iris, Southern Cross, new Linkin Park stuff-) and more babysitting and chores.

I am mired in melancholy and inertia and pessimism.

I have ticked off things on my to-do list but frankly don't really care about any of it.

The tape I thought MIGHT have some footage on it was, of course, blank. :(

I am too sad to even rant about it here.

More on a better day...

Love you Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey

Back to My TX Reality

2008-07-06T10:03:00.004-05:00

Dear Dazzy,

It's official-jet lag has been replaced with "summer mode", wherein I go to bed between 12 and 1 AM and sleep until 8 or so...bad habits, LOL
When school rolls around I will have to be up at 6:15 again, so I will be weaning myself from the late sleep-ins in just a few days.

Just getting past the last of the jet lag now and it feels good to be awake at the right time, lol.

I have unpacked and done my laundry, while the pile of Australian goodies still sits on the chair in the living room. The photos on the memory card have been dropped off, and fingers crossed that tape I found that says: "Andy's Party" in your oh so pretty handwriting really does have some shots from Andrew's 40th. After finding those two VCR tapes taped over-grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr-I am hopeful, but not confidant, that I will have found some of you most precious memories preserved for the rest of us to see.

Last night I was really sad as I went to bed. Boomie and Ranger were all settled in, and just looking at your side of the bed brought tears. Maybe it's the letdown that comes at the end of any trip-you know, life goes back to the way it was, no more running around with all our friends and grabbing a coffee at Shoppingtown, wandering through the streets of MEL, walking to/from Andrew's place...I simply miss being in Oz.

Even the wintry Oz :)

Of course what I really miss is my life with you-I have said it ad nauseum, but it is still true-I have a life now that is not of my choosing, and I still miss you terribly. Some people still don't get it, and cannot say/do the right things, and I almost feel more sorry for them and their limitations than I do for me and my sadness.

My trip was necessary and cathartic and even happy at times. I did what I had to do, went through your "stuff" that was still at the house- speaking of, I got nowhere with the house situation, but that was what I was expecting, really. It will shake out sooner or later, and it will be fine. I know in my heart what your wishes would have been. So do all you friends, and some of your family. The call from Uncle Morrie made me smile. He really thought a lot of you, babe, didn't he?

I could definitely live in OZ-its my kind of place. That may come to be in a year or so; after the kids graduate and get settled we may make that jump across the pond, ya know?
It would be fun to do a whole year in OZ and go through all the seasons, see it in spring and fall....lots of choices and whatnot for me. Sometimes it's almost too many choices that I get to have, whereas when you were here, Dazzles, we had such clear cut direction to our lives. I miss that knowing, that sense of where we were headed, etc. I miss it all.

I will find that directness again, though, I am sure of it. It's in me, I know, it's just that grief sometimes gets in the way of finding it. The only thing I know at almost 15 months into this journey of widowhood is that these blue funk days don't really last long anymore-by this arvo, I will be making lists of things that need to be done in the house/with my stuff, your stuff/etc. I will busy myself with life and it will be fine.

If not fine, it will be O.K. and that will have to suffice.

My words today are not in any way profound or optimistic, but they are true-I miss you. Heaps.

Love you, Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey.

July Jet Lag Ramblings

2008-07-03T08:56:00.003-05:00

Dear Dazzy,

Ahhhhhhhh jet lag-flying TO Oz is never the problem. Coming back to the USA, now, there's the rub-I havent slept all night. Urg. Hopefully spellcheck will be my salvation.

I am not coherent enough to really post the things that are in my heart about my trip-it was so emotional, so endearing, so powerful in my journey of grief that I want to do it -and you-justice with the correct, precise words.

Until I get some sleep, however, I am afraid it will be just a rambling mess of
run-on sentences and lost of fragmented thought-so for today, I will just say that before I left, I felt adrift-homeless-because you were not by my side anymore, Dazzy.

Now, after being back to Australia and sleeping in our bed on that side of the world, I feel like I have TWO homes-and not just the physical ones. I was made to feel so welcome by the friends who love you-I could not have asked for more...
( And if I could, I would ask for YOU, but we all know the sad answer to that question, right babe?)

I love OZ, honey. I know it because of you-and I will always remember that.

Love you Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey

Melbourne Architecture

2008-06-28T18:40:00.001-05:00

Just some pix of random building in Melbourne; it really doesnt rain all the time there, LOL, but it did when I was taking these-just love the old buildings and their history, as well as the new stuff, too! More later...

Australia continued...

2008-06-26T02:01:00.008-05:00

Dear Dazzy,

BUSY is a great word. I love to have heaps on and our friends have been so kind and helpful and engaging-they "babysit" me, LOL all hours and include me in everything. I love them like you did/do, babe-they are the best friends anyone could ask for-ever.

Especially Andrew. I know I shouldn't play faves, and I really don't have one per se, but he has been so lovely to me-I know why you loved him so. Anything I need, andything I have to get or do-he's there or he arranges it for me. It's great being looked after like this.

Sadly, I won't be able to make it up to Mum's place-three weeks and a bit sounds like a lot of time, but it just isn't when all the emotional stuff is thrown in as well. I have had many hearbreaking hurdles to jump over whilst here-not the least of which is finding that someone has taped over important videos of yours.

GRRRRR!

I wanted to take then to the photoshop to have em put on DVD and now-well I am saddened once again by the way your things have been dismissed so easily. I don't have time to be pissed off about it-it won't bring you back, and it's not worth my time to try and understand how someone could do that without thinking about YOU and YOUR wishes.

Not happy, Jan.

The past few days have been a time trip through Melbourne and its surrounds-all the places you and your friends frequented; all the cool old buildings and great new places/apartments that you would have loved; Westfield's Shoppingtown renovation-WOW!

You took me up to the roof of that place on my first visit here. GREAT view and fun shopping; we had a blast there. Silly and goofing around on the escalators, you and I were like teenagers, holding hands everywhere we went and kissing every time we had the chance. We went into the safeway and shopped for dinner and just had a fun day. I remember it was really nice out , warmerthan today, and so sunny it was hard to see off into the distance.

Today the weather was chilly and cloudy, but seeing off into the distance was just as hard-I have no idea where my life's horizon lies anymore. At least I feel like the boat has steadied a bit, but the sailing is not yet smooth-and I am not sure it will ever be so again.

Still I give it a go, as you would say, throwing myself into the choppy sea of life, most chances I get, trying to figure out my direction "After Daz."

This trip was important, and I am so glad I came.

It will be sad to leave. I will miss the heavenly bakeries that remind me so much of NY.
DFW places suck in comparison, LOL, and I will miss the new food court at Shoppingtown heaps...they have beautiful things there, and it's new, so the decore is fabby-you would LOVE it, babe!

It's a warm and welcome feeling being in Oz, even if it is sad overall- I love being in the country that helped add to who you were as a person. Your spirit is unique; your loyalty to your friends-who really helped mold you in many distinct and important ways-is second to none.

As I walked from Andrew's the other day-he wanted to drop me off, but I wanted to walk--warm sun, decent temperatures and a daily walk as my exercise are good things babe-
I went the same route you must have travelled countless times, beginning as a teen and continuing on until 2006, when you were here last at the age of 41.

Starting on Narallah, its a quick turn to Wetzell St, then a right on
Boxleigh Grove...netx a quick right onto Aspinall, then a left on tiny lil Rye; Harrison and Birkby come next...followed by Dorking and the hill at Cherry Orchard Rise and finally , the corner house at Second Ave.

I had the directions written down because I didn't trust myself after being away for six years, but I didn't need them.
I felt like you were right there with me, holding my hand, saying "C'Mon, Susie, lets gooooo" like you used to when you had business to attend to that JUST could not wait! LOL

I took pictures along the way, slowing my pace, just to make sure I took it all in. The beauty of OZ is reflected in the species of trees, plants, birds, etc.

I looked at the houses and wondered aloud how many people you knew from that walk, taken a zillion times over more than twenty years. How many families did you see moving in or out; how many footy games did you start, finish or interrupt?

What did it feel like to walk over to Andrew's that day when you first told him about me-that crazy blonde NYer in Tx?
The one you were crazy about and were calling Wifey! :P

I love your country as if it were my own, sweets.
Maybe one day it will be mine as well?

Enjoy the pics from "our" walk, honey-

Love you, Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey

Dragonflys

2008-06-22T21:15:00.009-05:00

Dear Dazzy,

Just a lighthearted post this morning-one of the things I love about buying earrings when I travel is that every time I put a particular pair on, I can remember the place I bought them from, what the weather was like, whom I was with, and the whole vibe of that time in my life.
Of course, over the past eight years, I have acquired more than a few pair of earrings from Oz.

The first pair we bought in a little artist's shop in Warryndyte. They are moonstones set in sterling; the girl in the shop said that wearing moonstones signaled a change about to come into one's life.

We bought them on the spot! LOL

I also got a pair of clear quartz ones; very simple and I liked the idea of clarity in one's life, so that pair came home with me as well.

I wore them all the time when I went back to the states-that time without you-and I will wear them for all my years to come.

