My four-month report on how—squirrel!

I had a hard time writing this “it's been four months” blog post. I just couldn't decide what to focus on—Ups and downs? Been there, done that. Something I did this month? Nope—a pretty uneventful month all in all. Thanksgiving? That seemed promising.

But in fact, being unable to focus has been a hallmark of this stage, which is foreign to me. One of the things Vic always said he admired about me was my ability to focus. He bounced from thing to thing, and it often took him a week to perform the smallest of tasks.

That's where I am. As I described it to my stepmom on Thanksgiving, I have a hundred five-minutes tasks on my to-do list. I made a small donation to my alma mater, and now that my company does a charity match, I have to file the paperwork to get them to match that donation. It's just a download of the receipt and an upload to our charity match vendor. It practically took me longer to type those two sentences than it would take me to do the work. I have to put my thyroid medication on a 90-day fill through my company's prescription vendor. Again, it's just going online and filling out a few form fields, but there it sits, on my task list, undone.

Every time I sit down to work on my task list, I start by checking my email. And there the rabbit hole begins.

Oh, there's a new part available on the crochet-along I'm following—I'd better go download it. Here are some notifications from PayPal about money I spent. I should put those in Quicken. And as long as I'm in Quicken, I'll sign on to the credit union and my credit cards and my HSA and make sure I've entered everything from those accounts into Quicken. Wait, I can get AMC+ for $2 a month for a year? I'll go sign up for that so I can watch The Discovery of Witches. I wonder if there are any sales on for Christmas music in iTunes? I should check. Speaking of that, I should check my wish list on Amazon and see if anything on it is on sale. Oh! I have to check Zillow to see if any new houses have been added to my search criteria. Boy, I really need to sync Vic's iPad to his computer before I update it to the new operating system.

Next thing I know, it's 7 p.m. and I haven't taken Bella for a walk and I still haven't done my charity match (or anything else on my to-do list).

As I've said many a time, I'm riding out every stage of grief without trying to change it. I'm getting the important things done—I'm paying all my bills on time (now that I have them synced up), I'm getting Bella fed, I'm getting important appointments made (note to self: car needs an oil change), and so on.

And I was very diligent in putting up all the Christmas decorations on Thanksgiving day, so now the house is a Christmas miracle. But you know what? It's not the same. I think what I loved about Christmas decorations was how they came to be. One day I would leave the house for work (remember those days? When we left our houses to go to work?) at 6:15 a.m. (remember that? Getting up before the crack of dawn to get to work?), and when I got home at 6:15 p.m. (remember that? Getting home from work after the sun set?), the house would be completely decorated—tree up, lit, ornamented; music boxes spread around the house; mantle cleared and ready to display our Christmas cards; stuffed bears and moose and pillows strewn about. The only thing I had to do was pick out a wreath and hang it on the door.

Vic didn't love doing any of that by himself, but he knew I didn't love it either, and he knew I was working and didn't have as much time as he did, so he did it for me. He loved my coming home and seeing me admire all his work. Every few years, there would be a new music box. He bought all of them because he knew I liked them. And he always wanted me to approve of where he'd placed the ornaments.

And oh, those ornaments. We long ago got rid of the generic ornaments we bought at Target when we were first together. Now, every ornament has a special meaning. One ornament for each of our pets. The “first Christmas together” ornament from my mom. Several ornaments that I made as a child or were old family ornaments. Many, many souvenirs from our travels and those of his sisters. A ceramic “Dad” that Vic's daughter made.

I don't know how he decided where to put them, but I started with that ceramic “Dad” and put Laurie and Bryan's bears next to it. (Along with the Wags ornament.)

Then I put up our bears, with Bella between us. Next, I put the cats together. Then I went through the ornaments and picked all the ones from our trips plus a few of his favorites from other people's trips. This, from his sister Patty:

And these from his sister Alice:

The next thing I knew, I had a tree (complete with presents, sent early by Vic's daughter so I would have presents under the tree and know I wasn't forgotten).

I also put up the ornament tree from Alice, which houses all the White House Christmas ornaments she's given us over the years ...

... as well as all the music boxes, stuffies, bubble lights, and things I stitched (most of which aren't pictured because I ... you know ... forgot to take pictures).

So the house is festive, even if I'm not quite there yet. It was a lot more work doing it myself than it was when I left in the morning with a plain house and came home to a snazzy one. And Vic always turned on the tree and the stair lights (the lights he wrapped around the stair banister so I would have Christmas lights in my home office) when he got up in the morning, so I woke up to lights. I loved that. I didn't turn on the tree lights until around 6 p.m., and I still haven't put up the stair lights.

