Superstitions and Rituals

“That guy hasn’t missed a free throw all night,” announced the color commentator of the college basketball game.

            “Now you’ve done it, you’ll jinx him for sure,” said the play-by-play broadcaster. Sure enough, the player missed his next free throw.

            Why do we say such things? Do we really believe there is a supernatural universe operating out of sight? Is it a form of magic? We all do it; we go through rituals for certain tasks, in an effort to affect things we cannot control. I don’t consider myself superstitious, but I do still participate in rituals.

A favorite of mine is “knock on wood,” a mantra to assure things will continue the positive way just stated. For example, after a visit to a friend in the hospital, I said, hopefully, “Well, it looks like she’s out of the woods now, the worst is over. Knock on wood!” Woe betide us if there is nothing made of wood handy! It feels like a bad sign if we don’t follow through, so I feel some dissatisfaction if I can’t knock on real wood. I have nothing wooden in my car, alas, so I am out of luck if I am in the car when I try to knock

            I think rituals help us because we believe they give us an edge to achieve a desired outcome. Going back to basketball (can’t help it, as I write this we are in the midst of March Madness), a coach will often wear what he considers a lucky sweater, or tie. A player will go through the same routine each time he lines up for a free throw, but that could also be muscle memory, since he practices shooting hundreds of free throws. Each time the routine works, it reinforces the behavior – until it doesn’t work. Then the person needs to find another ritual. Maybe he will cling to the ritual a little longer if he thinks the failure was just an aberration.

            I am a Duke basketball fan; I wear my college gear when I am going to watch a game my team is playing. It doesn’t necessarily work, but it makes me feel like I am doing my part. I have sweatshirts, T shirts and earrings as well as mugs to drink from.

            So many people are superstitious that it seems to be part of being human. I would venture that all cultures have their rituals and superstitions. Anything you can do that might be able to improve the odds is worth a try. But people do these things without actual forethought, it seems to me. If we think about it too much we realize how silly it is to think we have such power. So we continue practicing these behaviors without examining ourselves too closely.

            I remember as a child, when I walked on a sidewalk, hearing in my head the saying:

                        “Step on a crack, you’ll break your mother’s back,

                        Step on a line, you’ll break your mother’s spine.”

I did not believe it, but I was careful to walk the proper number of steps it took to get through each sidewalk block, so I wouldn’t step on a line. I still do that, to this day.

            Here are some more common superstitions: if you spill salt, you must immediately throw some over your left shoulder (to ward off evil); it is bad luck to walk under a ladder; a black cat crossing your path is bad luck (making it a not-so-great idea to have one for a pet, as I do); if you break a mirror, you’ll have seven years of bad luck. Those rituals and superstitions all portend negative consequences.

            Some rituals are inherently positive. If my daughter and I happen to say the same thing at the same time, we immediately join pinkies. One of us says, “What goes up the chimney?”

            The other replies, “Smoke.”

            The two of us then say, in unison, as we shake our pinkies up and down, “Your wish and my wish will never be broke.” That always gives me satisfaction, even if I haven’t thought of a wish. It’s kind of like breaking a wishbone, which the two people must hold between their pinkies. I always believed the person getting the larger piece had their wish come true, but I discovered that my husband believed the opposite. So we could both win (or lose)!

            Athletes in particular seem to engage in rituals. I am told that tennis player Rafael Nadal goes through an elaborate ritual each time he serves, although I have not seen it for myself. He wins a lot, so maybe it works! Superstitions and rituals help us to believe that we have some measure of control over the universe. Even though we know it’s not so, we continue using them, anyway.

Just in case.

Just Passing Through

My daughter, Stacy, and I were talking the other day, and we came up with the name of an old colleague of mine. “I wonder where she is now,” she mused. I wondered, too. As we talked, her story came back to me. June had told us about nearly dying from salmonella in undercooked eggs she ate while living in England. She was an independent contractor I worked with when I had my own business, and she gave Stacy a beautiful plate as a wedding gift. I have not heard from her in close to 20 years.