Throughout the following years, you continued to buy me jewelry-I never bought another piece for myself. You doted on me in that way, because it gave you such a kick to pick out things you knew I would love.

Gold and white gold hoops, a tennis bracelet, diamond earrings, my gorgeous watch-the last piece of jewelry you ever gave me-and my sapphire necklace that you surprised me with at our wedding are all pieces that you got as much pleasure out of giving to me as I did proudly wearing them.

As I went through the things I brought home with me from this trip, I came upon the package from a small store that is up near a shop called Pie In The Sky. (GREAT name, fabby food!)
They had beautiful earrings, and it was hard to choose at first , but when I walked around a corner in the cramped and filled-to-the-brim shop, I spotted the bronze dragonflies with the moonstone insets and knew they had to belong to me.

Dragonflies are simply beautiful in color, with their iridescent blues and greens .
They are plentiful near the creek where we lived for a time when you first came to the US.
They eat bugs that are pests and fly like hummingbirds do, hovering in mid-flight before darting off to some unknown destination. Not unsurprisingly, many cultures revere them and have written fables and legends regarding the dragonfly's transformational powers.

This one is my favorite:

Dragonfly Legend

In the bottom of an old pond lived some grubs who could not understand why none of their groups ever came back after crawling up the stems of the lilies to the top of the water.

They promised each other that the next one who was called to make the upward climb would return and tell what happened to him.

Soon one of them felt an urgent impulse to seek the surface; he rested himself on the top of a lily pad and went through a glorious transformation, which made him a dragonfly with beautiful wings.

In vain, he tried to keep his promise. Flying back and forth over the pond, he peered down at his friends below. Then he realized that even if they could see him they would not recognize such a radiant creature as one of their number.

The fact that we cannot see our friends or communicate with them after the transformation, which we call death, is no proof that they cease to exist.

- Walter Dudley Cavert

Today, as I wear my dragonfly earrings, I will think about all the fun we had in Melbourne and Sydney and Box Hill and all points in between, babe, from a time when our lives were exciting and our future was filled with nothing but love and happiness. When I catch a glimpse of them reflected in a mirrored surface I will smile at the words of Mr. Cavert,knowing that there is no PROOF that you cease to exists-because you do exist, right here in my heart.

Love you Dazzy-Always.
Kisses, Wifey.

Happy Anniversary June 23

2008-06-22T18:36:00.013-05:00

Dear Dazzy,

Oh, honey. How sad I am today. It should be six years of celebrating our married life together. In Oz, it is already the 23rd-no matter what the computer posting says...

Instead, I am sitting in you computer chair posting about my heartache over spending this day alone-without you to bring me flowers, without a fab dinner out complete with champers, without laughing and joking and planning for the next six years, and the next six, and the next...

So Andrew and I went to the Windsor and all throughout the city/suburbs/Box Hill today; kind of like a Daz tour. We found a NY Bagel place and had vegemite and cream cheese for tea and I only lost it when we walked into the Windsor hotel, where you an I spent our first hours as Mr. and Mrs W.

My tears flow freely today. I am OK with that.
I know myself in the grief journey now, a bit more anyway, and I know this wave won't last forever.

It has to wash over me with itssaltwater tears
and then it will lessen.

One thing that doesn't lesson is my love for you.
Just because you are not physically here does not mean that I have to stop.
That is not possible for me to comprehend.

Six years ago tonight, we married. We promised forever and you told me you would always make my life interesting! Larrikin...:)

We were surrounded by family and friends and most of all, love.

That love sustains me through some of the darker parts of my mourning and grief, and I truly know that love has no boundaries-its as infinite as the stars in the universe.

Stars. We both had a fascination with the stars above; the heavens, the universe, space travel, sci-fi, all that ilk. We used to remark about the different star patters that we could see from our respective homes, and our wish was a simple one-to live in the same place, and look at the same stars on the same night-together.

Always together.

The other night, on the way to the stores, I looked up and saw the Southern Cross high in the sky , close to the luminescent full moon. It was beautiful.

I then wondered how many times you must have stood in this very spot, half out of the driveway, arguing with the metal gate that ( of course) doesn't close properly, only to turn your eyes to the brightness of the moon through the eucalyptus tree that stands guard over the little house on Second Avenue.

It made me feel connected to you, in whatever dimension you now inhabit.
I told you aloud that the stars were gorgeous, and that I loved you and missed you.

I even think you may have heard me, for right then, a single tree leaf fell onto my shoulder.
Just one.
Just at the exact moment I spoke to you, with no wind or rain...it was sweet, babe.
Thanks.

So off to the store, I wandered around the mall ( proniounced MELL in Oz speak, lol) and into the bookstore. Not hard to figure that I would go there, eh babe?
On a table of poetry books, one caught me eye-probably because the binding and cover were a rich shade of midnight blue.

That lapis hued cover also showcased a smattering of stars and was titled:

count me the stars

It was nothing short of beautiful, and the poetry in it spoke to me-of you, and of our love.
While the whole things is wonderous, my favorite follows:

count me the stars on your ceiling this night-
those trapped inside the cracks and webs
on purple pages

blue

those reflected in your sleepy eyes
scattered in your lashes
those that breathe and dance
and those that calm the view

count me the stars
on you ceiling this night

count me the stars

Anyone who has ever been in this house knows about your bedroom ceiling, LOL where a huge amount of stick on glow-in-the-dark stars, planets, and whatnot live. It's whimsical and silly and oh-so-you, Dazzy.

When I would come to Oz, we would lie in bed and count them, laughingly trying to out count the other, doing it in silly accents or fake foreign languages-we had so much fun with those stupid pieces of phosphorescent plastic toys that are really made for kids.

Reading that poem was so amazing, I knew I had to have the book. It will come to TX with me, and sit on my shelf of VIP books-and when I am very old, and need to relive a moment in time when I was so happy, so loved, so content with life, I will open the pages of this midnite blue universe of words and let their light spill forth and embrace my soul, once again thinking of us in our warm and comfy bed, counting the stars on your ceiling ...

counting the stars

Happy Anniversary Dazzy-you will always be the man of my dreams.
Love you. Always.
Kisses, Wifey

Books, words, life...

2008-06-20T07:11:00.009-05:00

Dear Dazzy,

On Friday we went into the city of Melbourne. I walked the same places I walked today with you years ago-the State Library, Lygon Street, Lt. Bourke, etc. Had a great fish dinner and fun shopping and listened to the live music and took in the sights and sounds and smells that are MEL. I saw Nicolas Cage making a movie! "Knowing" will be out next year. Very cool to see the set and all in the middle of downtown MEL.

On my own, I felt at home in the library.
The exhibits there were impressive to say the least-

http://www.slv.vic.gov.au/programs/whats_on/2008/wo_08_06_e.html

But this one was the most near and dear to my heart.

Books.

Those things with words in them, which to me are things in and of themselves.
The things that truly do hold a mirror to oneself, to society, to life.

As a kid, books took me to places only my imagination knew about.
I read the way others would breathe, and books-words coded into recognizable information-were my touchstones to both reality and fantasy.

As a teen, my copy of Lind Goodman's Sun Signs got quite a workout. So did every sci-fi book I could get my hands on. I discovered my genre, and felt at home among the aliens, the new worlds, the what-ifs...and of course poetry and song lyrics spoke to my soul.

As a new Mom/Mum, parenting books helped me as much as my own Ma did.

As a teacher, student, etc, books are my life.

When we met, I began the process of reading about Oz, about the land downunder, about Libras, LOL.

Books always helped me get a handle on whatever life situation was happening at the time. Yes, when you dies, honey, I ran to the bookstore, tissues in hand , and asked for everything on grief, the afterlife, living without your soulmate, etc.

Books. They feed my brain.

So today, I walked into the "Books" exhibition at the State Library, and I was in heaven.

Mirror of the World: books and ideas

This magnificent exhibition showcases rare, beautiful and historically significant books from the Library’s collections. See treasures such as Audubon’s magnificent Birds of America, classic children’s books and 1950s pulp crime fiction.
Time: 10am–5pm daily
Venue: Dome Galleries, Level 4
Free

It was awesome. Took me nearly two hours to gaze at early hand copied bibles, childrens' lit, botanial tomes, anime-you name it, they had it. Fabby, as you would say.
I loved the illustation area as much as you would have, Babe -for without artists, without pictures, how would children be enticed to pick up a jumbly mess of letters that one day will not only make sense to them, but will call to there very soul?

I love the fact that among all the things you were good at, art was at the top of your list. Working for Michael Salmon, doing his website, etc was quite the feather in your cap, sweets. We will always be proud that you had a hand in making kids around the globe smile with you artwork expertise.

I hopr one day to have grandkids that will look through the pages of the "CAVE" website, and I can tell them that their (Grandpa? Dazpa? what on earth will they call you?, LOL) Dazzy put it all together, and he did it for all the kids who love reading/art-like a living book.

That's what websites are to me-a book in motion.
And there is simply NOTHING like a great book.

Love you Dazzy. Always.
KIsses, Wifey.

