Broken Lives Matter

Ten days since I last blogged? My how time flies. I've been so busy (or lethargic), everything is just a blur. Well, the good news is I've started getting into writing my story about me and Mikel...but I don't think it will be done any time soon. Maybe not even this year! We were together a year, and there is so much correspondence and material to go on. Just the journals I've kept and the memories that go along with them are a novel in themselves. Then there's the fact that writing everything; my sadness, my bewilderment, my shock, fury, disappointment and miniscule joys--is exhausting. I've hardly even begun the first chapter and it's almost more than I can bare. After every writing session I find myself needing to break for a day or two just to get my head back on straight:( But I do have a wonderful office. Or at least the makings of a wonderful office:) The floor is unfinished wood and the closet doors don't close properly. But I have the w...

And here it is, my wedding ring:') I had planned, months ago, that this blog would end when I received this ring and said my vows. The gold band with scrolled sides and the outline of a heart encircling an engraved "o" were to be the crown I wore around my finger. An entry entitled "Crowned" was to be the end. But somehow this is not the end! This ring is the biggest promise he made--and kept--to me. It symbolizes much more to come, and a much more different life than I had planned. Whatever lies ahead for both of us, I know he will help me through it. Mikel will always, always be a part of me. And of course I didn't need a symbol of that, but now there is no denying it. My heart will hold the memories, the ring will display my heart.

Yesterday I had a revelation. Things are a lot easier for me, all of a sudden, than I thought they were two months ago. When you're hit with the death of your whole world after a quick, terrible illness, it feels like the air is rapidly being removed from your lungs. You feel like everything everywhere is collapsing in on you, and the whole world is against you. Given all of these suffocating factors, of course you're also going to feel like the simplest things are impossible, and the harder things will almost kill you. But then if you're lucky, and I guess I am, something happens. You discover friends who love you whom you've never met in person. Family will appear from out of the blue to support you and encourage you when you feel like you'd much rather join the person you've lost than go on. And all around you will appear new places for your energy and love. I thank whatever inspired me to seek another dog on the Internet just a few days after Mikel...

My life-long anthem singer, the man who has unwittingly written my entire life's story in his songs, Tom Waits, sings a song with a very appropriate line for this moment, in a song called "Hold On." Possibly my favorite song of all time, it sings, "with charcoal eyes and Monroe hips, she went and took that California trip. Well the moon was gold her hair like wind, she said don't look back..." and here I am. Planning a trip to California to properly remember my own beloved with his family and friends who loved him. I'm just lucky enough to have loved him too, so now I've been adopted into his circle of distant friends and family, all of whom I can't wait to meet. I'm planning on taking the train down too, which brings even more romance to this whole affair; I always wanted to take Michael on a train for some part of our honeymoon. He'd never been on one, and I thought this was such a shame; once we wandered into a toy store and he la...

Tonight's entire dinner I owe to a little help from my friend:) Yesterday I bought some ground lamb, starving for a little something tastier than beef or chicken. And I had just finally gone to the health food store near by to get groceries. Surprisingly, the health food store is where you go for game meat in this neighborhood. Well, the only thing that came to mind to do with ground lamb was either chili or shepherd's pie, neither of which sounded very appealing in this God forsaken heat! So I grabbed one of Mikel's cookbooks that he'd had before he even met me, and found a recipe for ground lamb patties on salad. It sounded delicious, and fairly quick, so I started gathering ingredients. To my shock and delight we had almost all the Greek-inspired spices, and they were all in Mikel's spice drawer in the apartment before he met me. Cumin, paprika, mint tea (that I sprinkled on the meat), and amazingly, Montreal Steak Seasoning! As I think about it, maybe Mik...