Yes! I am a widow! I absolutely hated that word in 2017. A widow……it sounded so nasty to me. So dark. So not possible!!!! I was a widow! NOOOOOOOO! It is not possible. I’m 51 years old. I have a lot of things on Jeff’s honey do list that still need to be done!! I just had a normal morning. A widow??? Are you freakin’ kiddin’ me????? How the hell did this happen??? Oh wait, I know exactly how it happened because if you asked me to tell you the story, I could still do it with every last detail. A story that happened 6 years ago that I remember as if it were 6 seconds ago. Anyway, back to the “W” word. I desperately tried to come up with a different word that I could be because that one was NOT working for me!! I wanted to invent a new language. A language that made sense of all the things that were not making sense or that I couldn’t explain or I just didn’t seem to be able to find the “right” word for the situation. For instance, I knew it wouldn’t get ‘easier’ over time because the hardest thing I have ever dealt with does not have an easy component to it! I knew it would not become more ‘tolerable’ over time. I knew that it would not become ‘less important’ over time. I knew all these things but I did believe it would become something. I would find a way to go on and be ‘normal’. I would be able to walk this earth and live again. I knew I would do this because the alternative was to go with Jeff and WE had way too many things going on here so at least one of us had to stay around to try complete them. With the title came this thing, Widow’s Fog. Had I ever heard of it? Of course not! Had I thought it would happen to me? Of course not! Did it hit me like a ton of bricks? Of course!! Can I explain it to you? I can try but again, sometimes there just aren’t the right words and the way it affects you can be different from person to person but here are the biggest ways in which it got me. I was a teacher (well, I’ll always be a teacher but I’m just not “officially” a teacher anymore) and I was a well read teacher. I loved to read, I loved to analyze, I loved to discuss books, and I loved to get another book to start that process all over again. Now, I find myself as a widow. What better time to become a major bookworm than when you have all the time in the world? I grabbed a book….yet another Mary Higgins Clark novel. I got ready to wander into another place. I got as far as the third word on the dedication page. Over and over I read the same thing and just could not understand what I was reading. And now, 6 years later, I still struggle a bit with reading. The other thing…..I was at a loss for words. Now prior to this, no one would say I was ever at a loss for words!! All of a sudden, I would be talking, I knew exactly what I wanted to say, and I had absolutely no way to say it. It could be a whole sentence or more often just a word or two. I would stop dead in my tracks and struggle. I felt like I was playing charades…….small word, one syllable, and so on. No matter how hard I tried, I could not find the word. I still have moments like that or know exactly how a word should be said but I cannot remember how to pronounce it correctly. It is quite crazy but over time, it has become less of an event so onward I go. Now, back to the W word. I own it now. I’m proud of it because that means that someone allowed me to love him until he left this world. Yes, I am a widow and I always will be a widow. I don’t have an ex, I have a husband (who just so happens to “live” somewhere else). I will refer to Jeff as my husband when I talk about him to others and that will never change because I AM A WIDOW!!!