Words

2008-06-20T06:42:00.006-05:00

C'mon, go make a wordle!
Very cool...just click on the link-the title of this post(words) and make you own wordy work of art.

here's the link to my first one-they are too much fun not to make more...

title="Wordle: SueDaz"> src="http://wordle.net/thumb/02898/SueDaz"
style="padding:4px;border:1px solid #ddd"
>

Dimes! Power surges-and other weirdness...

2008-06-18T18:56:00.006-05:00

Dear Dazzy,

Oh honey-you may have convinced Andrew just a bit that you are here with us in a way-after my reading yesterday-all positive things, even if I didn't want to know some of them- I was talking about how I have seen you twice, how I have heard you call my name, and jow I have had all sorts of things happen that are not easily explained now that yoou are gone.

Well!

Andrew is a skeptic through and through. As he was sitting at his computer, cursing you-in that funny /awful way the two of you used to talk to each other in-out loud, saying, of course, "Why didn't you wrap up all your paperwork before you left for the US, , you &^%$#@*! Look at the mess that's left now!" all the power in his house just dimmed- alot. Didn't go out, just really powered down-very impressive, honey.
Very impressive!

He laughed as he said "I still don't believe it," LOL, but I think you may have cracked the door open a bit, sweets-goodonya.

Dragon has "seen" you as well, and many people have dreamt of you in that non-dream like way. We dont; really know what comes next, do we? Of course YOU do, Mr. Iwanna knoweverytihingrightnow.

I think you may be happy that all of us are on the same continent again-all of us, sadly, missing you. Signs, even small ones, jolt us into remembering that we take no material possessions with us on to the next life; love really is the only thing that matters-isn't it babe?

Yesterday, as soon as I got up and walked into the lounge/dining area, there was a dime-an Aussie one-sitting in the middle of the floor.

How sweet is that? Thanks babe!

Here is the lowdown on dimes, for anyone who wants to know more about their spiritual connection:

"The meaning of the number ten deals with returning to our center, coming full circle. Ten holds a vibration of unity, as well as fresh starts.

If the number One symbolizes the beginning (& it does), then we can say that the number Ten represents the outcome, result, or achievement of that first step or beginning.

The most profound message number Ten hails is “whatever we sew, we shall now reap.” In other words, “what comes around goes around. ”

Ten also represents fulfillment, attainment, and completion. These attributes are obtained by observing the Ten containing all the elementary numbers from 1 to 9. As such, Ten is a vessel holding all the jumbled up potential found in the language of numbers.

Ten is also a bit slippery because reduced - it turns back to number One - hence, again - a full circle, coming to the beginning - finding unity (all is one, one is all).

That you are picking up a great deal of dimes is quite a good sign. Specifically, dimes may be symbolic of shiny opportunities coming your way that you once thought were lost to you.

Remember Tens are strong representation of recycling events (full circle) - a dime is a superior symbolic symbol of such phenomenon. Consider how many times a dime (or any money for that matter) is recycled through our society.

Symbolic dimes provide messages of lost opportunities regained. Things we thought we should not or could not do are beginning to resurface. Our energies are being recycled. Our intellectual currency is on the brink of change.

Shiny, bright and round…these dimes on your path are beacons of promise. They hold the meaning of number Ten firmly in their vibration and that is:

“Events are coming full circle. Cast off the old, and don the new. Step into the begining that is for your greatest good.”

It was new and shiny and I took a pix of it.
It will go with all the others in the dime jar at our other home in Tx.

Very cool move, Dazzy. Very cool.

Love you Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey.

Aussie Pix and Details

2008-06-18T08:13:00.003-05:00

Dear Dazzy,

Hope you like the pix, babe. :)

Even though I have only been here for a week tomorrow, I feel like I have been here for yonks as well. It's that weird time warp of remembering-from 2001 when I saw OZ for the first time; amazed at all the flora/fauna never mind the star patterns and jeeze it was all new and wondrous.

By the time we got to June 2002 there was a wedding and a honeymoon and smiles and happiness all around. I was still wide-eyed at the coolness of Melbourne and the oh so cute suburbia that is Box Hill, not unlike our TX place.

I liked the heavy Asian influence-yummo food-and as we walked though the house at Second Ave, we would muse about redoing it, ripping it down and building two properties, or just selling outright and putting the $ into something else.

We had options-or so we thought.

So here we are, babe, in 2008, you are gone and I am fighting the tide of sadness that comes with grief. Back in TX, I was past a lot of the, "Oh we used to go there
and do that" kind of feelings; I knew when I got to Oz it would be starting all over again in a way-and it has been. It is not as piercing as those early days, but it is still raw emotion that overtakes me when I am in a car going down a road and all of a sudden its familiarity pops like a flashbulb and I am transported to a time that still includs you. I smile though my tears and embrace my emotions, knowing that one day it will be O.K. and the tears will not be so close to the surface anymore-like when I am 125 or so.

These last few days I have seen all of our friends-and last night Dragon gave me the grand tour of his fabby new digs. Wow! Honey if you were really still here, lol, we would be moving in! That place has every gadget known to mankind and then some.

You would be in love with the big screen that drops from the ceiling at the touch of a button or the landing lights that go on automatically as one goes up the stairs...amazing stuff. So very cool-so very you! You would be having Drags over to make him put that stuff in by you as well, LOL, I know it.

While we chatted, he told me that he thought he saw something a few months ago, after he first moved in-a flash of bright light that whizzed right by him-we speculated that it could have been you. Andrew, of course, will have none of it, he does not believe at all. He wants you to visit by calling him a name, like you always did, or smacking him upside the head a good one. LOL

Me , I have had enough weird things happen to say, "I have no idea who/what is right or wrong," and I will leave it at at that.

Dragon called again tonight to say he ahs arranged a physic for me to see tomorrow! Seems the guy lives near him and is always going off to do readings for people with big $$$$ in other countries, has help police with missing people etc.

Very cool.

I know that these kind of things don't change anything-no matter who channels you, honey, you will not be coming back in the flesh anytime soon-but I go to these things with an open heart and mind, just to see what this person can shed some light on.
He does not know me from a bar of soap-so it will be fun at the very least.

Maybe there is something you need to say babe? I did not initiate this at all..:P

These are the most up to date pix so far-more later!

Love you Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey

Memories

2008-06-16T04:14:00.003-05:00

Dear Dazzy,

Here I sit in your home office, in your old computer chair, typing away while I answer email, post to BB's and write to you via this blog. I have been out and about all day, came home in time to make dinner, and now am planning some more things to do while in MEL, on my journey to a new normal.

I found things today in the house that broke me heart, yet made me smile at the same time. Our blue wedding goblets-the glass has bubbles in it, yet the stems are clear.
The bowl of the glass is the same brilliant blue we have in out TX home in curtains and pillows and paintings. I will pack these and take them there and put them in the kitchen cupboard near the sink; way out of my reach, but not out of sight.

Every time I open that cupboard, I will see them and remember the amazingly romantic time we had on our wedding day/night. Next week will mark what would have been six years of anniversaries. My tears can't help but fall when I feel the deja vu happening all around me-I am here in Oz, I have been 'round to see friends, I have had dim sim and tim tams and look up agog at the different star patterns late at night...

This time back in 2002, we were waiting for the twins and Kath USA to arrive. We had wedding lists and details to attend to and all was right in our universe.
We were making huge plans for the rest of our lives-to be lived together as husband and wife. We were madly in love and it showed.

Most of all we were happy.

I have your Kangool cap packed now as well-the black one that you are wearing in the photo on the opening page of this blog. One of my fave pix, that one; I love the beret-its so you, so cool, so worldly and artsy and handsome-it's a symbol, to me, of your artistic abilities, which never ceased to amaze anyone around you.

I also found those lil star candle holders-the crystal ones we used on our wedding table. I can see us "fluffing" the decor the day before when we went to settle the bill. We chose stars as a "theme"-even though we don't so themes-because we never got to see the same ones when we lived apart. Hopeless romantics, eh?

Then there was the magazine I sent you so many years ago, with the redone house that looked just like the Box Hill house( ok, so our house is still in the "before" stage, lol, poor thing. It was still in the nightstand drawer.

Still had my sticky note on it!" Babe, this is what the house will look like when we are done with it..."

How can a stupid sticky note still be here honey but you aren't?
Damn, that's not fair.

So, today Andrew and I went to Footscray and Brooklyn and the Docklands and over the Westgate bridge into Port Melbourne. We ate Vietnamese( beautiful stuff, not unlike Genroku)and I took photos and I looked at the beach with longing, remembering how you took me there-first time I had been back to a beach since I had moved to Texas.
We collected shells while you snapped a zillion pix of me, of us, of life.
I have the biggest grin ever in every single pix. So do you.

I still have those shells in a glass cylinder in our bedroom, back in TX.

I arrange them and rearrange them and when they are in my palm I feel the bright Aussie winter sun on my face and I can see the wind blowing the seagulls over the water and I remember the white down vest I wore and the flat white coffees we had at the Londoner Cafe right on the beach-

Those shells are my touchstones for a life that was filled with love in a form that I had never felt before.

