Grieving Secret Weapon

Well, things continued today. This time I was cutting the grass and just started getting tears in my eyes. It wasn't like sobbing or anything, it was just a continuous stream. I was thinking "is this because I have to do *all* the yard work myself now" :)

I didn't see any reason to stop mowing the lawn – I just had to be a little careful where I pushed the mower because things were getting blurry. If the neighbors saw me they would have thought I was nuts. So what else is new?

Later I was in the house and I guess I was feeling a little low. Well, the hospice folks like to say you should "lean into the pain" instead of backing away from it. No problem. There were a few dozen sympathy cards I had never opened. I figured they were my "backup weapon" against grieving. Instead of hiding from the feelings I pulled out these wonderful cards and started opening them.

Well, turns out cards are pretty hard to read when your vision is blurry! But I really did feel better having gone through them. I hope you don't feel bad that I took so long to open some of them - I'm glad they were there for me when I needed them!

One card caught my attention. It said something to the effect that "there's never enough time on this earth for us to prepare to say goodbye". I thought, nope, actually the longer you know someone, I expect the harder it is to say.