So having Christmas decorations around the house isn't exactly bringing joy to my world. And when I took Bella for a walk, the sunset was gorgeous. I took a picture, but it was with my iPhone, and it didn't capture the subtle beauty that Vic would have gotten if he'd taken a picture—so that made me sad. (In fact, a lot of astronomical things make me sad—there was an eclipse Vic would have gotten some great pictures of; Jupiter, Saturn and Venus are aligned, and the full moon swept past them with nary a picture taken; and there's a comet coming that would certainly be visible through Vic's long camera lens.)

I keep a list whenever something strikes me. Last month, I used that list to make my “Ups and downs” blog post. This month, I don't see a single “up” thing on the list. I finally took all his winter clothes to the OUR Center to donate. (An “up” for the people who are getting them, a “down” for me.) I came across a picture of the macaroni and cheese Vic made for my last birthday—the last time I'll ever get Vic's mac and cheese. (Yes, I can make it. I'm not helpless. But I want Vic to make it.) As I was doing laundry one day, I remembered that Vic used to put a quarter in the watch pocket of his jeans when he put them in the hamper. I mean, I was never gonna get rich from those quarters, but I kept all of them. And now there won't be any more. One of my favorite things about special days (like Veterans Day) was going to Facebook to see what pictures Vic posted. No more of that. I dropped his cell phone from our plan yesterday, and I teared up talking to the agent when I told him I wanted to remove it. (Honestly, I should have done it weeks ago—he wasn't getting any calls or texts, I hadn't needed it for two-factor authentication since August, and I'm saving $75 a month by removing it and going to a much smaller plan. Your head is on the chopping block, home phone line!) And the saddest thing of all, the husband of a dear friend of mine entered hospice this month, so she will soon be where I am. I don't want that for her. So, lots of sad things this month. (Not to mention that I also missed my mom on Thanksgiving because she used to come over to breakfast every year.)

And yet.

In the weeks leading up to Thanksgiving, a lot of people said to me, “Probably not a lot to be thankful for this year.” So after I wrote that bummer paragraph above, I thought about it for a minute. And in fact, I have so much to be grateful for. I always start with the obvious “friends and family”—but it's more than a flippant remark.

I'm spending time with friends I haven't seen in decades. I'm making new friends—the neighbor two doors down previously known as “Sonny's Mom” (because we only knew her through her dog, Sonny) has become “Anne” (because that's her actual name), and she takes walks with me and Bella a few times a week. And of course my “regular” friends—the ones who texted me on Thanksgiving to see how I was; the ones who just treat me normal, as if I'm not grieving (trust me—you need those friends); the ones who laugh at my jokes because they actually think they're funny.

My family continues to be a source of great support, whether it's my sister coming up to help me sort through Vic's things, Vic's sisters inviting me places to make sure I know I'm still part of their family, Vic's kids and our grandkids texting me and sending me pictures, all of my nieces and nephews who check in from time to time, and all of my steps—mom, sisters, brother, in-laws and all their extended families—texting, calling, e-mailing, Facebooking, always reminding me I have more than just my birth family.

How do people even get out of bed in the morning without this kind of support?

When you start thinking of what you're grateful for, you start seeing those things all around you. I am grateful for sunshine. For music. For yarn. For my iPad. For popcorn. FOR BELLA.

And although he is gone from this earth, I am eternally grateful that I had nearly 37 years to love and be loved by Vic.

I leave you this month with a video of Vic's favorite Christmas decoration, the Bandstand Bears. I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving and that you find peace and contentment in this holiday season.

How's Bella?

Virtually every time I talk to someone, they start by asking me, “How are you?” It always seems genuine—they always want to know the truth. And the truth, as I mentioned in my last blog post, is, “I'm OK. Ups and downs.” Sometimes accompanied by the Tom-Selleck-on-Friends head bob.

And I'm getting a lot of Facebook support—lots of like, love and care reactions to my posts, usually from a wide variety of friends and family and almost always one or two who are a happy surprise—as well as email and text messages, often just when I need them.

But what I didn't expect was the number of people who ask, “How's Bella?” I don't know why this should surprise me. People know how close Vic was with all our animals as well as how much they loved him. Here, too, I have my standard answer: “She's OK—she was always more my dog than Vic's.” That, too, is also true. In the beginning, she seemed to like us equally, but over the years, she got much closer to me. So she doesn't have any behavior changes—she eats, sleeps, poops, walks, just as she always did—but I do think she misses him (especially when I forget to check her water bowls 🙄🥴).

Shortly after he passed away, I noticed she would spend part of every day sleeping on his bed.