Our discussion got me thinking about all the people I have known throughout my life. How many people have passed through my world and then moved on? My mind is a kaleidoscope of all of them, and my memory is filled with their little touches before they or I moved away or just drifted apart. As I continue meet new people, I am delighted that it is not too late to feel the joy of another person joining my life story.

            I have this image in my mind of the little yellow ducklings that float by in a shooting gallery. They just keep coming, until you knock them over. Another will always pop up if one is gone. They are all the same, but the people we meet are all different.

            New relationships arise unbidden, maybe a chance encounter, maybe a new neighbor. Some stand the test of time, some don’t. They bump into me like a bumper car and then stay or bounce away. Some are convenient, perhaps living nearby, but we lose touch when one of us moves. I still remember them, however, and I like to think they remember me.

            I need to go back nearly 50 years to remember Betsy and Tom, a young couple who were neighbors at my first apartment in Durham. NC. Tom was in graduate school at Duke and Betsy was a teacher. The windows were open when Betsy knocked on my door. She had heard me arguing loudly with my two-year-old.

“Pick up your toys!” I shouted.

            Hands on hips, Stacy shouted back, “I won’t!”

            “You will!” I shouted, determined that a two-year-old was not getting the best of me.

            When I answered the door, Betsy asked, “Can I help?” I was embarrassed that Betsy had overheard our scene, and that I had turned into a child myself, but I was grateful for our rescue. If ever I needed a friend, that was the time. I will never forget that moment, but now I have no idea where Tom and Betsy ended up.

            I remember a young woman who worked for me when I was Executive Director of a small nonprofit in Manassas, Virginia. Pam was afraid to drive on the beltway around D.C., and she was also afraid to drive in the dark, so she had to leave work early at 4:30. However, she was very bright, and I really enjoyed working with her. I still have a cross-stitch she made for me that says, “Polly’s Kitchen.” Her baby girl was born the day before my birthday.

            A sudden loss or health crisis may bring some of those old friends to the fore. When they responded on Facebook, even though I knew it was easy to do so, it made a difference to me after my husband, Jerry, died. I was touched that faraway friends still remember me. I also respond on Facebook to others’ sorrows, writing, “So sorry,” knowing how inadequate that is for the person suffering deep pain.

I had several friends in northern Virginia who lost their husbands after we moved to North Carolina. Jane’s husband, Jeff, had recently retired as a pilot for United Airlines when he died suddenly from a heart attack. He had been one of our guitar players and sang bass for the church singing group that Jerry and I were a part of. We loved Jeff and mourned him along with his family. That small singing group has lost almost all its members through death or moving away, but we had a wonderful time singing together.

            I rarely keep cards sent to me, but I have kept all the cards I received after Jerry died. When I am feeling sad, I read them again, sharing my loss with others that loved him, and remembering the connection we each had with the person sending the card.

            I have friends all over this country and even all over the world who go back many years. Some are the kind of friends I pick up with immediately, as if we had never been apart, if I am lucky enough to see them again. There are also friends I have known less time, but they are a part of my daily life, friends I see at the Y, for example. The local friends who know me best are in my book club, or my writers’ group, or church friends. These people feed my soul, especially now. Some I have not seen since the pandemic began; I look forward to spending time with them again, in person. This pandemic has taught me more about loneliness than I ever wanted to know.

            It brings me pleasure to think of all the people who have joined me for a time on my life’s journey. Each has a place in my memory, each special in his or her own way. They may have been just passing through, but they have not been forgotten.

To Your Health

If you enjoy good health, chances are you may take it for granted. Until it’s gone. A cancer diagnosis, a heart attack, a bad fall: these can be a wake-up call that life is finite and health is never guaranteed. Even if you have been taking good care of yourself, things can still happen. When you get the wake-up call, you may respond with appropriate action, possibly making life changes, or you may not. It’s up to you.

            I had such a wake-up call in 2019, when I had a bad fall, even though I knew that falls can greatly impair a person’s mobility for life, especially if he or she is elderly.

