Summertime

     Before meeting my late husband, summertime for me had always been a time for a celebration of warm days spent outside and a break from the long days of cold and darkness that soon would follow. It had been one of the best times of the year for me. After meeting my late husband summertime became a mixture of emotions both good and bad.  On the positive side, it represented time spent with my children during school breaks, time to leisurely go through the day without the hustle and bustle of a schedule, working on my gardens in my yard, family visiting from out of state, kayaking, hiking and lots of day trips. The day trips were usually adventures to various places my late husband chose for us to visit as a family. Sometimes these were places we all wanted to visit. Other times he would drag us along. Yet even those times have become precious memories of times spent with him while he was fighting cancer. These days meant even more because we understood we could not take these times for granted any longer and wanted to savor the life we had left together since we did not know how many more days we would have with my late husband.

      Summer time for me also represented long times spent alone waiting for my husband to return from his work day of fishing in our early days before he got sick. I used to call myself a summer widow before I knew how true this would become. Later as each summer passed without my beloved, summers became a time of such mixed emotion. I was glad to be on summer break from my job as an educator free for the summer to pursue leisure time working on my gardens and my home as well as time to spend with family and friends. However, so much of this time meant I would be alone most days and I often felt the loss I had suffered until the weekend came. Weekends were the best days because often I would be able to make plans with others so my days would be full. Yet, often even in those times, I would think of the man I had expected to be there for the rest of my life. He was gone.

      Although now this thought is not prominent in my mind, summertime can still bring a subtle kind of sadness. Often in my mind, I cannot help thinking how Rob would have enjoyed some experience I am enjoying if he was alive. Other times, I reflect on the fact that since his death I have been much more open to trying new things because I had no other choice. Staying in the comfortable place I had been was taken away from me after he died. I was forced to grow whether I wanted to or not. I am often reminded of something Rob said whenever people told him how brave he was while going through treatments. He would say, “What choice do I have, it is this or dying?”. Often my grief journey towards feeling better felt similar.

    Watching my husband’s journey while fighting his cancer, gave me a road map to how I could deal with the grief trying to take over my life. My husband demonstrated how you could continue to live even if you knew you were dying. He did a lot of living during his fight with cancer. He was more passionate about everything he did,, but especially about repairing the damage, he had done to any of his relationships before he got cancer. First, he started with his relationship with himself and pursued harder than before things he loved to do. He made up with those he had been estranged from and made more time for all of the other relationships in his life. He became a better husband, parent, and friend which for so many of us left behind who loved him made it even harder to lose him. However, I would not change getting closer to him, because those were some of the best memories of my life. It showed me how good a relationship can be even while knowing he would pass away.   The pain of his loss is worth the reward of being able to be his wife when he was alive. He gave me an example to live by, which was to cherish all that you can and to value the things which are important in life.

      Money became less of an issue. He realized at the end money was quickly replaced, but good relationships with others were worth more than all the money in the world. Seeing him in action reinforced the idea joy and satisfaction were not found in material things. It was found in quality time with others. He showed me good relationships with others should come ahead of everything else. He did this by putting old grievances aside and focusing on the good times he had experienced with others. He learned to forgive others for their past actions, realizing that they were doing the best they could even if what they did in the past was hurtful. After all, he knew he had not been the perfect person in his life and forgiveness was a gift others could have to give to him both before and after his passing. Having cancer changed him into a more caring person, even though eventually it would take his life.

     My feelings about summer reflect that life comes with a duality we often do not appreciate. Summer for me brings with it both good and bad memories, I just have to be willing to embrace both, and come to my own realizations that without each of them I could not understand the value of the other. The loss of my husband also reinforced this lesson It was the most painful time of my life, yet it brought me the greatest growth as well as the greatest lessons in life! One such lesson is to appreciate the relationships you have had in life even if they have been flawed in some way because they are the greatest source of joy and satisfaction.  His death forced me to look at my own relationships. It is my hope I have become a better parent and friend and will continue to improve upon the relationships I have built until this point. Before his sickness and death, I had made some of the wrong things a priority at times, but now I see much more clearly what really matters. This summer I made it my mission to reconnect and rekindle relationships by spending time together after a year of Covid when all I could do was call and write. As a result, making this effort this summer is more about connection and less about what I have lost.  Now I just need to find a way to stop the cold, dark nights of Winter from coming. Well, maybe not, since without those days I might not appreciate the gift of summer!