Life after you

It's been a rocky week so far, with the wounds feeling fresh and raw again. I don't know why, though I have a few theories involving hormones and the rapidly approaching new year. It could even have to do with the return of the rains and the darkness, after Seattle had a record-breaking dry (and sunny) start to December. Whatever the cause, I've been feeling desolate again, unwilling to look forward and in pain when I look back.

One of the challenges this week has been the shift in the public conversation from Christmas to New Year's. With the arbitrary changing of the calendar comes the requisite reflection on the year past and the goals and hopes for a better year to come. I've done little but reflect on this past year for several months now, so that part doesn't get me so much. But this focus on the future is hard. How can 2012 be a better year if Sandy's not with me for any of it? The worst days of 2011 for me weren't the days that she was dying — or the days that she was in pain, even — but every day from July 19 on.  Hanging a new calendar is unlikely to have any effect on that, except to emphasize that I'm expected to make plans that don't include her.

Sandy with the team she worked with back in 2001. Joyce, on the far right, was
one of the friends who visited Sandy at the hospice a few days before she died.

I had a good session with my therapist today, and I'm hopeful that I might start to find some peace, might even get some sleep. I biked home in the rain, had a good snack, enjoyed a hot shower, and was about to go down to make dinner. But I stopped at my desk to check email, briefly, and ended up reading old messages from Sandy. It comforts me tremendously to read the everyday lines from a few years ago. When she worked across the lake, we'd exchange several emails a day, along the lines of "hey did you see this?" and "this made me think of you" and "let's go to this event." I've enjoyed clicking old links to see what reminded her of me, and I've loved reading her words of encouragement and support.

Because I've been dreading the new year and feeling sorry for myself, I was intrigued when I came across an email from April 2010. She sent me a song by Chris Daughtry titled "Life After You." I listened to it just now, and though the song was written about someone wanting to get back together after a break-up, the chorus seems particularly apt to me.

All that I'm after is a life full of laughter
As long as I'm laughin' with you
I'm thinkin' 'bout all that still matters is love ever after
After the life we've been through, yeah
Know there's no life after you

My task in the coming year is to figure out how I might defy the feeling that time should have stopped when she died. I'll have to slowly find a life for myself after Sandy, some way of including her even though she's not here physically, and some way to move from pain to gratitude. That's a tall order. I will probably be working on those tasks for decades to come.