I was being stupid, standing precariously on a kitchen chair, and I have not been so careless since. I cracked my pelvis and had difficulty sleeping, walking and getting my prescription for pain pills refilled. Although I recovered completely, it took months, and I did not enjoy the experience.

            I have been lucky enough to avoid the coronavirus, and I do believe it was luck, because I have been to quite a few gatherings in the last year. They have mostly been small, with everyone masked and socially distant, except for Christmas with family. I also have a couple of “pods” that I meet with often: my daughter’s family (four of us) and the several members of my writers’ group. I attend classes at the Y where we are all masked and maintain social distance.

            My church offers an in-person service each Sunday, with masks and social distancing required, and I have been attending regularly. Additionally, I belong to a book club that meets exclusively outdoors once a month. It has been too cold for the last two months, but we hope to meet in March. I am grateful that my family and friends have been cautious and follow guidelines, and I am especially grateful to have had these people in my life when personal interactions have been so limited.

            Now I have completed my Covid-19 vaccinations. I intend to proceed with caution and continue to wear a mask and socially distance until it’s safe not to do so. That may be later than we think.

            We have all had our lives compromised over the last year, but there are positive ways of looking at anything. The fact that we even have a vaccine is cause for optimism. Experts did not believe it could be done so quickly.

            Although many thousands have died, we have heard and seen inspiring stories of nurses and doctors who have worked tirelessly to keep others alive this last year, despite all the difficulties involved and the emotional toll it has taken. Others have found creative ways to overcome the hardships of the pandemic, thanks to the indomitable human spirit.

            When the worst is over, we will smile at each other as we emerge from isolation into the beautiful world we inhabit and celebrate that we survived. We will hug the ones we have missed hugging, and we will enjoy the lives that we put on hold. I mourn the loss of every person that died due to Covid, and those that have become debilitated. I know what their loved ones are going through. I also lost my husband a year ago, though not to Covid, and I am still grieving.

            What better wish, at this time or any time, can you bestow upon another than good health? Here’s to you and the solutions you have found to get through this pandemic. Here’s to creativity and love and laughter. Here’s to your health!

Abundant Hope

I am filled with optimism. I sit here with my computer on my lap and a cat looking plaintively at me, hoping for my lap for himself. Such pleading in those green eyes, he makes me laugh. “Not this time,” I say to Frankie, as he finally gives up and settles against me on the couch.

            I am light, I am benevolent, I am joyful. It feels like going back to church again, where the congregation fills the pews, and chatter rolls around the sanctuary before the service begins. We will see that this year, I am sure of it.

            As I go out to the grocery store, I smile at people from behind my mask. I think they can tell because my eyes crinkle up. I learned that from a woman in Harris Teeter one day. Our buggies were headed for a low-speed collision, which was fortunately averted.  I didn’t want her to think I was upset, so I said, “I’m smiling.”

            She said, “I know, I can see it in your eyes,” and her eyes crinkled up too. There are a lot of crinkly eyes at Harris Teeter on Thursdays. We seniors all shop there for our 5% discount. How nice it would be if we could solve all our disputes with crinkly eyes.

            So why am I so optimistic? It feels like a new day dawning, with the changes in Washington. It feels like someone has gone out and hosed down the streets, and then swept them clean. I feel washed clean, too. We are seeing a return to decency and caring for others.

            I believe we have a special opportunity this year to change the atmosphere we live in from hate to love, even if only in our own circles. I have a friend who has told me that he no longer watches or listens to the news or reads about politics. It was making him angry, and he doesn’t want to be that person. We have been at odds for years because we are on opposite poles. I applauded his decision and told him I feel the same way. 

            I have seen people who act out of love, and that is what I am hoping for, for me and for others. I know that behaving in a loving way feels so much better than acting hatefully, because I have experienced this love for myself, and I believe we were meant to live this way. Love is powerful, and a person can act lovingly even when the feeling is not there. The feeling can come later, and can take a long time, but the action sustains the love.

