Marking this Day

 

Marking this day ... as ...  What? 

 

 I don't even know what to call this day. Is it a 'death anniversary'? That sounds morbid. "The date of my husband's passing"? Too long. "The day my widowhood began" sounds a bit dramatic, even for me.

Whatever you call it, the anniversary of the day Derek died marks a whole new chapter, or maybe even a whole new book of my life. 

I lost both of my parents much too early in my life. Mom died of lung cancer in 2007, and Dad of pancreatic cancer in 2015. Their deaths made me sad. I miss them very much. But other than not being able to go 'home' for a visit, or  pick up the phone and hear their voices, their passing didn't really change my life all that much.

          Thank God I have never lost a child. Many of my friends have, and I can't begin to imagine the pain of such a loss.

I have heard it said that the death of a parent is a loss of the past, the death of a child a loss of the future. But the loss of a spouse is in the here and now. This one event changed my life more than any other. When Derek died, I lost a partner, a provider, and a care giver and a lover. I lost the person who fixed my computer glitches, who got mad at me when I spent too much, who sometimes drove too fast for my liking,  worked way too many hours for my liking, and was always right way too often. 

    Sometimes I think I hear his truck coming home, eventually, just really, really, really late for supper. I catch myself thinking that I need to tell him something. I always felt like I was "off duty" when he got home. 

Whatever you call this day, it is going to come around once a year, every year, whether I like it or not.  

I have been trying to  think of a way to end this blog with some insightful, clever, maybe even devotional or inspirational thought. I got nothing. Maybe next year. Stay tuned.

Is there such a thing as a second world country?

You know, I have written and read a lot about First World Problems, and the gaping chasm that is the third world, but I don't know that I have read anything about the Second World. Is there such a thing? I could google it... everything is on the internet now, and there is no excuse for lazy journalism -- but I'm not a journalist, and this is not a research project for a class, it's just a blog and it's supposed to be stream of consciousness writing. Why is that? Why am I defending myself to myself? Whose voice is up there, arguing with me? And why have I gone so far down a rabbit trail that I can't even remember what I was going to say about the Second World?

Looking for a voice of reason, I don't think I will find one anywhere in my brain tonight. I should just go to bed now.

I remember now, why I was thinking about the gap between the First and Third worlds, so I won't go to bed just right away. I con't speak for everyone because I am just thinking random thoughts, but I am thinking that most people think that they are the Second World, like the geopolitical equivalent of the quintessential middle child. "Marsha, Marsha, Marsha! If you are young enough to not get that tidbit of pop culture, then you are young enough to just google it. I am going to bed now.

Procrastination

The sooner you get behind, the more time you will have to catch up. Words that I have lived by. Procrastinator should have been my middle name. My middle name is Lucille. I remember my cousins saying my name was Lucille Ball, because I was always bawling. I don't remember if I cried about that, but I may have.

I remember my dad saying that he wanted to name me after a country music singer named Lucille Star. Nobody that I asked had ever heard of her. I wondered if maybe I was wrong about that memory, and my dad died before I got around to asking him. I procrastinate. 

I did get around to googling the name, and found out that it was true. There really was a country singer named Lucille Starr, and apparently she lived in St. Boniface in the 60's. We lived in St. Boniface in the 60's. Coincidence? Maybe my parents went to a concert, or maybe they knew her. She could have been our neighbour. 

Technically, this blog was not finished on the third day of daily stream of consciousness blogs, because it's 1:05 am on Tuesday morning. I procrastinate. My time is up. 

Day 2 of daily blogs

It seems like only yesterday that I started back to daily blogging. That's a day longer than most things that I start. I really would love to be diligent and self disciplined, but I am not. I am a starter upper, not a finisher.

My first grade teacher saw this trait in me and commented on my report card that I was smart enough to do the work, but that I didn't hand in my school work at the end of class because I wanted it to be perfect. I remember grade 1 quite vividly: my desk neatly organized with all of my unfinished assignments nicely stacked in the corner. Pretty much still functioning the same way. I start a project, but get stalled by the second day because I want to do it perfectly, so I will leave it until that magical day when I have time to do it justice. Then I start a new project, and the cycle continues. I remember Derek coming home from work and I would have ten unfinished projects lying around the house. 

Twenty minutes went by so fast again. This daily blog thing might actually happen. It might nor actually say anything of value or interest to anyone, but it's finished.