Ever Forward - 2014

I had wished for a simple, Normal New Year on January 1, 2013.  I desperately needed normalcy after what transpired during the latter half of 2012.  Not only did I not get a normal new year - or a normal year - for that matter, I got the most abnormal 2013 of all my abnormal years combined.  

Moral of the story:  Be careful what you wish for; you may get something entirely opposite.  

It is difficult for me to read my Normal New Year entry from merely a year ago.  I hung on to the last ray of hope that Eric's undiagnosed condition could still make progress.  Not through miracles or expert advice, but sheer persistence, pure sweat, and more pain.   I had hung on to any last shred of hope for us both, but that wasn't enough.  

I had wished for a dramatically different 2013.  I had wished for less pain.  

Moral of the story:  Be careful what you wish for; you may just get it.  

It is once again a new year.  I have been here.  For 2014, I am reluctant to wish for anything:  I may get what I wish for, or I may get something entirely opposite.

2014.  Why wish for anything when I can simply Be.  

2014.  I come first - Always.  Courage shall prevail.  Love shall be treasured and reciprocated.  Memories and friendships, honored.  My Gratitude Cup shall always overflow.  

2014.  My life shall remain Ever Forward.  And Eric shall always be there, in spirit, Without Bounds.  To watch over and protect.      

2014.  I am All In.  No matter what. 

Winter 2013
Skating by Alki Beach in Seattle 

Three More Minutes of Light

File:NASA-Apollo8-Dec24-Earthrise.jpg

The grand return of Winter Solstice symbolically brings me much hope and beauty.  I said "symbolically" because in reality, everyday brings me much hope and beauty. Yet, I need and look for significant milestones to mark progress in life.  We all do. Mine is Winter Solstice.  

Winter Solstice is one of my favorite events of the year, after my birthday, and the New year.  I'm a sucker for calendar dates that symbolize newness, rebirth, hope.  I always celebrate those days with reflection and gratitude, and secretly hope for mounts of presents… 

This Solstice, I don't have grand aspirations on how to live my life "more fully."  I think what I have been doing is grand enough.  This year's Return of Light symbolically gives me the grandest permission for rebirth.  The rebirth of relationships with myself and others.  The rebirth of perspectives and directions. The rebirth of my belief system.  The rebirth of love and intimacy.  The rebirth of rebirth itself.  

I now use the phrase "All In" with profound significance and meaning.  I have few reservations with my approach with life.  I think I am finally brave.

I recently discovered this short five-minute film and it captivated me, perhaps because I instantly saw Eric in it.  It's bravery, courage, All In. Let this film and its message be our grand aspiration.  

"My heroes are my belay partners.  Blind people who cross the streets by themselves.  And those who discovered that inside, we're all capable of surprising ourselves."   



     

Together again, our wedding rings

Wedding rings are meant to be worn.  Preferably on the fingers.

I have been wearing Eric's ring on my neck for months.  Feeling it against my skin brings me comfort.  I twirl it in my hand when I need an extra shot of courage. For months, I know the two rings would eventually come together.  

I never thought I would take off my wedding ring.  But today, I did just that.  I now wear his and mine, string together on a simple platinum necklace.  Together again, the bands.  

My ring finger feels naked.  It's missing the brave story.  My simple but beautiful band made a slight indentation on my finger.  I stare at my left hand; without the ring, it looks abnormally pale and wrinkled.  My thumb naturally reaches over where the ring once sat, searching for the familiar feeling of my band.  I have done that a hundred times a day.  Nothing.  It's bare.  Torn, I feel a trace of sadness mixed with a splash of guilt.  Gratitude.  My emotions are taking their sweet time to reconcile with each other.  My eyes well up.  I sat patiently and let this pass.  I've sat and patiently waited for it to pass, just like this, for more than a thousand times.  It is oddly familiar.  

I love my simple, well worn ring.  Full of scratches from everyday love. It's the only piece of jewelry I wear.  The small, pale blue Chatham diamond sits humbly but proudly, prominently, in the middle of my well-fitted platinum band.  I am proud of my lab-grow diamond.  It was the only diamond we would purchase.  My ring made me sparkle from within. It shone magic. It carried the bravest of the bravest story; our story. The ring has grown into my personality; it has become a part of me. Deliberate, purposeful.  Rebellious. Unconventional. Gentle as a whisper, tough as a warrior.  

Our wedding rings belong together. 

Photo courtesy of Katie Wat and Adrian Rus

It is symbolic as well as practical to string them together today - our wedding anniversary.  It is an act of remembering the blue bird winter day I married Eric. December 10, 2005.

I wrote a marriage manifesto on my blog as a celebration of our 7th wedding anniversary last December. I dedicated my manifesto to my husband, and attributed my growth as a person to the journey we shared together over the last decade. It was the best anniversary gift I could give him.  In Eric's honor, I read a part of the manifesto at his Remembrance. It was at once comforting but heart-wrenching. Most stabbingly painful.  I wished I had read it to him when he was alive. I am fortunate that I have very few regrets in my life.  This, I may have to live with for a while.  