            Now that we are ensconced in 2021, we can all shake our heads in disbelief with what this country and the world endured in 2020. For me, suffering grief and isolation at the same time, I had to manufacture hope. I knew I just had to survive, and I did.

            I am optimistic about my life because I have survived a year without my husband, Jerry, and there is no place to go but up. I rise up a bit more each month as I learn more about myself and my aspirations for the future. There are no timetables for anything, I realize, so I am easy on myself as I consider future home repairs and responsibilities. I can look out at my backyard, now all winter-dead, and picture how it will look when it is green and blooming.

            Right now, it is easy to be kind to others. My heart is happy and grateful. However, I am realistic enough to know that my hopeful feeling probably won’t last. I have always known that I am a bit of a dreamer. But loving others, and praying for them, and being my best self that I can be to them, is not impossible. I pray daily for God’s help, that he will give me the grace to continue to strive for that.

John 13:34  “I give you a new commandant, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another.”

Living Through Grief

Losing a beloved spouse is like being sliced open, with a piece of you taken out forever. Not only will you never get that piece back, but you are unavoidably changed from that time on. You still look like yourself, you may keep the same habits, but you are different.

            I have lost two husbands, fifty years apart. The first time I was 24, so young I was still unformed. I had a lot to learn, while taking care of a young daughter at the same time. The pain was intense, and I buried myself in books, which took me to a place where I could escape. Gradually, I was able to live a normal life, and to discover joy again, as the person I was becoming, on my own. I never wanted to remain single, but it took me ten years to find Jerry, a man who complemented me, and who loved me as I loved him. We had almost forty years together.

            Now I am mature, I know what I want out of life, and I feel content with the person I have become and am still becoming. It was not even a shock, as it was with my first husband, Jim, when Jerry died, from Acute Myeloid Leukemia. We had been battling Jerry’s two cancers, off and on, for 15 years, but our times together were almost all good. He was always active, and had great vitality.

            My two experiences of grief were very different. As a young person, it was devastating. My husband, Jim, completed several years in the Army, including a tour of duty in Vietnam flying medevac helicopters, from which he came home unscathed. After the service, he took a temporary job as a lumberjack for his dad’s lumber company in Pennsylvania. He had applied to several law schools and was waiting to hear if he had been accepted. One day he went to work cutting trees in the woods and never came home. A tree fell on him, killing him instantly. He was 28.

            I was in shock and had no idea what to do. I was fortunate enough to be able to live with my parents for a few months. I kept this image of a tunnel; if I could only make it through, there would be life and light on the other side. I clung to that, because I just knew the pain would get better. My brother-in-law, who lost his father when he was a teen, also assured me that time would help me heal, and I kept that message close to me.

            About nine months after I lost my first husband, I moved 500 miles away, with my two-year-old, to attend graduate school. By then, I felt strong enough to pursue a life for her and me, although I knew it would be hard.

            After losing Jerry, I suffered again, missing my special, unique man who was smart, caring, had many friends and was so full of life.  I have been very lonely without him. But this time I have noticed a strange phenomenon. I have felt vulnerable, which is normal, but I have also felt like I am experiencing the whole world for the first time, and really enjoying everything, like a wide-eyed innocent. I am reminded of advice which is given to new widows: don’t move or make any big decisions in the first year. Now I know why they say it! I keep running into people who just delight me, people I had never met or people I knew only slightly. I am enjoying the feeling of being opened up, letting down my defenses.

            I am also not afraid; I have this optimism that everything will be fine. There will be challenges, probably some mishaps, but I will be able to weather them. I will soon be entering my second year of widowhood, and I expect it to be full of exciting new experiences.

            I should note that this past year of grief has coincided with the covid-19 pandemic. How much of my experiences and attitude could be attributed to that, I wonder? For example, when I meet someone I really like, I can’t decide if I am really delighted with the person or just the opportunity to actually get out of the house and talk to someone! I feel so grateful that a new year is upon us; it just has to be better, which means my life will be fuller, and I will no longer need to be so isolated.