Tonight, as I was cooking, for one brief moment I had that feeling that you were just down at the shops picking something upto go with our meal-fresh bread, a great bottle of wine, some kind of fun dessert-and while I was stir frying the veggies, I looked out of the big kitchen window every few minutes, and I watched as the winter sun slowly slid behind the treetops and the roof lines, the purple twilight enveloping it all, yin to the sun's yang.

The thought that our life together was just like the sunrise and sunset today was intriguing.

Dawn was when we first met.

At our zenith, we married. We were happy and eager for our future to unfold.

Now the twilight has separated us-and I am lost in the darkness of my emotions.

I am not afraid, just sad; aware that I will never have you in my arms again is a terribly heartbreaking acknowledgement.

The moon, however, is full and bright tonight. It illuminates the darkness. The memory of you-of us-is the moon in my night sky, honey.
You brought such light to my heart-how can I ever say thank you enough to make it worthwhile?

I knew this trip would be emotionally difficult. That's OK. I can handle it. I am hoping to come out of this period in my life better for all that has happened-but some days I wonder...

Tomorrrow I will have a different set of things to do, but they all revolve aorund you, babe. When I make dinner tomorrow night, I will again pretend for a second or two that you are only down at the store/the gym/Andrew's and will be back home really soon...

I will always be waiting for you to come home, honey. On both sides of the planet.

Love you Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey.

California Pix

2008-06-14T19:05:00.001-05:00

Stranger in a Strange Land

2008-06-14T17:07:00.003-05:00

span>Kangaroos in the park - Box Hill
Orb=?

Dear Dazzy,

Stranger in a Strange Land is a sci-fi book by Robert Heinlien that explores the way society and its different cultures act and react to any number of familial, socioeconomic and political viewpoints.

I first read it while I was in high school, and it was my favorite book for a while. To "grok" something is to understand it at a level that goes beyond the obvious; to say that I grok anything these days is a stretch.

Being in Oz is still a magical thing for me. It is familiar in some ways, yet amazing when I catch a glimpse of somjething out of my ordinary realm-kangaroos in a local park, lorikeets in the gum trees, Jacaranda trees in bloom-and it jolts me into that "Oh yeah, it's Australian" kind of thinking. I am happy here in a way that makes me feel like no other place does-so far.

Strange.

I do feel very much the stranger when I keep looking the wrong way for oncoming traffic, LOL, and I don't know if I will ever be comfortable enough to drive here. Good thing there is mass transit, but if I were to plop myself over here for a bit, I would have to learn how to drive again :P

Yesterday was another part of the sorting out journey- I went through the box from the garage. In it were wedding cards, our guest book, old stuffed animals, and some clothing of yours-just all heaped into the box willy nilly, your Tigers jumpers all wadded up and stuffed into plastic bags like dung for a trash heap. The person who stuffed all these things into the box and chucked it into the garage has obviously no reverence for anything of yours.

It's even more painfully obvious that that ideal will never change in my lifetime.
I'm sorry honey. Truly sorry. The house is the biggest mess I have ever seen.
Nothing matches, everything is the wrong size and it's all tacky and cheap and well, I almost glad you cannot see it. Not one drawer or closet or cupboard or area is organized.

Electronics rules the roost here now, and while they may be top of the line, when you cannot put anything down on a bench in the kitchen or the bathroom because of the clutter, well, things are just not right.

Of course, in the ultimate irony of the universe, I have to live here for two more weeks. Me, the neat freak, the organization and feng shui queen of the universe, LOL

You would be so disappointed in the way the house is neglegted.
Soemtimes I believe you already know, and thats why I feel you with me so much in TX.
There are a few nice flowering plants in a garden of sorts out there, but gardening needs to be taken in stride when there are dust mites playing poker on the window sills. Ick.

Going through the wedding cards was awful. I relived everything from June 23, 2002- our wonderful nighttime wedding wherein we promised each other forever. Every card was so full of good wishes I am amazed that it didn't carry us happily through the rest of our lives on karma alone. I also have our knife set and our wedding cake candles and all the silly little things that go with weddng nonsense that at the time was oh so important.

We knew the most important thing was US. We knew it and acted accordingly. I was me before I knew you and vica versa, but I have been forever changed by your love-so I am looking for me once again. That stranger in the stange land.

Anyway, I took a few photos while out the other day, and I have this great one of a bunch of Roos-and an Orb! Some people believe that Orbs are the captured bits of our deceased loves, especially near us when a "big" day or event or whatever is happenning. Is it you in this pix? I like the idea of saying yes, it is.

Maybe I am wrong, but I do not care anymore-it gives me comfort.

I have a photo of the twins, too, the Halloween after my Mom passed, and next to them and a plastic Casper figurine out in front of the house is a huge, flimsy orb. At the time, I didn't believe in any of that stuff, so I dismissed it as poor lighting and bad developing ( wow developing photos-that dates me, eh babe?). Now it's different.

Today I am off to sing Happy Birthday to MR P at luch down in Rosebud.
Yesterday we cought up with Mel and Marino and the kids-all so grown now, jeeze! Evryone was lovely; Mel made toasted sandwiches-YUM-but I was so alone in my skin; it was much too hard without you there, Dazzy.

It was-well, in a word, wrong.

It should never be just "Susan."

It should be "Susan and Dary.l"

Forever.

It will be 14 months this week since you last kissed me abd wrapped your arms around me and made me tea and took out the trash and went to work and brought me flowers and ...how do people keep going? I want to know how. I want a road map, a check list, a friggin REASON for crying out loud!

The thought od being the outsider looking in, the odd duck without its mate, the widow-your widow-for the rest of my life just makes me sad down to the marrow of my bones.

Once my trip here is over I will have a better idea of where I might fit in the world.
Sometimes I am afraid that I will figure out that I fit in nowhere. Stranger in a strang land? Or just everything too strange to reckon? Hmmm....

I use to know my path, my direction, my strenghts-and here, with my regular touchstones removed, I have to really ask myself a lot of hard questions. In the end, those questions are really meaningless, right babe?

Wish you could let me know what's coming next.

I look forward to the rest of this week-sorting through things and photos and whatnot, even though it will be hard, even though it will break my heart, even though you are not next to me inthe bed in the house with the ceilling of the glow-in-the-dark stars...

Love you Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey.

The Beauty of Oz

2008-06-13T17:16:00.004-05:00

Oz Sunrise from Qantas Q94

Dear Dazzy,

As the plane I was on rocketed through the night sky destined for Melbourne, I would open the window shade every hour to see if I could detect the changes to the east that meant the sunrise would be taking place soon, and that time marker meant that I would be close to landing.

Soon enough, the first glimpse of light sluiced its way between the almost furriness of black that inked the sky at our altitude and the curvature of Earth's horizon. I have seen this three times now, and every time it reminds me that I know why astronauts are in awe as they circle the globe; one cannot see this cosmic happening and just nonchalantly say, "Oh, look, the sun is coming up..."

It is mesmorizingly sharp in its colorations and fluidity. Its like a Rothko painting done in warp speed; colors bleeding into one another to encompass all the named hues of the visible spectrum. It is spectacular in its simplicity and calls to the artist within me with a spirituality that has nothing to do with religion.

Amazing.

Once the day punctured the night, the coastline was visible-and I had the immidiate thought of ,
"I am nearly home!" It was home when you were here with me, honey. I guess home was really whever you and I and the kids chose to be. Not sure how it will really feel now...

Of course, not to much longer after that, I was in Tullamarine airport and was driving off to Box Hill with Andrew. He hasn't been in the house since your brother changed the locks, right after he left our house in TX after your memorial service. I still scratch my head about that.
Andrew had a key for 25 years to the place-and now...well isn't everything different in our lives, babe, eh?

He still did not come in. He let me go in and be by myself for a few hours; unpacking and wandering around through the place that we hoped to retire to. Sad? overwhelmingly so.

This was the house that you painted up and cleaned and gardened in before my first visit in 2001. It's where we got engaged that year, where we called everyone we knew to tell them of our good news, to invite them to Oz the following year for our wedding.
OUR WEDDING!
How happy we were as we went out that night; you introducing me as your fiance. Our smiles were permanent, or so we thought.
Memories of that weekend will be in the front of my mind no matter what age I leave this planet to be with you again.

Giddiness and happiness and love are what I recalled as soon as I came in the back gate.
We never had a cross word in this house; we learned everything we could about one another as we IM'd via the computer across the miles and miles of ocean and earth.

It was really a very old fashioned courtship in a way; by the time you came to the US to visit it was just the cherry on the sundae. We already knew all the we needed to know.

So I sat on our bed-which is in the back room now-and had a good cry. Then I wandered through the small, wood frame home, standing in various doorways, running my hand over the positive affirmations that still adorn your full length mirror in what was your/our room....listening and looking and hoping against hope that this would be all a stupid TV show ending, a dream in which I would wake up in your arms, in the bed under the glow in the dark stars painted on the ceiling and all would be right within my universe once again.

