Crazy Widow : Bring on the Tears

I find it intensely ironic that a song that once made me bop my head like a bobblehead, and sing at the top of my lungs, left me choked up and bawling my eyes out last night. Songs such as "Free Fallin'" by Tom Petty weren't written to be tearjerkers, yet that's exactly what happened driving home from Delware at midnight.

Widowhood is nothing short of a complete bipolar rollercoaster. One minute you're on top of the world, getting back out there, and the next you're debilitatingly depressed. Nothing prepares you for the next major high or the next intense low, you just barely hang on for whatever nightmare is about to be thrown at you yet again.

I think about death a lot, more than is "normal". I contemplate where my dead husband may be right now. The humorous part of my brain that always wants to make a joke at inappropriate times, wants to believe he's up there playing poker with his pop.

Another vision is that it WAS him that made caused all the storms that soaked the firewood when I went camping this weekend, so that we had to use every possible fire starter imagineable until we finally succumbed to motor oil just to keep the fire lit. Mmmm, motor oil burgers. Yum. I can almost see him with his "I did something bad" smile as he says, "If I can't there for a bonfire on the beach, YOU can't have a bonfire on the beach'. Jerk.

Then I think-is he really up THERE? Is there a heaven? A purgatory? Reincarnation? How do I know that he's really still sorta with me, watching me? What if the agnostics and aethiests are all right and he's NOWHERE? Well that's just depressing. Nope, I think I need to have faith just so I can believe that he's still up there watching me screw it all up.

Am I really just eating double stuf Oreos just to prove to him that I CAN eat double stuf oreos and be depressed and not workout because he's not here to kick my butt to the gym? Part of me says yes! He's not here to make sure I take care of myself, so why should I even bother? Who am I going to impress? Screw bad cholestoral. Somedays it feels empowering to think those things, and others, it just feels so alone. I kind of miss his nagging to get me to the gym. I miss his smiles as I try with all my might to a chest press with these boobs.

You see, when they're dead, suddenly not only do you miss the good things, but you miss the annoying things about them too. Like how he made me late for everything. It drove nuts! I'd be waiting on the front porch or in the car because he was still doing something. I never knew exactly why he couldn't get out the door on time, but somehow it never happened. I think he purposely did it because I was so anal about time and 'what now'. Now I just don't care.

I don't cry anymore like I used to. I used to cry at movies, tear up at a sad song. Now, it's different. I cry at happy songs, and the sad movies don't make me cry because I think, 'well, that's not nearly as bad as what I've been through!' How cynical is that?

My emotions aren't just a rollercoaster, they're mis-named. No word truly defines the depth of that feeling. Anger just doesn't seem justified anymore. Enraged? That's getting closer. Desperate even seems weak to me. As a widow, it's as if there is no longer a vocabulary to fit my world. I think I need to start a Widow Dictionary. Eeearrrghuh, noun for 'my soul is ripping out of my body as we speak'. Sounds like a good start to me.