She did that for about a week, and then she just stopped. The next day, a friend spent the day with me cleaning out Vic's closet and drawers. I was trying to get through as many of his things as I could so that people who were coming to town for the service could take anything I wasn't keeping, and I was going to donate the rest to the OUR Center. Unfortunately, the OUR Center wasn't taking clothing donations at the time, so I just left all the clothes on the bed.

One day a few weeks ago, I heard Bella flap her ears around midnight. She does that when she wants to go outside to do her business. So I yawned, pulled on my robe and slippers, and went out into the hallway. But no Bella. I turned on the stair light and looked for her in her bed. No Bella. I turned around to see if maybe she had slipped into my bedroom unnoticed and something caught my eye. It was Bella, standing in the middle of Vic's clothes on his bed. She looked very guilty, as if she thought she wasn't supposed to be there. (Sorry, no pictures—did I mention it was midnight?) Anyway, she jumped down, and I took her outside.

When I came back upstairs, I moved all of Vic's clothes off the bed and put up a blanket he liked to use when he was cold at night. She didn't go up there that night, but the next day while I was working, I noticed she wasn't sleeping in her bed behind me. I leaned back to see if she was in her bed in my room. No Bella. So I grabbed my phone (it wasn't midnight), and there she was, on Vic's bed.

Since then, she has been on Vic's bed at least once a day. Usually it's late at night, and I can hear her flap her ears, jump off the bed and come get me to take her outside. (Vic used to take her when it was the middle of the night, and I wonder if she's remembering that?) Sometimes, I don't see her at all, but I know she's been there because:

Blanket as I put it on the bed

Blanket when I wake up in the morning

I really love seeing the evidence of her on Vic's bed, because even though she was always my dog, I know she loved him too, in her own “special” way. 😂

So thank you for caring not just about me but about my beloved Bella. Since I have been so self-absorbed in my last few blog posts, I'll cut this one short and just leave you with some of my favorite pictures of Bella over the past few months.

Why are you so close? Please, back up.

Tummy tickle, please

That was such a hard day, what with all the sleeping

That treat looks delicious!

Are you going to give me that treat, or not? I am being extra cute.

“I'm OK. Ups and downs” (a look at month 3)

My standard response when anyone asks me how I am is, “I'm OK. Ups and downs.” And it's always the truth. I'm not wallowing in the pit of despair; I'm not having celebratory parties. I'm OK. And this month, every time I had an up or a down, I wrote it down on a notepad, and I realized that would be the perfect content for this blog post! So without further ado, my list of the ups and downs I've experienced in the third month after the love of my life passed away.

Ups:

• I'm a huge sunroof fan. I just like to have that extra light in the car when I'm driving around. But when there are two people in the car, you can almost never use the sunroof because the sun almost always hits one person, so I never really got to use it when Vic was in the car, which was most of the time. I also like opening the sunroof when I'm driving around in the evenings. I love the rush of fresh air. He did not, because in his later years, he was always cold. But now, I use the sunroof all the time.
• Crochet date night. Last month, one of my crochet buddies read my blog post lamenting the loss of date night and asked if I wanted to have a crochet date night. (She was also the foster coordinator at the Longmont Humane Society who was responsible for getting us to foster Bella, so she's really the gift that keeps on giving.) Naturally, I said yes, and the next thing I know, she's inviting another one of our crochet buddies, and I'm inviting my crochet buddy, and now crochet date night is a thing. It gives me something to shift my focus when I realize it's Friday night and I'm not with my date.
• I changed my password at work last week. I had a password change come due shortly after Vic passed away, and I decided I was going to do a year of Vic-related passwords. This is my second one, and it incorporates his profile name on one of our streaming sites: Thag. This is an up because it always makes me laugh when I type that part of my password, which I do at least a dozen times every day.
• Another thing I did last week was have an early breakfast with a dear friend from my early days at Leopard, when I idolized her (as I still do). This alone is an up, but there's more.
• As I pulled out of the garage and drove down the street, I noticed that many of the cars had frost on them. We lived in a townhouse for 14 years that didn't have a garage, and for at least seven of those years, I drove to work. Did I ever have to scrape the frost of my car? I did not. Vic always scraped my car off for me. One of the things I am fond of saying at bridal showers is, “A wedding is a day. A marriage is every day.” I have said this countless times over the years, but Vic always showed up for me.
• As I drove down to Lafayette, the sun was rising. And it's fall, so the leaves are changing. And the Earth is in just the right place that the sunrise is particularly spectacular. These are all things that I wouldn't have noticed if I hadn't married Vic.
• I just realized last week that I don't have to wear headphones when I'm on a work call. #FreedomFromTheCord
  