That thought lasted for a fleeting moment; I know-it's been 14 months now-I know how "gone" you are. In TX, my life has a different pace, and I can busy myself with any manner of things-but here, in Box Hill, I have no set agenda, no work schedule, no dog schedule, no weekends with my college children , no picking up the phone at any time to call Kath or Mary or Cyn or whomever . I have to plan phone call times so I don't wake people up at 3 AM ( did that once in '01, sorry Nan).

I am glad I didn't attempt this trip last year.
At first, I wanted to run to Oz-I am sure my shock-filled brain thought at the time that I would find you there, honey. I just couldn't do anything last summer, let alone travel.

Hell, I was lucky to get out of bed and walk the dogs (many thanks to A and M).

So am I stronger? NO. HATE that word.
Maybe I am more acclimatized to your absence, but that's all.

So, on day one, I stayed up until midnight , going to the opening of Boeing Boeing that Andrew had a hand in, saw celebs at the after party-Rove McManus(Rove Live!) and Chris Liley
( Summer Heights High!)-got my sim card for my phone and an ID on Steve's computer.

It's familiar and otherworldly to me all at once.

I can feel you with me, here, though babe-hard to explain in words, but your heart knows what mine is trying to say. And yes, I will do my utmost to make sure what you worked so hard for isn't grubbed up by others with such a blatant disregard for living conditions. Ick.
Sorry its such a mess honey-I'll fix it. Promise.

Love you Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey.

Melbourne Rocks!

2008-06-12T19:02:00.007-05:00

Daz and Sue, at our house in Box Hill in much happier times....

Dear Dazzy:

Honey, I'm HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOME!

After a 3 hour hop from DFW to LAX, a side trip to Santa Monica Pier, and 15-oh yeah, 15-hours over the Pacific flying @38,000 feet going waaaaaaay too fast for normal humans, I touched down at Tullamarine Airport in Melbourne right on time, 8AM, June 12.

The trip I have been both dreading and longing for has become my reality.
I am letting the emotions and the expectations of my journey lead me where they will.

It promises to be quite the expedition. I am not unlike the main character in The Alchemist; Paolo Cuehlo's gift of a book about the inner journey to oneself as mirrored in the outward trek. This trip is the culmination of my mourning rituals over this past year; finalizing a place to house my Dazzy's tangible things and putting to rest in my heart all the hopes and dreams that ended on this side of the planet for us on that fateful day in 2007.

This small 3 bedroom house in a MEL suburb has become my Mecca, my Holy Grail, my Northern Star. I have a small amount of time-less than a month-to make all things right with my universe in Oz.

Hopefully, it will be enough time.

Leaving for Oz!

2008-06-09T22:10:00.002-05:00

Dear Dazzy,
Well, tomorrow is the day-I am off to Oz!
Box Hill North.
Our Australian home...

Friends and family and lammingtons and Footy and 'roos and a good dose of sad wait for me at Tullamarine Airport and beyond.

I am awash with emotion tonight; not all hard or sad- maybe because I talked to Ash before, and her spirit lifts me up whenever we yak, LOL, or because Mikey is here-home safe and sound from his NYC jaunt-and he and Boomer and Ranger always make me laugh...kind of like you used to, honey.

I am keen to see your/our friends and family. You most of all know how much I love being in the land down under. This time I am taking my resume and etc. and entertaining the thought of living there for two years or so-enough to become a citizen, so if I choose to retire there I could.

I will not dwell tonight on all the possibilites that we had for our life together that evaporated when you died; suffice it to say that I have had to regroup and rethink and reimagine scenarios that I only thought happened to older people.

Much older people. Not me. Not you! Not us...

Anyway, I am excited to see more people who loved you, who knew your essence, who loved the larrikin that I came to know in our short seven and a half years.

They had you longer-and yes I am a bit jealous at times about that-but I loved you with a richness of color that even they would say was grand.
We made each other happy, and loved lived in our hearts-simple as that.

So I have a LONG slog of a day at airports with lines and whatnot; some people from MUO will be babysitting me in L.A. ( thanks you thank you WizBin and Kate)and with luck I will sleep a bit.

I have made this trip twice before. It is long,but not unbearable.

The first time was in June 2001, after you had already come to visit me, and we knew we had to be together forever.
I was introduced to the land downunder by a larrikin that was so proud to be an Aussie! You loved your country, your friends, your home, your Footy team , LOL, and by then you even loved me.

I fell in love with everything, too-the way the kookaburras wake you up in the morning with their LOUD calls, the spectacular Pacific as it embraces parts of the island nation, coffee in REAL china cups at great lil coffe shops; lammington cakes and Tim Tam cookies, Footy and the Tiges and Rove live-it was instantly familiar to me even though I had never been that far via a plane-or anything else-before.

We got engaged that year-standing in the hallway at 12 Second Avenue, between your room and the bath. We kissed when I asked YOU-it was a private lil joke, carried over from out "hubby" and "wifey" goofing around, but we both knew it wouldn't matter who did the asking or who did the answering. It was a win-win situation.

We went right away and picked up the phone in your office and started calling people, all of them saying something to the effect of "yeah we figured" or "no kidding" etc. Everyone knew we belonged together.

Even our dogs! They each liked both of us, LOL

My second trip out to Australia was for our wedding, in June 2002.
Kath and the kids came this time, and we had that Sydney Harbor Brady Bunch honeymoon. It was fun and romantic and magical in every way possible.

They say the third time's the charm, but I don't know.
Yes, it is June, and I am off on the very same date I left on when we married.

Not sure if that is coincidence or necessity-school has to be out for me to travel, so...

There is no charm involved this time though; no reward at the end of my long journey-no handsome Aussie in a NY Yankees cap with a rakish grin and dimples that chiseled a face which I had come to equate all at once with the words rugged , handsome, and graceful.

You will not be there in a physical way, but I am sure I will feel your presence around me during my visit. How could I not? Our connection is something amazing-even a year and two months after your passing.

To say I still miss you is such a redundant thing, but it is still true.
I miss you. I love you. I still wish you were here, every second of every day.

The difference between last year and today? I just hide it better now.

But tomorrow I will go to a place that you loved as much as you loved out home here in TX. When I get the the house in Box Hill, I will stand in the hallway once again, this time with my wedding band- and yours- on my finger, and I will remember the laughter and the joy and the ear-to-ear grins. I will look at the table where we ate, the kitchen counter where you would set up your tea making acoutroments, and I will cry my heart out that I cannot cook lamb or pav or even just porridge for you any more. I will go into our bedroom and look up at the zillions of glow in the dark stars that cover your adolescent ceiling. :) and I will smile while I sob.

(And yes, I brought more with me to add to the collection, lol)

The stars-we always wanted to live in the same place, so we could see the same stars at night.

Hopeless romantics we were, eh babe?

Then it will be done-and hopefully I can move forward, going through your things, settling house issues with your brother, laughing with friends over stories and whatnot about you.

I will be doing in Oz what I do here now in Tx-go on without you.

You. My larger than life larrikin, my amazing friend, my wonderful hubby.

Part of me cannot wait to be in that space that you called home while we lived apart.

I know I will find more of me there, just like every other time I have visited. I have to thank you for that-for opening my life to greater things than I ever thought possible, all because you loved me.

Love you Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey.

One Sweet Dream....

2008-06-07T11:48:00.003-05:00

Dear Dazzy,

Honey, this past week not only have I dreamt of you-twice(!)-I have had a few
weird-y things happen as well. They are small, personal things that make me stop and think and wonder.

Because I have not always been on the "believer in signs" side of the fence, I am still skeptical at times. Other times, when I am sure it is your touch or scent or whatever I have experienced, I have the fervor of the newly converted, that wants everyone to see they way they see, and can't understand why anyone would want it to be otherwise.

Last night I went out with ML, and we had a good time up at Abueloe's.
It was the anniversary of her hubby's passing, 28 years ago. Yes, 28.
We talked about how he was the love of her life, how hard it was to go on with small children-a toddler and a new baby-and that no matter how long it has been, those emotions really do stay just below the surface for the rest of one's life.

At least they do when real love had lived within both hearts.

When I came home, I was wistful-it was a warm summer night, stars were flickering, and the crescent moon hung askew, like a modern installation of an old master's painting. All I could think of was how we should be in the convertible together, returning from some fun Friday night outing, the top down so we could see the moon all the way home.

Missing you is the thing that still, still, permeates my waking hours. I don't believe it will ever truly leave my spirit.
I force it away at times, but it always hovers around my periphery.

After I came home last night, I was on line a bit, then went to bed. Smash doesn't feel well, so she went to bed before me.
As I turned off the light in our room, I heard what sounded like someone whispering.
I checked my cd-radio( nope, not on) and my cell phone( nope, not ringing funny), and then realized it was coming from my pocketbook.

It turned out to be my MP3 player. I never had it on yesterday, and it is not touchy-feely in its operations-you have to consciously turn the thing on, holding down buttons and whatnot.

The song that was playing was "You Never Give Me Your Money" by the Beatles.
Funny title, but very apropos song-here are the lyrics that were playing when I heard it:

...Monday morning, turning back
Yellow lorry slow, nowhere to go
But oh, that magic feeling, nowhere to go
Oh, that magic feeling, nowhere to go
Nowhere to go

One sweet dream
Pick up the bags and get in the limousine
Soon we'll be away from here
Step on the gas and wipe that tear away
Came true today
Came true today, yes it did
My my my...
One sweet dream
came true
today

One two three four five six seven
All good children go to Heaven
{Repeat to fade}

So now, to overanylize...

