Confession Time, Again

It was one of those days that started out great. Cool but pleasant driving conditions. Money in the bank longing to be spent. I got a parking space up close to the doors at the super store where I can buy everything from groceries to paint thinner. Not that I’m going to thin paint any time soon but at least I know where I can go to buy some when the mood strikes me. Inside, I walked right up to the courtesy desk, no waiting in line like I expected to do this close after Christmas. And surprise, surprise they had my lost watch in their ‘lost and found’ drawer. It had been in that drawer since the Monday before Christmas, not long enough for it to make friends with the two dozen other watches waiting patiently for their owners to take them home.

I did my grocery shopping which wasn’t that easy to do because I was also busy patting myself on the back for passing up all the tempting things in the cookies, candy, chips and ice cream aisles. Walking through those aisles was a real test of my will power. I had worked hard on my recent weight loss but I had also strayed off my diet over the holidays with all temptations around and I was determined to get back on track before I can’t even see that track anymore or worse, I don’t care anymore that it’s located on the corner of Better Health and Common Sense. The last area of the store I had to walk through to get to the cashiers was the Evil Bakery where I said to myself: Why you’ve been such a good little girl passing up all those cookies, candy, chips and ice cream you deserve a Bismarck.

“Are you crazy?” I heard another voice saying. I looked around. I was alone so I figured I must be talking to myself again. Is that a byproduct of living alone or am I---well, you know---on the bridge leading to the land of senility?  If so, I should be there by now because I’ve been talking to myself since Ring was a pup. You know Ring. I wrote about him in my last blog. He’s the old Beagle Don had when he was a kid. “Ring time” was a marker for him, sort of like using B.C. and A.D. for before and after Christ was born. Okay, I’d better strike that last line out of the final draft so I don’t offend anyone who might erroneously think I’m comparing Ring’s importance in Don’s world to the importance of Jesus in the history of the world. But darn it, to a boy of 14 or 15 the death of a dog you’ve had your entire life is pretty important. If not for Ring’s passing, Don might never have reached out and discovered girls.

Back to the jelly filled Bismarck. As I reached in the case to pull one out I swear it looked at me as if to say, “Sweetie, are you sure you want to do this?” And because I really didn’t want to do that I ate it in the parking lot before coming home so the evidence of my sinful ways wouldn’t be around to mock me. Damn it, it's time for a sugar detox again! How many times do I have to have sugary treats grab me by the throat and insist that all my troubles will be far away if I just consumed it? Wait! “All my troubles will be far away?” Isn’t that a line in a Beatles’ song? Great. Now I’m channeling a song that never fails to make me cry. “Yesterday, all my troubles seemed so far away. Now it looks as though they're here to stay. Oh, I believe in yesterday.” Yup, only a crazy person could connect a classic Beatles song like Yesterday to a Bismarck from the bakery aisle. Or maybe a would-be writer could to that, too? So am I off the hook, off the train to Crazyville? I guess as long as I’m not grabbing the aluminum foil out of the drawer in the kitchen to fashion myself a hat, I’m still okay.

All kidding aside, my eating is out of control although my bathroom scales hasn’t yelled, “Loser!” at me yet---that didn’t come out right. I wish it would shout “loser” at me. What I meant to say is I haven’t lost or gained anything over the holidays but I have to turn that round so that I’m losing again. But mostly I have to get the sugar monster off my back. Oh, well, my day may not have ended as good as it started---contrary to how it might look, binge eating does not make me a happy camper---but at least the dog didn’t see me do it. ©

A Widow’s Holiday Secrets and Confessions

“We can all find reasons to be thankful,” I was told when I was lamenting the fact that I wasn’t looking forward to spending Thanksgiving with strangers. Ya, sure we can. After all, isn’t thankfulness ‘mindset' #12' in the Handbook for Better Living, a book I’ve been preaching from my entire life? Thankfulness is a cornerstone of philosophic thought all over the world and I know the Thanksgiving Day drill: “Dear Lord, I’m thankful for central heat, clean water, indoor plumbing and the fact that my address isn’t ‘the center refrigerator box underneath the Main Street viaduct.’ I’m thankful that farmer Jack’s cows come home every night for milking, that I have Ben and Jerry’s Death by Chocolate ice cream in my freezer, and that we’re not living in a nuclear winter.” But here’s where I get a little testy. We humans are multi-taskers so why is it so hard to understand if a thankful widow---anticipating a Thanksgiving dinner with strangers---can visualize herself standing up on her chair and proclaiming she’s got a whole cup of crazy going on in her head? “But I am thankful you invited me here,” she’d continue, “and I thank you for asking me to lead us in prayer.” Of course, you know I’m not going to do that at dinner on Thursday, even though I am stressing out over the very real possibility they’ll ask me to lead a pray, me the person these super-sized Christians don’t realize is an agnostic.

You’ve got to admit there’s a difference between having a good time and pretending you are so you’ll get invited back by the hostess of whatever affair you’re attending. You want her to know her kind gesture of including you is sincerely appreciated. And isn’t that what a good guest is supposed to do? We bring a little wine, maybe a box of bonbons or flashy flowers and smile in all the right places. We help where ever we can and feed their dog under that table. We are good little guests who try hard not to let on that we feel out of place, like a fish swimming in olive oil. I am woman, master of multitasking and I can be as two-faced as the next person. “Thank you very much for inviting me and my ghost for dinner," but did you have to let your uncle Harry sit on his lap?

Last year, my holiday season and the invitations that came with it was all about concentrating on not bursting into tears. This year my mission statement for the holidays is to “dam the torpedoes, full speed ahead!” I am a woman at war, a woman determined to stand on her own two feet. A widow who can move on with the best of them. But I’ll tell you a few secrets I’ve learned over the past year. Moving on doesn’t mean you forget. It doesn’t mean you can’t be both thankful and regretful at the same time and still be a perfectly balanced, sane person who knows how to keep her cup of crazy from spilling over. And the piece of résistance of all secrets is this: in the second year of widowhood a woman must learn to carry her losses forward (minus the pain) to live in harmony with the joy that she’s adding back into her life one baby step at a time. It’s hard work. It’s worthy widow’s work to let go of the pain that came tethered to our losses. And, yes, I am thankful I learned these secrets in a timely manner and I didn’t scratch anyone’s eyes out in the process. I am woman and I’ve roared enough for today. ©