Dream A Little Dream

In the last few days I've spent a lot of time on the internet, mostly seeking out others like myself that are in dire need of other people to speak to about their feelings and their loss. I've stumbled upon the saddest, most heartbreaking "club" you could ever know, one who's membership consists of reluctant, unwitting women and men, some unbelievably, and sadly, very young, the common denominator being the collective "unimaginable".

There are those for whom much time has past but the pain still runs deep and the emotion is still like a fast moving river that time can't seem to slow down. Then there are those who are taking steps large (re-marriage) and small ("I left the house today") to try to reconstruct what remains of their dismantled lives, shaken to the core by events they couldn't control, like a small town after a catastrophic earthquake. There are those that are new to this club and need guidance and support from those that have come before them, and many of those "club elders" are more than happy to reach out their hands for those of us to grasp a hold of. This simple act of human kindness has struck me as quite remarkable. I have seen many, many postings of widows saying "please reach out to me if you'd like to chat" "or email me if you need anything", and, unlike the common-folk, these people actually mean it. You see: they know what it's like to have people tell you those things and NOT mean them, so they wouldn't imagine uttering those words themselves unless they truly did.

I've often sat and wondered what these people were like before this "experience". I wonder how it changed them as a person. Not their lives - we all can just imagine how drastically most aspects of their lives have changed – but their actual person. What kind of person were they before, compared to now. Some of these people are so compassionate and willing to help, were they so before? Experiencing a loss such as this, the loss of a spouse, can put so many things in a perspective in a way that many of us couldn't imagine beforehand. You find that which matters most begins to crystallize before you. The concept of time becomes very apparent, which I think is a major thing that changes for most of the younger people that find themselves walking this particular road. Until reality is thrust upon us, we tend to believe that not only are we going to live forever, but also that we are going to live out all of our days with our partner, who's going to live forever, too. We make plans for the vacation we're going to take, not next year, but the year after that. What we're going to do when we retire, and so on… Now that's not to say that you shouldn't make plans, however, I guess I am just a little more reluctant to believe in the future, so I may as well not waste time planning for one. I spend most of my time these days thinking about what will happen to my children if I die. When I think of the future that is what I think about. Morbid, I know, but it's my reality. I have no faith that tomorrow is going to arrive (and I usually curse it when it does), so I try not to think about it because when I do, it's never positive. I guess that's the biggest thing that's changed about me. I am an Aquarius, we're well known dreamers. Dreaming is part of my makeup, part of who I am. But my ability to dream has dissipated, and I don't know if I will ever witness its return. Ethan would probably be very upset to hear me say that. We were dreamers together, he and I. That's what we did, that was our bond (well, that and a secret passion for 80's hair metal, shhh, don't tell anyone…). We dreamed about our family - our kids going to college. We dreamed about our home - about that deck we were going to build, and the hot tub we were going to install (when we got rid of that God forsaken radio tower – looong story for another day). We dreamed of the long and successful careers we were going to have, of our future achievements. We were a team, and we were truly each other's biggest fans. I've never in all my years known what it was like to actually make someone proud of me until I met Ethan. He encouraged me at every turn, and stood beside me when I needed to follow my heart (whether it was the best financial decision or not). We looked forward to sitting in our house, complaining about "kids today" because we were 70, and, well, it would be our right…

But now it's all gone. And the dreaming has stopped. So that's what has changed about me the most, I guess. I've absolutely lost my ability to dream…