Yellow lorry slow-you did drive and own a trucking co.for a bit in Oz.
The slow and nowhere to go? That's a bit like I feel these days...and that nagic feeling bit?
That has to be how I feel as well; no restictions on me after the kids graduate-OR it could be you, in your new "place" in the universe, no earthly shackles or demands or hurts or anything to wigh your soul down.

Even with that altruistic ideal, I still wish you were here in the earthly flesh again.

With me-where you belong. :)

I go to Oz on Tuesday. The limo is the airport shuttle, LOL
My sweet dream-about going to Oz with you-will never be realized, but maybe may part will?

Wiping away "that" tear tells me that my trip will be Ok in the end.

The "all good children go to heaven" part still has me a bit bewildered.

Is that where you are? Is there something more to this than you and I ever thought? I will not be finding manistream religion anytime soon, LOL we all know how you and I thought in that direction-but yeah, trying to keep an open mind here...

Oh and the time all this went on?
1:13 AM

How do I know?
Hard to miss the large, obnoxiously luminous digital numbers that glow in the darkeness of our bedroom, as they do every night, eminating from the front of the cd player/alarm/radio that sits opposite our bed.

It registered instantly that 113 is also the date of the first time we met via ICQ.
November 3, 1999.

11/3.

Most people would dismiss this as fantasy and nonesense, a widow grasping at straws of possible contact with the only man she has ever truly loved.

They may be correct, but I say screw 'em.

If anyone could reassure me from beyond the life-curtain that has drawn between Daz and I for now, it would be him. Larger than life, always insistant, always loving and wanting the best for me and the kids and his friends and family...

one sweet dream
came true
today

Love you, Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey.

Another Birthday Without You?

2008-05-29T22:52:00.002-05:00

Dear Dazzy,

How can it be that this makes two times now that the Sun has gone around the Earth and I get to add a candle on my chocolate cake and there are balloons and pressies and cards, and YOU are not in the thick of all this? I mean life keeps going and I feel I am still on the outside of the picture window looking in...

Sad day today-just sad. People at work remembered, Kath still thinks my B-day is ON Memorial Day-gotta love her, she's just like you with important dates-and while it was an OK day, it's so hollow without you to share it with. I wonder when that feeling will ever go away. I wonder IF that feeling will ever go away.

Have a cold as well-pretty good considering that I haven't been sick in a year and a half! Glad I got it NOW and not right before I go to Oz.

I used to make my yearly goals list on my birthday every year-a list, a vision board, my future shaped by my thought and words and intention-or so I thought.
Now that I know we control nothing, how am I going to make that new list?

What's the point?

What really matters?

I know if you were here I would have had flowers sent to me at work, you would have cooked or brought home food, and you would have left a card and a pressie on the dining room table for me to find early this morning.

The card would have been funny and cartoony, you would have signed it ,"With Heaps of Love, Daryl, AKA Hubby" and you would have had my tea ready to go, in my red mug...

Instead I made my own tea. Kids made me dinner, bought me tix to a play, did cake and balloons( green and gold-good on'em eh babe?)I didn;t feel well enough to do anything except watch TV and blog.

Now I am off to bed; hating that you are not here.

Just hating it, babe.
No good reason for your leaving, no plan or other bullshit that works for me.
Nothing works.
Nothing.

My tears tonight are for the time that we did have together, on birthdays and anniversaries and every other day that ends with a "y," now that I know how love really goes-how am I ever going to celebrate anything again and mean it?

Such a long time without you now, honey.
Such a sad and lonely time.
I am sick of holidays, birthdays, all my days without you.

Love you Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey.

BOOKED!

2008-05-27T23:21:00.003-05:00

Dear Dazzy,

Well, finally, I have settled my itinerary for Oz -
I arrive in Tullemarine on June 12, and back in DFW on July 1st.

Wow. The arrival date is the same on I had when we were getting married in 02-what a fun plane trip that was, knowing YOU were the prize at the end of the ride, babe. I carried my dress, and chatted up anyone who wanted to know about my Aussie hubby-to-be.

Now I have the whole trip to think about us again, only this time-well, this time "THE END" shows up at a much too early point in our fairy tale love story.

Damn.

I know I will be incredibly sad for more than a few days-just hoping that the funk will wear off in time for me to enjoy Oz a bit without you being there in the flesh-I know you will be with me in my heart, honey, but I have never done Oz without the promise of you and your love, your warmth, your "I'll take care of us" attitude...not sure how this will play out. I am ctying as I type tonight, hoping this sadness will pass.

Some friends are hi-fiving me like it's this fabby trip I have planned-and I just shake my head and think they STILL don't have a clue. They won't ever get one, either, until some horrible twist of fate stops by their doorstep one night and brings the Armageddon of change to their lives.

I do not ever wish this pain on anyone. Ever.
Not even on my Ex- and for people who know me, that's really saying something.

I am going to Australia to visit our friends and family and to sort out your stuff that's still over there. Paintings come home with me, as do wedding pressies and pictures. We will donate clothing and whatnot; the lawyers will sort out the house title and the chips to that will fall where they may.

Honey, I know you are NOT happy about your brother taking advantage of our situation, but it will work out in the end. I am sure of it.

I will call your Mum and Andrew and etc soon and send them all my details and set up a calendar of things to keep me busy/happy/etc for my three weeks abroad.

I am hoping to meet up with some MatesUpOver people and some widows from the widow board I frequent. I know that Dragan and Mel and Kath and Trish , etc will be around here and there so it will be fun on one level to see everyone-but I will be the one to make them all cry as well. You get to be the elephant in the room-the VIP.

Just like you, eh, babe, to be the center of attention, even in your passing, LOL
This will be quite the trip-emotionally more than anything else. Oh how I wish you were still here nad we were going together...

That flood of memories is threatening to spill over the dam of emotion from when I first visited you at the lil house in Box Hill North-I KNEW when I walked in with you that this would be OUR home in years to come, that we would be so happy there...

It's where we got engaged that June, in 2001; it's where we had our first dinner party thingy; it's where love had come to live within our hearts.

I believed it would be forever.
In a way it is-we will always be married, even if one of us is not physically here anymore.

Here's to a trip filled with memories that sustain me, and the kids, and all those who love you still, my handsome hunk-o-spunk-here's to love that truly lasts forever-the love you gave us all.

Love you Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey.

Boomer and Ranger, my "boys"

2008-05-17T11:49:00.002-05:00

Just testing the picasa app that embeds pix here-want to test drive it before I am off ot Oz next month! I am going to blog about my adventures in the land-dowunder so people in the US can see how/what I am doing-Buying tix later on today; planning and whatnot to follow.

I am both happy and sad to be making this jump across the pond; so bittersweet to know that you will not be at Tullamarine, babe, standing head and shoulders above the crowd with that wickedly handsome grin and your NY baseball cap on, each of us looking for the other after a prolonged absense-sigh.

Not sure how I am going to get through this, but like eveyhting else you know I will, and I will be the better person for it. That's what people say, anyway...

I really have had rather decent days lately, only a spot here and there when I cry a bit about what we have lost-and really all we have lost is time , honey.
The love is still there, the bond between us doesn't feel severed in any way, it's just that you aren't next to me in bed/the car/the dinner table and it still-after 13 months time-still takes me aback that your spot is empty of your physical prescence.

Wonder if that feeling will ever fade? Hmmmm....

Not much of a post here really, I notice I am making them farther and farther apart-and that, I believe, may be progress?

I think I have explored my feelings here to a point of repetition, yet acceptance has come of that-while I will never accept your early passing as something
pre-ordained or good or needed, I can accept that it will be a while before we meet again.

I have three and a half weeks 'til school is OVER for 2008; I start back with my Master's stuff in September, and in between I will visit Oz and all our friends and family there and go to Austin to see Kath and she'll come up here, and maybe I will even visit other friends in the US.

Last year it was all about cocooning in our lil love nest;then I was in that fetal position, howling all rest of the summer; now I want to scout out locations for the next chapter in my book of life.
Moving is somewhere on my distant horizon; whether its going to be Oz or the Us or the moon, LOL, who knows? It's coming though-I can "feel it in me waters," like K&K say.

Another part of our Grand Adventure, eh babe? I know you will be with me wherever I deceide to go. But going is coming, LOL, and I am starting to look forward to that. Progress. Slow, but progress still...

Love you, Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey

Mother's Day

2008-05-11T09:24:00.005-05:00

Dear Dazzy,

In Oz, Mum's day has already come and gone; I called your Mum and we talked a bit late last night. We were both missing you, as we do. I told her how hard it is to get up on Mother's day and know there will be no card, no pressie, no flowers from you-the kids will make up for it, of course, but there will always be that "Dazzy" space that one will will ever be able to fill.