• Showers are boring, and although I have a boatload of music and a bazillion portable devices, you can't just put an one in the bathroom. You can't even hear one of the original iPods without a sound dock (yes, I still have an original iPod—do you want to make something of it?), and the volume doesn't go high enough on a newer iPod or an iPhone to hear it over the running of the water. I do have a sound dock, but I use it at my desk to keep my (very old) iPod charged (it no longer holds a charge at all, but as long as it's hooked up to the sound dock, it always has power). Vic had two sound docks—but they were his, and he used them where they were. I certainly didn't want to be moving any of our sound docks back and forth to the bathroom every day. Not to mention that Vic was usually asleep when I was taking my shower, and I didn't want to wake him with blaring music that he probably wouldn't have even liked. Vic offered to buy me a waterproof Bluetooth speaker for my birthday one year, but then I would have had to to take my phone in to the bathroom, and the Bluetooth drains the battery, and that's not the device where I keep all my music, and none of my other devices had Bluetooth, blah blah blah. But last week I was in the shower and it occurred to me that ... uh ... Vic was no longer using his sound docks. So on Monday, I pulled one of his sound docks into the bathroom, hooked up his (very old) iPod Touch and started playing an album, which was the Statler Brothers, whom I love. It may have been my best home shower ever. Now I just have to make a shower playlist in iTunes.
• The World Series started yesterday, and I don't have to watch it. Vic loved baseball, and although he didn't follow it religiously (he only cared about how the Rockies were doing), he did tend to tune in to the end-of-season games. I don't love baseball, and my shows piled up on the DVR during the playoffs and the series. (That said, I did get a lot of crafting done during those games. When I'm watching a movie or a show, I often have to look up to see what is going on, and if it's really good, I stop stitching/crocheting for a few minutes. If I cry—and let's face it, this is why I watch the shows I watch: for a good cry—I have to stop for even longer. But during a baseball game, I never have to look up once! So this could just as easily gone in the "Downs" list.)

Downs:

• I received a branded apron from my company recently. I had participated in a months-long event called 100% You, which gave us access to four amazing woman who coached us on money, movement, meals and mindfulness, and the apron was a gift from the “meals” segment. I wanted to take a picture of myself in the apron, and a selfie just wasn't going to cut it. Obviously, Vic was always my go-to guy for taking pictures of me, whether I was showing off a crochet project I just finished, modeling something someone else gave me, or just wanting to put something special on Facebook. The realization that he would never again take a picture of me was a real blow.
• Side note: There was a time when I got tired of Vic taking pictures of me—specifically on vacations—and we could both point to the exact picture when it happened. He did not like that at all—he took it as criticism—and he didn't take a picture of me for two years after that. We laughed about it in our later years, but there was always a tinge of anger in his laugh.🤣
• Similarly, I miss the person I could really celebrate my wins with. The person who didn't think I was bragging about how many blue ribbons I won at the fair (not gonna lie—it was a lot 🤣), or something good happened at work, or someone on the street complimented a hat I made.
• Recently, the TV show Eli Roth's History of Horror showed up on the DVR. We watched the first two seasons when they came out—Vic was a huge fan of old horror movies 🧛‍♀️ (and some new ones), and that is something I shared with my dad (we called them Patty Daddy movies)—and the third season started recently. I'll watch it in his memory, but I'll be sad.
• I have had some lower back pain for a long while, and I have tried a number of treatments. Now I'm going to get a treatment that requires anesthesia, and you know what that means: I need a ride. I am fortunate that my sister is retired, so she is able to take me to this appointment, but she lives in Littleton. This is going to be an all-day thing for her, instead of the two-hour thing it would have been for Vic.
• The watermelons in the garden mocked my grief. They kept growing even though the person who really wanted them was no longer here. A-holes.
• Halloween. It was not his favorite holiday (that was Thanksgiving), but our neighborhood is particularly festive come Halloween. Last year was subdued. I don't know if you are aware, but there was a pandemic. But one day, on my Bella walk, I noticed that the one house that would be Clark Griswold's main competition in a Halloween Vacation movie was starting to set up again. He loved that house.
• Just realizing how many things Vic did—even in the later years when he was really going downhill—that I took for granted. I often thanked him for doing things that were his “job” (just because it's his chore doesn't mean I can't be grateful), but I don't think I had any idea how many things he actually did around the house until I had to start doing them myself. I hope he didn't feel like I took him for granted.
  
• Side note: I find it exceedingly ironic that both “uphill” and “downhill” have a negative connotation. This was something I discovered when I was trying to equate “ups and downs” with a roller coaster ride.
  
