In the Mists of My Mind ~ Part 1 of 3

     After my husband passed away last year everyone thought I would be doing my best work, writing at my very best.  This made me think I should be writing at my very best too.  To my chagrin, not only could I not write a word, I stopped reading altogether; and I am an avid reader.  I would sit in front of the computer, blank screen, and think to myself, "THINK.  Just think.  Put one word down.  Just one."

     Nothing.  Nada.  Not one letter.  Not one syllable.  Not one word.  Nothing.  More surprising, I didn't feel upset or frustrated  about it.  I didn't care.  It did not phase me at all.

     What I did do was turn on my solitaire and play ... for hours ... and hours ... and hours.  I had found Mahjong several months before my husband passed.  I played it.  For hours ... and hours ... and hours, also. 

     A dear friend introduced me to Pinterest.  I very quickly became obsessed with it too.    I would get on Pinterest and look at everything. I started with tea cups and tea pots, animals, houses, nature and styles.  Then I began looking at clothes, doors, windows, house decorating, outside décor, gardening, flowers, anything and everything I could find, I looked at.

     When I wasn't on the computer, wasting time playing and Pinteresting (did I just make up a new word?) I was trying to figure out how to fix every problem with our home --- painting, reflooring, gardening (a new hobby for me), trying to figure out who I was without my husband, figuring out what the next step was in my life.  Our children were basically grown and I needed them more than they needed me.  I worry I wasn't there for them, even though they insist they were fine.  For the first time, I didn't know how to be there for them because I was a ... what? ... not a mess ... more like an automatum … there physically but useless for anything.

     I made myself get up and do the things I thought needed done; basically, I functioned.  Although at the time, I didn't see it that way.  I gave myself brownie points on how well I was doing.  From the moment I found my husband in our bedroom, until sometime this past Spring, I kept telling my children and friends how well I was doing.  I would say, "Didn't I handle that well?"

 

~ To be continued ~