I DID hear lost of music thought yesterday that was very meaningful to both of us-and honestly when Men at Work's "Downunder" came on in the Home Depot, I thought RIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIGHT, it was almost like you were with me saying you liked the mulch I picked out, LOL

Then at the grocery store the signs continue with "And I miss you...like the desert needs the rain" and then Sting's "Every breath you take" and...well I got it babe! But I swear I am going to sabotage the sound system in the Kroger the next time I go, LOL

So today I am making Mahi-Mahi and grilled veggies and some kind of lemon cake w/strawberries; the kids wanted to take me out but since I have no one to cook for/with most of the time I am going to do the work today, LOL

I really am looking forward to having them around this summer-when we are all here, LOL, we will be more like ships in the night, but that's fine too-it's their last year of college, and after next summer who knows where everyone will be living/partying/enjoying life!

I love everything about bing a Mom that one can love-I could skip the worrying part, LOL, but to see the fuition of all our hard work-mine early on, yours in their teen years-well, its just magical. I have great hopes and wonderful promise for those twins, honey.
I know you are proud of the way they do thingns, and especially happy with the way they help take care of me! What great adults they are shaping up to be...

I will be looking at school teaching in Oz when I take my trip in June; if they have a teacher exchange program it might work out for me to stay a whole year-wouldn't that be cool?
I'd rent out the TX house and go live with your brother! HAHAHA wouldn't he just LOVE that one...:P But then I could get to see Oz in all her year round glory-something I thought we would do when we retired there. In the future. Our future...and sadly, we know that has all changed now.

Today will be what it is-a beautiful TX spring day with the company of our wonderful kids( OURS, honey, just like you always called 'em)and Putt-Putt golf and a movie, silly stuff we all like to do, and a nice meal eaten together. I am grateful for days like these, and even though I miss you like crazy, we will still all have a good time.

Quite a change from a year ago, when all I did was lie on the couch, cry my eyes out, and tell the kids I didn't want any presents or cake. Kids-they never listen, LOL
Those mile-wide gashes on my heart and soul must be healing over.
Last year I wasn't so sure they would- so I will take my observations as progress.

Heaps to do this week-only two more sections of fence to paint, woohoo!
Then I want to really finish around the garden path with the flagstone, etc. I never thought I could do all this by myself-but like the cliche goes:

"How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time, :P"

So I have been dining on Elephant outside landscape wise and I know I can really make a dent in what I /we wanted to do out there. Pictures at 11...

Speaking of Mums/Moms, you know that my mom has been gone ten years next week-where does time go, babe? Her touch and the scent of her White Shoulders perfume and her kind ways live in me still. Have a cuppa with her today, she'd like that. :)

Your ways will live with me as well, honey, all the rest of my life-for "to live on in the hearts of others is not to die." I am proud to be the one that gets to tell your story, and Mom's too.

(Since I dont have pix of her for ten years now, I will have to scan a bunch of what I do have for that May 22 date.)

Too bad I have to do it all alone.

Love you, Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey.

Winding up? Winding down?

2008-05-06T21:34:00.005-05:00

Ashley's Performance(-she's on the right)

Mikey and Boomer

Me and Dad , AKA JacksonFoShizzle!

Dear Dazzy,

Yes, I know I haven't updated here in a bit-not because I don't have anything to comment on, LOL, but more and more I am returning to a life that does not include hour upon lonely hour staring at the cpu monitor...

Spring is in full swing-and so is the garden! I have pumpkin, beans, tomatoes, watermelon, and heaps of flowers-its filling in nicely and I know you would be proud of me doing it all myself, babe!

Mikey was here this weekend, and he helped me a bit around the yard-he fertilized-and we ran the sprinklers( they WORKED yea)and all that jazz. We went out to eat and did a movie, and on Sunday we watched Family guy while we ate in the lounge room. It made me remember when you and I would do that-sometimes with a kid or two when they were home-and I had what I call the sad smile inside.

Then, halfway through the show, the Dad character starts singing, "I come from the land down under..." and he screws up the rest of the words and Mikey and I, well, we just cracked up. Two seconds after it finished,though, I had the tear works start!

I was surprised at how quickly my old "friend" grief can still rear its ugly head. I cried some after the Moo left, but then went for a great walk and got it all settled before bedtime.

I had counseling today-and we agreed that after my Oz trip we can begin winding down the visits. She is happy with my progress, and so am I. I am never going to be healed, or cured, or fully accepting of the gone-ness of you, honey, but we all know that I hate being negative and sad more than almost anything.

I am happy to have heaps going on at the moment-Mikey going to Italy in June, me in Oz, Ash taking classes and doing performances-it's a summer I am looking forward to. Can't believe it will be the second one since you left us....:( I still have no idea where the time went.

I am thinking of finishing up this blog as well-not that I have nothing to say to you, honey, but I need to focus more on the "me" part of our life together now, and while I will always keep you in my heart, my writings of you are going to go into Biography form. I am toying with the idea of a new blog-but not sure really at this exact moment. You will know when I do, babe, LOL

Of course you may already know stuff that I can only dream about-leave it up to you to be the "first" to see what's next in this crazy game of Life.

Mother's Day is Sunday-and I am sending Val something you would approve of. I hope it makes her smile through her tears...

So I'll be getting tix soon for Oz and seeing everyone who loved you, besides me, of course. I am apprehensive yet optimistic.

Kind of like how I am in life right now.

Boomer J. continues to "dazzle" us with his wookie impersonations;he is so LOUD it's really funny. When it is warm he sleeps under the chair, just like Ranger used to do! Rangie is way too spoiled now and only sleeps on the bed, LOL.

So all in all life is OK right this second-I have lost a bit of weight, I am working out much more, I make the effort to go out on the weekends-even if I am the fifth wheel sometimes-and the garden makes me almost joyful.

I love you Dazzy, you know that, and I miss you beyond words-yet I am anxious for the next chapter in my life to begin to gel.
I have no clue what/how it's going to be like, so if you know something I don't, honey-spill it!

(You know you never could keep anything from me for a long time, LOL except my gorgeous ring, of course! How you did that I will never know...)

As time goes on, I more forcibly extract myself from the maws of the black hole named Grief. I concentrate on finding purpose and meaning in my life once again.
I know it will come-but you know how I have so little patience, babe. I am tired of waiting,and if you have any pull wherever you are, put my name at the top of the "Happiness" list will ya honey? Thanks babe. For everything!

Love you, Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey

Anzac Day-YOUR memorial day as well...

2008-04-25T19:22:00.004-05:00

Dear Dazzy,

Today marks one year from you memorial service.
It is also Anzac Day in Oz.
At the time, I was just waiting long enough for Andrew and Trish and Steve to arrive so we could celebrate your life and yoiur passing-I really was not aware of the signifigance of the date when we booked for Wednesday the 25th at 7 PM.

We had such an untraditional service that people STILL talk to me about it-how it was so you, how it was more authentic than any church-led service could have ver been-and I will never forget Mikey and Dave's Jim Beam run to the Colony ( b/c we live in a dry town)Liquor Store, LOL.

Mikey's band learned "Home Among The Gum Trees," an oldie that you used to sing when we worked around the house...in that goofy, silly, play-around voice that you would use.

It is not shocking to me that I do not feel well today-chills, sinus, allergies, the works. I am shocked that I haven't really been sick in a very long time! How I missed it all within the confines of my grief I will never know.

I was supposed to meet the Aussie mob for dinner at Outback tonight-but I called them and cancelled once I made it through the school day using a box of kleenex and countless ibuprofin. I am updating here early and then off to bed. UGH. Hate being sick...and no one is here to buy me sick pressies( The Star Magazine, my fave choccies, flowers...)so I bought my own small bunch of roses on the way home along with chicken stock( couldn't remember if I had some home or not; of course I did, lol)and some blackberries.If I could actually taste anything, I would say YUM.

Speaking of school, we had the water off for hours after a pipe burst in the wall by the 8th grade bathrooms. It was kind of funny and kind of a pain since we were all displaced for most of the day-and for some of my students who don't deal well with change, well, let's just say I am happy it was a Friday.

So now I am sitting here in a quiet houise-which doesn't upset me anymore. I like the solitude, I embrace it; I know I can pick up the phone and call a zillion different people if I neede to-but I am O.K. as is.

Another milestone, eh, babe?

So the garden is doing well, Ashley got a scholarship from the UNT Dance Dept-
"Go SMASHLEY, well done!" I can hear your voice saying it, LOL, Mike is pumped about Italia-we are all finding that mythical place called the "New Normal" in our lives.

Me included.

I have lost almost ten pounds( YEA ME)from the widda weight I put on while grieving, and I feel empowered about my health choices once again.
I am returing to finish my Master's degree this fall and I am booking my Oz ticket ASAP.
I know it will be very bittersweet, but I am hoping my Oz trip will cememnt your friend's lives with mine forever. I'd hate to lose them as well after losing you, honey.

So, after all these Fridays that have sucked the marrow from the etherial bones of my soul, here I am looking forward-ahead, to the future-instead of behind me at life's door that had slammed shut so apruptly.

Progress, babe, progress. I know you are proud.

I know it.