            Although I knew about grief, I did not know it would be so different the second time around. Perhaps I was more prepared than I realize, but probably it was just the gift of years of living, and not being blindsided. I feel like my grieving has been easier this time, and I am thankful for that. I have survived, and I am ready for tomorrow, whatever it brings.

Homemade, with Love

I have always loved to cook. The smell of a stew cooking, or a roasted chicken, makes me salivate with expectation. I also enjoy the prep work, if I have the time to do it right. I like to line all my ingredients up on the shelf next to the stove, pretending I am a famous chef doing a cooking show. It is a pleasure to serve food that is tasty and nutritious.

            When I married Jerry, my late husband, he didn’t cook much, but he had a few recipes for which he was famous. Well, at least in our family. He did a lot more cooking after he retired. I was still working, and I asked him if he could cook at least once a week, and he readily agreed. He had some dishes that he made by feel, such as his famous potato dumplings. A bit of a perfectionist, he had been known to throw away a batch of potato dumplings because they didn’t “feel right.” I am not so fastidious. Sometimes a recipe looks a lot better on paper than it ever turns out, and Jerry ate a few of my “mistakes.” Although he was always gentle about it, I took the hint. He usually didn’t volunteer the information, but would respond to my question, “Did you like that?”

            He would smile and say, “Well…” He always cooked breakfast on weekends and recently enjoyed experimenting with his instant pot and sous vide cooking process.

            I like to make main dishes, such as soups or pasta with lots of vegetables and a little meat or seafood. I am famous in my family for pea soup, made with a meaty ham bone. My Better Homes and Garden Cookbook, c. 1966, is out of control with loose pages and recipes and has to be held together with a thick rubber band. It was my Bible when I first got married, but now I have recipes in numerous other cookbooks and places around my kitchen. I am always looking for new recipes for main dishes.

            Jerry had the sweet tooth I lack, and he liked to make desserts, even occasionally including his own birthday cake, which saved me the trouble, although I must admit I felt a little guilty about it. I am not that fond of cake, and would eat one piece, leaving the rest to him. Whenever I volunteered to bring a dessert to work for any reason, I knew I could ask him to bake something and he would be happy to oblige. I could even admit to the group that I didn’t make it, and I often received as much admiration for a husband that bakes as for the dessert I brought!

            His specialties changed over the years. Cinnamon Buns were a favorite for a while, but then he moved on. Everyone loved his Apple Dumplings, so he continued to make them. We both made bread and dough in the bread machine, but cut back when the extra pounds appeared. He did have a favorite Cinnamon Raisin Craisin Bread that was a crowd pleaser. Most recently, he made several different kinds of cookies, which were much in demand among golfing buddies and other friends. In fact, he had to make special trips to the golfers’ homes because the wives heard stories about the great cookies, but there were never any left when the husbands got  home!

            Jerry is no longer here, but I have managed to still enjoy forays into my kitchen. I have found that I can cook the amount I used to for both of us and have a tasty leftover meal, plus maybe a lunch. Then I don’t have to cook every day. It may seem strange, but food has tasted just so good recently. I even like my leftovers! I look forward to making my concoctions, and have found a couple of new recipes I plan to make again.

            But there is nothing like cooking for others. How better to show your love? My daughter, Stacy, is coming for a visit later this month. She will arrive on Jerry’s birthday and has already placed her order for the dishes she wants me to cook, including pea soup made with the ham bone from our Christmas dinner. We will drink a toast to Jerry, and I will keep her busy helping me in the kitchen, just like the old days, as I take care of her and enjoy being her mom. Pure love, no recipe needed.

My first cookbook c. 1966

Memories of My Father

We called my dad Pop. We loved him and looked up to him, but he was not affectionate. We knew better than to seek that from him. However, he really came into his own when he became a grandfather, and we called him Pop Pop. By then, he had mellowed. As a father his highest praise had been, “What’s the matter with that?” which we translated into “Good job!”  but, for me, it never felt like the praise I was seeking. In contrast, his grandchildren knew him as the “gamer,” who was always ready to play. When I moved back home to New Jersey after my first husband died, my daughter, Stacy, was only 16 months old. She adored her Pop Pop, and could not wait for him to come home from work. She would run up to him and say, “Pop Pop, fwing me!” and he would happily oblige, grabbing her hands and swinging her back and forth between his legs.

