Spring and Kate’s Yahrzeit Moon
Friday gratefuls: Luke. CBE. The Thursday mussar group. Gracie and Leo, two dogs also learning mussar. Kep, the sweet boy. David Sanders. Being where I need to be. Taking a breath. Or, two. To Speak for the Trees. Ancient Celtic wisdom. Relevant today. Thanks, Tom. The Lodgepoles and the Aspens on this property. The Willows along Maxwell Creek. The Bristlecone Pine on Mt. Evans.
Sparks of Joy and Awe: Authenticity
Not quite done with David Sanders. Close, though. The result may be, probably will be, I’m doing fine. Things will be good with my heart and my life. This meshes well with my levothyroxine boosted energy level, the coming of spring.
Even Kate’s yahrzeit though a sad memory does signal a year’s worth of time to integrate her loss. Time I’ve used as best I can. The grief has not passed, nor do I expect it to. Or, want it to. That sudden welling of tears has a direct heart link with her, with our marriage, with our love. I imagine the intensity of those moments will continue to diminish, but I don’t expect them to disappear.
As I explained earlier, due to the Jewish leap year her Jewish yahrzeit will not happen until May 1st. This April 12th though I’m lighting two 24 hour yahrzeit candles, one for her and one for our marriage. There is that third aspect of our life together, our usness, our mutual decision making, the frisson of our days and nights, the interactivity and mutuality, that also perishes.
No longer do we have a money meeting that parses our financial life. No longer do we consider how to celebrate our anniversary. Whether to go on another cruise. Hold hands in the car. Sleep together. Agonize over illness, celebrate joyfully for our grandchildren, children, dogs. Dead, too. And, grieved. I lost my partner. My best buddy.
My soulmate. Yes, corny as that phrase is. Yes. We helped each other grow. Consoled each other in tough times. Had the best interests of the other at heart. When I made a bad turn right in front of an oncoming car, I dithered about whether I should be driving. “Any one could have done that.” Oh.
Death has such finality. No do overs. No matter how much desired. I thought I already knew that, but no. I had to learn it again.
Sorta strayed from the main point there. Though not without good reason. Part of my question about what comes next lies entangled with the process of grieving. But not all. Not even most. It is my life, no matter the thread of sorrow now woven into it.
Feeling more confident about emergence. That as I live into the redone house, a less restricted post-Covid life (will it ever be really over?), when I feel my way into new possibilities as they become apparent, that the new, an extension of the old, of course, how can it not be, will declare itself. Might be a quiet embrace. Could be a noisy clamoring. Look what I’m up to now! Don’t know. Will, as Seoah would say, wait and see. Wu wei.
A word about To Speak for The Trees. This book, which I discovered after reading an article forwarded by Tom Crane, feels like a hook, a wu wei moment. Oh, yes. Celtic thought. I’d forgotten. Laid it aside. Yet here is this woman, about my age, Diana Beresford-Kroger, recounting her immersion in the Celtic life in Lisheen, Ireland. And how that immersion fed her life as a scientist, as a keeper of rare trees. How it might still feed us all.
Stirrings. Threads. Links. Weaving themselves again, still, into my days. I await guidance. With no expectations. Giving it over to the days as they come and go. Waiting.