• Facebook served me up with the following memory—an old post of mine—a week ago: “You gotta love a guy who goes to the store at 8 o'clock at night—alone and unrequested—to get you exactly the cough syrup you want. I'm not saying that Vic did that, because he doesn't like it when I brag about him on Facebook, I'm just saying that I could be married to a guy like that for, oh, 26 years, 2 months and 5 days. Maybe longer.” Yes indeed. I could be married to a guy like that for 32 years, 11 months and 14 days.
• Similar to that TV program showing up on the DVR, I got milk from Safeway the other day, and although we're not even past Halloween yet, it's Christmas at Safeway: eggnog in the house! Eggnog. One of Vic's favorite drinks, and Safeway eggnog was his favorite. He was a huge eggnog fan because (a) he liked the way it tasted, (b) it packed a lot of calories and (c) it shut me up when I was complaining that he wasn't eating enough. We kept Safeway eggnog in business for a decade. The saddest thing about seeing the eggnog was remembering that last year, he wasn't as fond of it, and it was just a reminder that although he died in July, the process started much earlier than that.
• And similar to that, I got an email from McDonald's last week. The McRib is back. Vic. Loved. The McRib.
  

The interesting thing is, when I have an “up” moment, it is usually followed by sadness, and when I have a “down” moment, it is usually followed by a smile. In a weird way, the up moments seem to reinforce the fact that he's gone, but down moments remind me how lucky I was to have Vic as my husband, my best friend, my true partner in life. Grief is funny that way.

Last week was the worst. No ups, all downs. Two incidents that caused me to break down in sobs, and one that I would have had my friend Linda not been here with me—with her here, I was able to laugh off my pain. I had no focus last week. No energy. And this was with the mindfulness exercises I was doing and crochet date night! But I'm just chalking it up to the fact that the three-month mark was approaching, and I'm expecting the sadness to ebb when today passes, just as it did after the two-month mark.

As usual, I'll leave you with some pictures. These highlight the ups and downs of this month.

Fall trees in the neighborhood

The first picture of me not taken by Vic

The moment when I said, “Can you please stop taking pictures of me?”
And then he did. For two years.

 

 

 

Watermelon salad made with
one of Vic's watermelons

And, yes, I'm going to post 13 pictures of Vic's favorite Halloween house. Enjoy!

This is the left side of the house—or in pirate parlance, the port side.

This is the full front yard—and it changes every year.

I made this one extra large so you could see their wicked sense of humor—
that is supposed to be a trick-or-treater in there.

This is what you see as you head up to the door.

And this is how beautiful it looks at night.

If you made it this far, as always, I thank you all for your support. It really helps to have a village. ❤️

Lucy and Ethel ship a steamer trunk to Florida

Vic's beloved Grandma Jones had a steamer trunk. Can you imagine the days when steamer trunks were your luggage? (Can you imagine traveling by steam ship??) This thing is 4 ft. long and 2 ft. high and wide and weighs about a hundred pounds completely empty. I have to pay extra if my bag completely full weighs more than 50 pounds. But I digress.

Grandma Jones's steamer trunk

 When Grandma Jones passed away, her steamer trunk came to live in our house. We put it in the basement, and Vic filled it with his treasures—all the cards he received from people over the years, keepsakes from IBM, awards and ribbons from his photography days, stuff like that. Even though it was in the basement, it had a huge presence in our house because Grandma Jones was a huge presence in the life of anyone who knew her. Like Vic's daughter, Laurie.

Laurie was the first of Grandma Jones's great-grandchildren (as Vic was the first of her grandchildren), and she adored Grandma Jones. (I mean, let's face it—everyone adored Grandma Jones. I only knew her for barely a decade and I still think of her every day, usually when I look at my wedding ring, because it is her diamond I wear with that ring.)

So it was only natural that when Vic passed away, Laurie was the one who wanted anything that came from Grandma Jones.

But how do you get a steamer trunk to Florida?

I found a lot of options through my old friend Google, but then I thought, what if I just took it to her myself? Vic and I drove to Florida once—it was not that hard. My family wants to go to Florida next year to go to Harry Potter World—what if I just drove to Florida, dropped off the trunk and spent a few days in Jacksonville with Laurie and the kids, drove down to Orlando, and then flew home?

A cross-country trip sounded great! So I set about planning one.

Step 1: Get mileage to Jacksonville. Google: 1,772.4 miles.

ALMOST EIGHTEEN HUNDRED MILES??? I swear it was not that far when Vic and I drove there. But, OK, 600 miles a day. How hard can that be? 