            He also would tease her at the dinner table, throwing a paper napkin at her, so of course she had to throw one back. He would grin and she would giggle until finally my mom said, “That’s enough, you kids.” For Stacy, he was the man in her life, and she felt comfortable crawling into his lap, something we five kids would never have done. We sought solace from our mother, who accepted us just as we were.

            During the ten years before I remarried, Stacy and I traveled home to New Jersey from North Carolina for all holidays and for two weeks every summer. Stacy and Pop Pop spent hours playing, inside and out. She loved all the games they played, mostly board games, and became the gamer she still is today. A favorite game was Clue; one time she caught him moving his token through a wall instead of using the door. He never lived it down that he was caught cheating in Clue!

            After I married Jerry, we moved to northern Virginia, and continued to travel often to see my parents. We also vacationed with them and played golf together. My dad was an excellent golfer, right into old age. He excelled at every sport he tried. His most notable sports achievement was winning the title of Badminton Champion of the state of Rhode Island in 1939.

            Stacy always remained close to her grandparents. When she was beginning her career in Raleigh after graduating from college, they moved to Myrtle Beach, about a three-hour drive from her. She visited them often, and we spent all our holidays with them. Pop Pop developed dementia during that time, and my mom had to take care of him. He would enter every sweepstakes that arrived in the mail, and would buy things he didn’t want or need, thinking that would enhance his chances of winning. Mom had to learn to intercept the mail before he could get to it. He always said he wanted the money to give to his kids.

            As my dad deteriorated, my mom became increasingly anxious about caring for him. One day she called me and said, “Daddy’s acting strange.” Jerry and I were living in northern Virginia, at least an eight-hour drive away. All my siblings were even farther away from them. Feeling frustrated that I could not help, I told Mom I would call Stacy. After I did, Stacy left immediately for South Carolina and spent the night with them. She called me to say that Pop Pop was fine and all was well.

            We kids knew that the situation with my parents could not continue as it was. Stacy volunteered to move to Myrtle Beach to take care of them, but my mom quickly squelched that idea. “You are not going to give up your life for us,” she said. My older sister, Marilyn, living in California, had been trying for years to get them to move close to her. She stepped up and took charge. Marilyn and her daughter flew to Myrtle, held a yard sale and packed up the old folks to move to California. Mom protested that she didn’t want to move so far from all her other children on the east coast, but Marilyn knew she was the one who could take care of them.

            “You know their best years are behind them,” I told Marilyn, and she understood what she was getting into. Pop Pop, now called Poppy, was 89 by then, and Nanny 84. The following year, we all flew to California for a family reunion to celebrate Poppy’s 90^th birthday. He lived another five years, and died in his sleep.

            Remembering my dad, I am sure he had a lot to do with the woman I became. I was shy and insecure when I ventured out into the world, a bit of a dreamer who never wanted to be anything but a writer. I think Pop saw himself as a molder of his children. He wanted us to try harder, to be better. When you are a kid, you think every family is like your own. Probably a lot of dads were as emotionally unavailable as my pop, critical and slow to praise. He did the best he could, as we all do. In the end, we loved him, and we all turned out okay, each flawed in his or her own way, but living life and loving each other.

My Pop and me c. 1948

New Year, New Life, New Possibilities

How many of us have been counting down the days to 2021? How many of us have just survived the worst year of our lives? I am so ready for the new year! We are like snakes, ready to cast off the old, dead skin and slither into a better life.

            I think about December, 2019, and our last Christmas with my late husband, Jerry. He was sick then, not doing well with his cancer, but we had seen a miraculous remission before, and we had hope. Despite that, we all suspected that this was Jerry’s last Christmas, although no one talked about it. We bought a cut tree and I decorated the whole house. We entertained our family, including a baby great-grandson, and had a wonderful time together. This year I did not decorate, but enjoyed looking out the window at my neighbors’ lights and decorations. We had our family Christmas in Raleigh. We loved being together, but we were always aware that Covid-19 could be lurking.