Off for more kleenex and doggie cuddles-

Love you Dazzy. Always.
Kisses, Wifey.

One year ago...

2008-04-20T00:01:00.003-05:00

You woke me up so I would get to work on time...
You told me you loved me...
You made my tea...
You asked where I wanted to go for dinner...
You kissed me goodbye...

That arvo, our lives changed in an instant.

I will never understand why.

Never.

I have cried oceans of tears, cursed all the gods man has ever invented, and still I have no answers.

Your death feels like it happened both a lifetime ago and just yesterday, all at the same time.

The only thing I know now is that I CAN be resilliant, even if I don't WANT to be.

So, in your honor, honey, we have named a star for you, planted trees, bought a memorial bench. Donated money and time to the AHA.

You were a selfless organ donor, but you gave more to people through your kindness and that cheeky smile than we will ever know.

Right now, I simply have no more words. These, by the group Bread, say it all.

Always.
Kisses, Wifey

T minus 2

2008-04-19T08:16:00.003-05:00

Dear Dazzy,

Here we are babe! LOL

Australia, the Movie comes out later this year-can't wait to see it. I am sure I will sob through the whole thing-but I am really looking forward to being swept away by it.

And looking at HJ for a few hours surely won't hurt me either :P

Love you Dazzy-always.

Kisses, Wifey

T minus 3

2008-04-19T07:48:00.001-05:00

Lisa Williams-Medium and Psychic in Dallas, April 18th!

Dear Dazzy,

The Lisa Williams book signing was awesome! She really is a larger than life personality-kind of like you, babe, LOL She's cute and funny and very humble in a way-I wish she lived next door, she and I would get on really well. You can tell she knows how to enjoy herself....:)

I took a few pix while I was in the crowd; the one that's the most fascinating is the one with the "orbs-" blasts of energy that people swear are our dearly departed. I used to think it was camera issues, but since I have since reconsidered. I am not 100 % convinced, but hey-what I know now, after a year into this journey, is that I know NOTHING for sure.

I cannot for the life of me figure out what I did in Picasa that caused me to loos the orb pix-I swear I saved it-but here's Lisa anyway, signing a card to moi ( they had run out of books!).

I told her that you had died a year ago, and that her show-along with her insight-had really helped me through some dark days and nights. She hugged me, and looked straight at me and said,

" He's always with you, you know. Always. Just think of him as being in the next room..."

She had tears in her eyes. So did I. I was surprised that I was that emotional with someone that I don't know that well in real life; I have seen her show a zillion times but I am not a crazy fan who thinks that means that I can actually connect with her on a personal level-but it was really quite intimate in a way.

So my wonderful Friday off turned into half a day off because they released my Dad from hospital, and since I was the one who was home-lucky me-I got to go pick him up, get his meds, settle him in the apt., yada yada yada. It was fine, really, I can make up my missed apts on Saturday-but still.

He doesn't have a lot of "him" left in there-he is not senile, but I get the feeling he has given up on life itself. I hope that some interventions that we are doing will find the spark for him once again. I know its the beginning of that long downhill slide into oblivion, but it pisses me off royally when someone who HAS the gift of life still doesn't want to take it by the horns and ride.

I guess it's all perspective.

On now to Saturday-Oh and Dragan ( James) called and left me a message-you know, your friend who has NEVER called at all, or sent a card, or even acknowledged your death-seems he was "too distraught." Ha. He has no clue, now, does he babe? I guess he figures he better talk to me now since I am going to be in Oz in June. It should be a very interesting conversation to say the least.

Off to Saturday land-gardening and phone calls from friends and who knows what else the universe has in store for us....:) Here's putting in an order for nothing but wonderful things.

Love you Dazzy-Always.
Kisses, Wifey

T minus 4

2008-04-18T09:05:00.003-05:00

Dear Dazzy,

Thursday was my last work day this week-I put in for a pesonal day for Friday the 18th a long time ago. Not being very sure about my emotions of that day, I figured I should give myslef some breathing room just in case. The real events of this Thursday however are my dad being in the hospital( he'll be home in a few days; bad UTI kidney infection)and the W I L D weather that rolled through.

Once again , the drive home is sunny and uneventful, but an hour later the rain starts and the TV Weather people go into hyper-overdrive as they salivate over the possibility of "tornadic activity." I love the weather in TX for the most part, but I am soooooooooooooo over April and her fickle ways.

You know me , honey-I have the radio and supplies and my cell phone ( that I know will not work when the power goes out but hey humor me) and enough flashlights and batteries that I could probably do a decent rendition of any rock star's ligt show, LOL; my adrenalin kicks in and I silently freak out that I am alone in a house with two dogs who have no clue.

It didn't last too long-the kids got worse hail and rain than we did-and soon I was back on line, enjoying some computer time, chatting with friends.

Other news of the day was that I got word that they are printing my short ( 600 words+/- a few) widow essay in Sunday's Dallas Morning News. Thanks, honey. I am sure that's no coincidence!

At least, that's what I would like to believe. That you still have my back, that you are watching over me, and the kids, and you will do so until we all meet again. That's small compensation for not livng my life alongside of you, but if that's all that I can have, I'll accept.

Something is truly better than nothing, isn't it? I lie to myself and say it is.

So Friday looms large. It's the last Friday in the year since you left us. I will make an effort to be in the house at 4pm, and sit in the last space you ever occupied. I hope I can just meditate about live and love and all that's important during this anniversary of sorts.

I have counted Fridays for a year now-and after this one, I will stop. I have figured out it doesn't matter how many Friday's go by, I will always love you. Miss you. Wish you were still here. I always wonder about your last few moments her eon earth and I pray to any god who will have me that you did indeed pass away as swiftly as I have been led to believe. That you didn't have pain, that you weren't scared, that...damn. Questions! I will probably always have them, but I have put them away now. They don't help either of us, do they?

Life , however, is still for the living and that's what I truly intend to do-live. And just for you, babe, in your honor, I will really live it up! :) I know that's what you'd want for me.

I would wish the same for you, had the situations been reversed. You know that, I'm sure.

So, this Friday, I have hair and nail and massage appointments and will go to see Lisa Willams at her book signing. I am excited about that one! I hope you duck your head in and say "G'Day" in some exciting way. I know you, and all the world was your stage, so to speak, so c,mon, aussie c'mon-say "G'Day Gorgeous" one more time-go ahead and use ole Lisa. Make us both smile.

That's what she's there for !

I am really seeing much more light at the end of the tunnel these days. The good thing is it's not attached to the front of an oncoming train! I don't know what the big turning point was, because it crept in slowly. But I have this gut feeling that my blackest days are behind me, and hope and joy are darting in and out of the shadows, playing tag with my emotions.

Eventually I will stand still enough for them to touch me and say, "Tag, you're IT!"

Love you, Dazzy. Always.

Kisses, Wifey

Countdown mode-T minus 5...

2008-04-16T17:50:00.004-05:00

Dear Dazzy,

So, after a blowout on the Sebring, two new tires, a red-light ticket( ME????) and a huge "something" bite on my ankle that if it gets any bigger I will have to name,
I was happy to have a quiet night Tuesday.
I did spend a good portion of it on the phone, but you know that is not ever a hardship for me. :)

It was all that practice I had with you, babe, all those years ago...

So here we are in the midst of that last week before you and I move into year TWO.
This timeline boggles at its complexity; I have said it many, many times-it feels like both a lifetime ago and just yesterday since you and I cuddled up on the sofa to watch COPS or Family Guy or any myriad of movies we owned/rented/downloaded.

Didn't you just leave a "G'day, Gorgeous" on my phone?

Didn't we just laugh together for the billionth time over something stupid and goofy that Rangie, we or the kids did?

I am sure it was less than 24 hours ago that I called and left you a message at work about that Friday night (a year ago!) and what/where you felt like eating; which movie was your pick to go see; what home improvement project we would do next-all the fun things we would gab about.

T minus 5...you would laugh about that reference, re: our Star Trek/Star Wars thing; and our nighttime sky star wishes. I miss that heaps, babe. Always will, too.

However, as much as I still miss all those things, I have made peace with the fact that you and I will not be together in the same physicality for quite some time. I am really OK with it finally, and I am starting to look forward to the future instead of looking only to the memories of the past.

Day by day, moment by moment, slowly but surely, I am building a new normal. I am great some days, awful others, but all told I have far more good days than bad now. I am happy about that-and you know , babe, it's been far too long since I could use the word happy in a sentence that was connected to moi.

I will go back to finish my master's degree in the fall. I will be visiting Oz in June and settling some things over there with regard to your estate.
I have finally gotten a handle on the weight thingy! I am planning again-and while I may never have Pollyanna as a middle name anymore, lol, I know I can find joy once again in my life. I am weirdly certain of it. I can hear it fluttering around, like the wings of a dragonfly-deceptively delicate yet capable of flight.

Leonardo Davinci once said,

" Once you have tasted flight,
you will forever walk the earth
with your eyes turned skyward,
for there you have been,

and there you will always long to return."

Indeed.

Love you, Dazzy. Always.

Kisses, Wifey.