Step 2: Plan stops. So, Google wants me to take I-70, but if I take I-80, I can stop in Nebraska and visit my stepmom. Yes, it adds 50 miles and an extra day (what, I'm just going to spend the night? No! If I'm going to stop in Nebraska, I'm going to spend a day with my mom), but it's totally worth it. OK, so what's next? Well, last time we stopped in St. Louis, so I don't need to do that again. Nashville is on the way—I'll stop there. Yes, it is a very long drive from Nebraska to Nashville, and it adds an extra day (what, I'm just going to spend the night? No! If I'm going to stop in Nashville, I'm going to visit the Opry), but how often do you get to Nashville?

Step 3: Make a budget. Rental car: $1,000—wait, $1,000 for a rental car? That alone makes the trip cost-prohibitive—and we haven't even added at least six tanks of gas and at least two nights in a hotel! And what was I thinking, driving 1,772.4 miles by myself? When Vic and I took that trip, we split the driving: He drove 1,722.4 miles, and I drove 50. So there's no way I can make that trip in three days, which means more nights in a hotel, more food on the road, and—let's face it—probably a car accident because I fell asleep at the wheel or tried crocheting while I drove.

How much can it cost to ship the trunk?

Turns out FedEx has some pretty good options for half the cost of the rental car in the scenario above, and I have a friend, we'll call her Ethel to protect her privacy and because it works better for this story (in which I am Lucy, but to be honest, I'm not sure which of us is truly Lucy and which is Ethel), who says she will help me pack the trunk and get it ready.

Before that happens, though, I have to get the trunk out of the basement, which I can't do because (a) it weighs a million pounds and (b) it has been sitting in the same place for decades, soooooo bugs.

Fortunately, I have another friend, we'll call her Colleen because that's her name, and she thought the two of us could get that trunk upstairs, and although she showed me by example that a woman can clear spiders out of boxes, she also recognized that I was not ready for the amount of buggage on the steamer trunk so she cleaned that off for me. We got the trunk up the stairs without incident. (I should also mention that Colleen helped me with a lot of other stuff the day she came over “for lunch.” I have some pretty awesome friends.)

Colleen helped me “install” these birdhouse
decorations my neighbor Sam made.

 

 

Ethel comes over on Monday. I bring her everything for the trunk, and she packs it (she is a very good packer). My entire contribution is taping down the lock so it doesn't flap open during shipping. This will become a sticking point later, so to speak.

She starts ruminating on what we need to do to get the trunk ready to ship. Do we need a box? A pallet? How much can we put in the trunk to stay under the weight limit? She starts calling her shipping friends (who even has shipping friends??? Ethel) and she comes up with a plan. We don't need a box, but we'll need zip ties and bumpers. Ethel calls more of her shipping friends. No one has what we need. What can we use for bumpers? Pool noodles! (Ethel is very resourceful.) Where can we get pool noodles? Nowhere! (Resourcefulness only gets you so far.)

We decide to head to Lowe's to see what we can get there. But first, we have to get the trunk in the car. It is much heavier than when Colleen and I brought it up the stairs, and it was already ridiculously heavy then (but blissfully bug-free). Fortunately, we are able to slide it on my throw rugs to get it out the door, and then we rolled it over to the car (even though it's square, you can still roll it).

We put my throw rugs on the edge of the back of her car and are able to pick it up and slide it in. Yay! At this point, one of us mentions that it looks like we have a body in the trunk. I hope Jimmy Stewart and Grace Kelly are not spying out their window and calling the cops.

We stop at Lowe's and find the zip ties there—but no pool noodles. Ethel (as usual) uses her noggin and gets an inspiration—pipe insulation! So we buy the zip ties and the pipe insulation and head over to the FedEx.

We get the trunk out of the car and realize we don't have anything to put an address on. I go in to see if the FedEx people have any paper and wait in line so long that Ethel comes to get me. This is when we start talking about the weight of the trunks. There is a 150 lb. limit to ship via FedEx Ground, which is our best option. We start talking to the FedEx people and they tell us to bring the trunk in. We put the trunk on the scale: 148.8 lbs. Lucy thinks, “Hallelujah!” But level-headed Ethel says, “That's too much.” Apparently, at any point on its journey, FedEx could weigh it and if it weighed in at more than 150 lbs., we would have a problem on our hands.

Ethel decides we can just take out a box we had packed inside one of the drawers of the steamer trunk. We take off the tape holding the lock down ... and the latch won't open. The tape, or perhaps the rolling, caused the latch to get stuck. (It certainly cannot be locked because we didn't use a key to lock it. It's totally just stuck.) This is where Lucy and Ethel really start to emerge. Ethel tries to turn the lock with a pair of scissors—and snaps the tip off in the lock. Lucy tries to use a different set of scissors to pry the latch open, which doesn't work because the scissors are too thick to fit between the latch and the trunk, so we can't get any leverage.

This goes on for several minutes before we finally decide to load the trunk back in the car and take it home, where I have many other tools that are much narrower.