            What do we have to look forward to in 2021? Vaccine! At some point we will all be vaccinated for the coronavirus, at least those of us who are willing. The disease will no longer be something we have to fear, and we won’t have to endure daily updates on how many people have died.  We should be able to go out, mingle with others as we choose, eat at any restaurant we like, and hopefully go back to life as we once knew it. Trump will no longer be president, and (if we’re lucky) we will no longer have to endure any news of him. I look forward, actually, to ignoring politics in 2021. I will save a lot of time when I do that, and it is an opportunity to live in a more loving way.

            Many of us have traditionally considered the new year a time to initiate self-improvement projects: lose weight, read more, write a book, take classes, be kinder, eschew politics, etc. Usually, these resolutions don’t last long. What might make 2021 different? Some people had enough time to work on those things already. Forced to stay home, others discovered how creative they were, and some families got closer. A couple of my resolutions are to be more compassionate and to work to be closer to all my family.

            A big difference in 2021 will be freedom! We’ll have a lot more choices in how to spend our time, and where we can go and who we can see. At some point, we can abandon our masks. I will be able to wear lipstick again! I want to travel and visit places I have only read about. I feel like the whole world is opening up to me.

            My optimist self says it’s about time for all of us to enjoy the good things we anticipate are coming in this blank slate of a new year. As I lived through 2020, I always knew it was going to get better, and it could always be worse. Yes, my husband died in February, and I had to endure intense loneliness along with my grief. But I am here. I did not get Covid, and no one close to me did either. I am emerging from my grief with profound gratitude for the life I do have, and the people who have helped me along the way, many unbeknownst to themselves. Dare I say it? Life is good.

A New Relationship with Money

I have always run my finances out of a mode of scarcity. I’ve said that I only needed whatever it took to live. I paid the bills and made up a monthly budget, based on whatever money I (or we, when I was married) had coming in, and I balanced it every month. If I ran out before the month ended, I revised my budget to reflect that reality. Same thing if I had a surplus for several months. I followed the budget throughout the month, always aware of where I stood. I hesitated about telling my husband, Jerry, if we had a surplus, because if I did, he was sure to spend it. Sometimes I told him, sometimes not. I always had some money put away for emergencies or modest vacations. Jerry and I had talked about the fact that my income would go down after he died, but we were both confident that I would be fine, because I am an expert on getting by with what I have.

            I thought my careful control of spending was healthy, but I think I had it wrong. I had a fear of running out of money. Perhaps this stemmed from the ten-year period back in the 1970s when I was widowed the first time, living with my young daughter on a fixed income, supplemented occasionally with temporary jobs. I was proud that I could afford to dress her in nice clothes and let her join the Girl Scouts and take gymnastics. I would save for anything else that I felt was important, including trips to visit family and friends. I was not going to let lack of money get in the way of a good life for us. I had my husband’s life insurance invested, and never touched it, because I was saving it for her college fund. I felt like I was on top of the situation, but I remember asking her when she was 11, some months after my second marriage to Jerry, if she felt that her life had changed much. She replied immediately, “We have more money now.” I wondered then how many times she had wanted me to buy her something and never said anything because she knew we couldn’t afford it.

            This year my life has changed: Jerry has passed on and I now have investments to manage that I can check whenever I want. I never paid much attention to them before, because Jerry handled them and reported that they were doing well. As I delved into my holdings, I came to realize that I could loosen the purse strings, and I am no longer just getting along. I can afford to do things I have only dreamed about.

            This is a paradigm shift for me; I am still trying to absorb it all. So how am I going to spend this money I didn’t even know I had? I do have home maintenance to take care of. I have already started giving more to charity, and I plan to travel, if I can find one or more people to go with me. My younger sister Denise and I want to visit our siblings in Florida and California, maybe even Canada. She also lost her husband, shortly after Jerry died, so we both are free to travel. We are going on a Viking cruise to Alaska next July together, and I hope that is the first of many excursions. 

