It has now been almost six months since my wife Rosanne passed away. For the second time in 20 years I have endured the initial stages of grieving the death of a spouse. I honestly believed that I had it all licked -- feeling stronger both emotionally and physically, getting on with life with a degree of normality as I remembered it.
Then out of the blue last evening as I was preparing supper, I felt the onslaught of a heavy ache in my upper gut and chest. Tears began to flow. "Good God almighty, it's happening again. I thought that I was all over this sort of thing," was my initial reaction. It was all I could do to control emotions and to return to the priority at hand -- getting supper.
For the balance of the evening, and even this morning, I have struggled with the depressive thought that for all intents and purposes, my life is over...nothing of significance to live for, not that my life has been of much significance anyway.
After all, when you stop to think about it, what does life really have to offer an 80 year old of meager means...One who has seen it all and done most of it? The question does give one pause.
Strange how grief can crop up on you when you least expect it or when you are, often unknowingly, most vulnerable. It is all part of losing something, or someone, of significance. Nothing is more final than death. What is gone, is gone, forever. What was, is no longer. That is the worst part of it.
As an escape or divergence, my impulse was to turn to one of the few things that satisfies a need within me -- offering my thoughts in writing on Wrights Lane
I have always felt that there is an inherent sort of comfort in wrapping myself in words, either of my own creation or that of others, and losing myself to a different kind of world for just a little while.
Well-written words on their own sing just as much as any song, and what’s more, they have the power to truly speak to you (the part of you that’s hurting). Because, regardless of how you’re feeling, there is undoubtedly someone who has felt like you before, and the power of music and words can bring about that emotion and re contextualize it in yourself and your current suffering.
Also, if I try to create, whether it be any form of writing or art, I feel incredibly separate from whatever is going on in my day-to-day existance. Creativity lets me truly bond with whatever art medium I’m working with, and I think that engaging in the creation of something you’re naturally passionate about is the best cure-all on the planet.
It’s important to recognize, too, that often times, suffering brings about the best writing. Pain leads to many of the greatest songs and symphonies. The power of either losing yourself to the world created from words, musical notes or a paint brush, or creating a new world from your suffering is something that we all can look to when there seems to be nothing left, if there truly is nothing. Then why not try to create something?
Then out of the blue last evening as I was preparing supper, I felt the onslaught of a heavy ache in my upper gut and chest. Tears began to flow. "Good God almighty, it's happening again. I thought that I was all over this sort of thing," was my initial reaction. It was all I could do to control emotions and to return to the priority at hand -- getting supper.
For the balance of the evening, and even this morning, I have struggled with the depressive thought that for all intents and purposes, my life is over...nothing of significance to live for, not that my life has been of much significance anyway.
After all, when you stop to think about it, what does life really have to offer an 80 year old of meager means...One who has seen it all and done most of it? The question does give one pause.
Strange how grief can crop up on you when you least expect it or when you are, often unknowingly, most vulnerable. It is all part of losing something, or someone, of significance. Nothing is more final than death. What is gone, is gone, forever. What was, is no longer. That is the worst part of it.
As an escape or divergence, my impulse was to turn to one of the few things that satisfies a need within me -- offering my thoughts in writing on Wrights Lane
I have always felt that there is an inherent sort of comfort in wrapping myself in words, either of my own creation or that of others, and losing myself to a different kind of world for just a little while.
Well-written words on their own sing just as much as any song, and what’s more, they have the power to truly speak to you (the part of you that’s hurting). Because, regardless of how you’re feeling, there is undoubtedly someone who has felt like you before, and the power of music and words can bring about that emotion and re contextualize it in yourself and your current suffering.
Also, if I try to create, whether it be any form of writing or art, I feel incredibly separate from whatever is going on in my day-to-day existance. Creativity lets me truly bond with whatever art medium I’m working with, and I think that engaging in the creation of something you’re naturally passionate about is the best cure-all on the planet.
It’s important to recognize, too, that often times, suffering brings about the best writing. Pain leads to many of the greatest songs and symphonies. The power of either losing yourself to the world created from words, musical notes or a paint brush, or creating a new world from your suffering is something that we all can look to when there seems to be nothing left, if there truly is nothing. Then why not try to create something?
And, how do I go about creating that something? I turn inward, because I am all that I have left.
I have to realize that I am temporarily being sucked into a familiar and painful vacuum, but this too shall pass. Maybe, just maybe there is something better in store for me tomorrow, giving renewal to a belief that Life's the greatest...Live it to the fullest! You just never know what's in store for you.
Life is like a sine wave. It's a continual test of endurance and self-reliance, full of changes and surprises to the very end. It is not like me to back away from change and I like surprises.
That's the way I look at it, anyway.
Thanks for listening!
That's the way I look at it, anyway.
Thanks for listening!
No comments:
Post a Comment