We get the trunk home. I get some narrow flat screwdrivers and we start trying to pry the lock open again. No success. Ethel tries prying the hinge open. No success. We try digging the broken point of the scissors out of the lock. No success. Lucy gets her fancy magnet and tries to attract the broken point of the scissors. Success! Lucy and Ethel continue to try to turn the lock to see if that makes any difference in prying open the latch. Several different scenarios are all unsuccessful. Lucy and Ethel must have been quite a sight, lying in the back of an SUV trying to pry open a steamer trunk.

Lucy says, “I guess I could get the key.”

Ethel stops what she is doing and looks Lucy square in the face. “You have a key? WHY DIDN'T YOU MENTION THAT?”

“BECAUSE WE DIDN'T LOCK IT,” Lucy says.

“Get. The. Key.”

Lucy gets the key and repeats the “turn the lock while prying open the latch” exercise. No success. Lucy feels smug.

Ethel tries jiggling the key. Jiggling is a time-honored way of opening locks. The key turns an eighth of a turn. Ethel feels smug.

Long story short, eventually Ethel uses pliers to turn the key gently (not wanting a repeat of the “scissors breaking off in the lock” incident) while Lucy pushes down on the latch—AND THE KEY OPENS THE LOCK!

In short order, Lucy and Ethel take out the box and prepare it for separate shipment, Lucy makes address labels, Ethel tapes down the latch so it won't lock again—but puts the key in the extra box for good measure, they get the trunk back in the car, drive it back to FedEx and anxiously await the new number on the scale.

Winner winner chicken dinner!

Most special thanks go to my partner in crime, Ethel. This was the last of the big things I wanted to get done, and I was paralyzed with indecision until Ethel came aboard and took charge. I am pleased to report that the trunk has reached its destination, and my stepdaughter has been reunited with treasures that belonged her cherished grandmother.

Month 2 (catchy title, eh?)

I'm not gonna lie—this was a harder month than the first month, and this last week in particular was the worst.

You already know about my plant stand—a small victory that nevertheless felt like a step away. And now I've made pickles. From the cucumbers Vic planted. Which I had to make because I couldn't eat all the cucumbers alone. (Yes, I could have shared my bounty with friend and neighbors, but that is not the point here. 😉)

You may already know about the pickles because I posted about them on Facebook. Vic and I always joked that we got all our validation from Facebook Likes, but it turns out that that is not entirely true. As I write this, I have 57 reactions (a delightful combination of Likes, Loves and Wows). I truly love seeing who clicked that little button, and every name in those lists makes me smile. A total of 14 people also commented on my post. For me, that's a lot, and I adore everyone who took the time to write a comment.

But you know who didn't hit that Like button? Who didn't write a comment? That's right. Victor Love, love of my life. I had no idea how much his validation meant to me—and it would have come all through the process: “Great job taking care of the cucumbers—they are delicious!” “Look at that haul! What are you going to do with all those cucumbers? “Wow—you're going to make pickles? Can't wait to try them!” “Those pickles look great! When can we eat them!” “Yum—great pickles, Poo!” (Yes, my nickname was Poo. Do you want to make something of it?)

The newest batch of pickles

Same goes for my plant stand. And my gigantic watermelon, which I have literally been trying to keep alive just for him, even though he's not here. 

For scale, my foot is about 10 inches long.

To be clear: I don't need external validation. I am internally motivated, and I do what I do to make myself happy, not to get Likes from others. But external validation is nice, and it was never nicer than when it came from Vic.

Moving on, this week was the full moon. Bella and I got a late start on our Monday walk, and when the full moon started to rise above the trees, it caught me off guard. September wasn't the best month for the full moon (although I thought it was until I went to the photo library to get some September moon shots), but it didn't matter—Vic would have been up in the wee hours of the morning to get another September moon shot this week. These are some of his September moons, and I thank a friend of his who emailed me pictures that he had taken of this week's full moon with the subject line “Thinking of Vic.” I'm so grateful people are still thinking of him—and reaching out to tell me about it.

And then there's date night. Friday was almost always date night, and it wasn't that we did anything special; it was just that we did it together. We almost never made plans with anyone else on Fridays. For years when I worked in Boulder, Vic would come get me after work and we would go to a $4 matinee and then get sandwiches at Weebee's Heros at Crossroads Mall, and then we would walk hand in hand through the mall for a while, just passing the time (and getting Karmelkorn, of course). The activities changed over the years, but the sentiment didn't—date night was for us. So as I was sitting at my desk finishing my work on Friday, it occurred to me that it was date night. (Yes, there have been eight other date nights since he died, but this is the one that got to me.) So I went out. Alone. (Well, I took Bella.) I don't think I'll do that again.