            This change in my thinking comes directly out of the grief process I am working my way through. I am developing a new image of myself as a person alone; I am evolving, and it feels good. I am also aware that I need to take advantage of my good health while it lasts, before I am truly “old.” The “faraway places with strange-sounding names” are really just around the corner. It is time to get started on all my adventures!

Thanksgiving: to Stay or to Go

           As we did every Friday, my daughter, Stacy, and I were having our regularly-scheduled video chat, the week before Thanksgiving. We were discussing the upcoming holiday in Ocean Isle, where Stacy, her husband Mike, her son Michael Paul and I would be staying at their beach house.  For the holiday meal we would gather with a number of Mike’s relatives, including his 91-year-old father, at Mike’s brother Ken’s nearby beach house.

            “You know,” I said, “Covid is on the rise here, and everywhere, actually. The health experts are telling everybody to stay home and not travel for Thanksgiving.”

            “I know,” she said, “I was watching it on Good Morning, America.”

            “What do you think?” I asked. “You know we’re going to go through this all over again at Christmas. I am in that older population at risk, over 70.”

            “Yes. If I had to give up one holiday together, it would be Thanksgiving.”

            “Me, too,” I replied. At Christmas we would be celebrating at her home in Raleigh with her family and members of my step-children’s families the weekend before Christmas. I now have a one-year-old great-grandson to add to the holiday fun, another generation coming up.

            “Mike’s not home now. Let me get together with him and we’ll decide what we want to do.”

            “Okay,” I said.

            By late November we were eight months into the pandemic of Covid-19, the coronavirus. We had been inundated with accounts of doctors and nurses working heroically around the clock to save lives. We heard sad stories about tens of thousands who had died. We were asked to stay home except for essential errands, like finding toilet paper. Kids had to do schoolwork by computer, and many didn’t like it, but there was fear that children in classrooms would spread the virus. For a while it appeared the virus was slowing, and businesses began to open up, but now cases were rising exponentially, all over the country. People confessed to having “Covid fatigue,” and many were just careless about observing precautions to prevent catching it. Some felt their rights were being infringed upon, and refused to wear masks. Now we were faced with what had traditionally been the biggest holiday travel days of the year. Thanksgiving meant being with family and friends; no one wanted to be forced to stay home.

            During these last months, people complained of loneliness, wanting to see friends and loved ones. I knew loneliness like I had never experienced it before. I had just lost my husband, Jerry, in February, scarcely one month before everything shut down. When I most needed people, I had to do without my friends and family. In all my life, I realized, I had never lived alone.

            The good part is that I adjusted, and I came to enjoy parts of the single life. Now I feel confident that I will be okay with my new reality. Although I could live with staying home for Thanksgiving if I had to, I was ready to go. This was my first Thanksgiving since Jerry had died, and I wanted to spend it with my family, but I felt it was Mike and Stacy’s decision to make, since I was coming to their house.

            I woke up the next morning after our phone conversation wondering what was going to happen. I texted Stacy to ask if they had made a decision. She texted back, “We want you to come,” saying we would decide how much to see Mike’s family after we all arrived. Pleased the decision had been made, I smiled as I responded, “It feels great to be wanted!”

            I knew we would be careful, and do what we needed to do to be safe. Most importantly, I was not going to be home alone on Thanksgiving, and that felt good.

            Little did we know then… Tuesday evening before Thanksgiving I received an email from Stacy: Mike’s niece, who works as a physician’s assistant, had just tested positive for the coronavirus. She and her family would be isolated for 14 days. Her father, Mike’s brother, Ken, had been to visit her, and might have been exposed. People were bailing out of our wished-for family gathering right and left, including me, after she told me. So the virus answered the question for me: no hugs, no family, no overeating and overdrinking. It wasn’t what I wanted, but I know I still have a lot to be thankful for, most importantly, my good health.