Finally, don't get me started on the shower. Years ago, the square shower in the master bathroom developed a leak. I hated the square shower, but I love my soaker tub, and you can't have both a soaker tub and a full-size shower in a small bathroom. And we have another shower—a regular-size one—so I just use that one.

But Vic loved the square shower. He felt it was warmer because there wasn’t as much air space to heat up, and there was nothing he loved more than a warm shower. Except me. And the dog. And pineapple upside down cake. OK, there were probably a lot of things he loved more than a warm shower, but you get what I’m saying. When the square shower started leaking, I told Vic he would need to shower in the guest bathroom until he got the leak fixed. (In our house, the division of labor was that Vic did all the maintenance—or arranged to have it done.)

That said, neither of us actually likes making calls like this. We often don’t even know where to start—a plumber or an appliance guy? A handyman or a specialist? We don’t know. And worse—how much is it going to cost? We’re both cheap. So he never made the call. He used my shower for years.

Fast forward to April 2021. Our neighbor across the street had a Re•Bath truck in his driveway for a few days. Next time I saw him outside (God forbid I actually ring his doorbell), I asked him what he had them do, and he said, “Oh, man, we finally got a new shower in the master bathroom!” So his wife took me upstairs and showed me their shower, and it was lovely. He gave me the sales guy’s card, and I gave it to Vic. “Here. Sam had these guys do their shower, so give them a call and we’ll get our shower done.” Tick tock tick tock, time goes by, no call.

I realized he was never going to call. I couldn't ask him to do it again or he’d consider it nagging and then he’d really never do it. So I just took the card and made the call. The guy came out in June, gave us a quote, and said if we ordered that day, he’d give us a 10 percent discount. Vic didn't like to be pressured like that, but the cost—while expensive—was less than we expected, and we needed to fix the shower!

So we ordered the shower. Vic got to pick out everything because it was going to be his shower. He was very excited about getting back to his square shower. But the sales guy said they had a lead time of 8 to 12 weeks, so we wouldn’t get it right away.

Well, as you now know, the shower did not get here before Vic died. And I didn’t even think about it until the day last week that they called and said they were ready to start work. So on the one hand, I’m excited to be getting a new shower. On the other hand, it makes me really sad that Vic never got to use it.

Still needs a door and a counter

 

Should I keep the bummer going? How's this for a kicker: I am not getting joy out of anything. I take Bella for a walk, and it's just a chore. I am working on some stitching, and it's just a slog. None of my shows are making me happy—even the ones he hated so I had to watch them after I went to bed. Even the new ones he would have hated. And definitely not the ones we watched together. He's never going to find out that (spoiler alert) all the firefighters made it out of the explosion on Chicago Fire. I made the pickles, and it was just three hours of my day that I didn't spend catching up on bookwork and filing and whatnot. (Not that I ever got any joy from that—does anyone?) I'm sure as things are winding down and I'm less busy, feelings are just catching up with me. So I am letting myself just sit in that lack of joy and experience it. It is part of life—and death.

I will say this—I'm glad I have my Bella. She is with me almost all day every day. (She does have to take a break when the sun hits all her favorite places on the floor.) She's not an overly affectionate dog, but she is here.

I turned around, and there she was. 🙂

I continue to be indebted to all of you for your friendship and support. I have had lunches and breakfasts and free pickles. I have people helping me get through Vic's things in the house and ship things to his family. I have had phone calls and texts and emails and cards. My favorite moment this week was a conversation I had with a former co-worker of Vic's. I'd been trying to reach her since Vic died because I knew he thought the world of her, but he didn't have her number in his phone, so I sent her a Facebook message. She received it on Friday and immediately contacted me. The first thing she said after hearing the news was this: “Vic was amazing and gave me a very good perspective on life. When we met, I wanted to conquer the world. (I was a 19-year-old intern!) He was one of my biggest cheerleaders but also made sure I knew what was important. Our conversations and the pictures he took and shared had a huge impact on me.”

Vic never thought much of himself. He didn't think he was a very good photographer, he didn't think he was much of a husband, he didn't think he was a great father—he just didn't think he was special. It was always heartbreaking to me when he would say something like, "Oh, no one will miss me when I'm gone" or "I didn't do anything to change the world." And I would tell him about all the people who would miss him or all the ways he made a difference in this world, but it never got through to him. But even I have been surprised by hearing about how many lives he truly touched. I hope his hummingbird persona is flying around hearing some of these stories and feeling a sense of pride. I know I am getting great comfort from them, enabling me to sign off from this post with a slight smile.

This week will be better. And if it's not, that's OK. Grief doesn't have a timetable.