There is no manifesto or celebration beyond 7th.  What needed to be said was said; needed to be written, written.  Love and adoration, expressed.  It was all done. He knew.  My husband had always known. 

Together again, our wedding bands, for one last time, on the day we were married. I was his proud wife.  Before, during, after.  Always.  Without bounds.   

I felt that I have taken the most deliberate, necessary, and courageous step forward and beyond.  Every bone in my body seems to hurt.  Frankly, it pains me.

But - still, All In.  

Thanksgiving 2013

If I must give myself a grade for Thanksgiving 2013, I'd give me a generous A+.  I passed with flying colors. 

I shared the table with "Crab Cakes Todd" and his family.  Todd, my white-version cousin, owns a wok and three rice cookers.  Puts Sirachi in everything.  Meals at the McCormick's never sucks.  Company is even better.  I can swear like a sailor or dress to the nine.  It makes no difference.  I feel like a part of that Irish family. 

5:30am.  As I was enjoying the morning stillness with a cup of joe, serenaded by Sarah McLachlan's Angel, I dipped my hands in the flour.  Parker House rolls are on the menu.  They were stuffed with my magic ingredient:  Daisy Love.  I was savoring the moments with Eric, smiling, missing him.  I miss cooking with him; I miss his presence in the kitchen.  Him doing dishes.  I miss him being my biggest fan in everything I baked and everything I concocted.  "Babe, you've outdone yourself!" He was my hugest supporter in every pursuit, big and small.  Tangible and intangible.  With him, I could beat anything.  He was my man.  
  
However, despite missing my husband, I feel no sadness today.  Instead, I feel a sense of complete gratitude. I am immensely grateful for my incredibly charmed life.  I am so loved by all who surround me, near and afar, to a point of unexplainable mysteries.  Together, my friends bring out the best in me. 

If I leave this world tonight, I could honestly say, I have no regret.  I am doing my best living my life All In.  Except, maybe I should have had another helping of Todd's turkey. 

Todd - 1
Turkey - 0
Thanksgiving at the McCormicks - Perfect 10

I wish December would disappear

I warn myself time and time again, the problem with making good progress is that I and others expect me to be on a perpetually upward trajectory with my grieving and healing.   

I haven't had a meltdown of any size since August 15.  Any good statistician will tell me one is due, and I should prepare myself.  It's like a seismologist predicting the biggest earthquake ever.  "The big one is due any day now!"  

I wish December would disappear.  It's freezing.  It's dark.  It's wet.  Feliz Navidad on every radio station, and if you're unlucky, you get Michael Bolton.  December is also my wedding anniversary, which I opt to no longer celebrate.  Then there is the monthly 15th.  And Winter Solstice.  

Eric and I always celebrated the solstices with our version of fanfare.  Winter Solstice trumps Christmas at the Gilmans.  The only days you get better meals are birthdays.

The seasonal significance of the winter solstice is in the reversal of the gradual lengthening of nights and shortening of days.  Many cultures hold a recognition of rebirth.  I love the symbolism, the representation of the circle, and cycle, of life.

For me, one of the most welcoming parts about Winter Solstice is, still, the absence of commercialism.  There is no obligatory gift giving.  Hallmark has yet to flood the card aisle with "For My Dear Wife, Happy Winter Solstice" cards. There is no Winter Solstice wrapping paper.  Or catchy tunes about a flying ungulate with a glowing red nose.  To a simple mind like me, it works.  

This holiday season, like any holiday season in past years, I need no gift.  What I want most, I will never and can never have back.  So, I must look beyond.  To evolve the love that was, into what is and what is to come - and what is to become. My dear friend Suzanne understands this well; she recently lost her mother.  It is easy to text about it with her about death.  The concept of death is so profound and so definitive that it won't hit you until it hits you.  Then, the finality of its silence is deafening.  

The definitive nature of Eric's death has started to hit me, when I made a conscious decision that I shall no longer celebrate the day I married him.  This day will always bring fond memories of deep love, but it will no longer be celebrated.  Nor will I mutter the words "it would have been 8 years…"  Those words are unnecessary.    

December will not disappear.  It arrives in eight days.  Darkness, coldness, dampness, the memories of my wedding day, Ten Month, Winter Solstice, Feliz Navidad, and yes, Michael Bolton.  And, the potential of a big meltdown according to a good statistician.  

Exactly one month to the Season of Rebirth, I do have some things to wish for.  I wish for a full year of paradigm-changing experiences.  A year of unconventional thinking.  A year of just the right amount of meltdowns.  A year of courageous decisions and behaviors.  A year of standing tall with my spine straight-up.  A year of great health, glowing skin, belly laughs.  A year of loving fully, freely, fearlessly.

Above all, I wish to live another year "All In" in life.  

Winter Solstice 2008
on my street

A Letter to My Husband

I debated for the past 48 hours whether to publish something as personal as a letter to my husband on my blog.  After a lovely dinner at my friends Andy and Melinda's home last night, I got an answer.  My blog has always been an extension of me.  My writing mimics me.  I am open, expressive, warm, vulnerable, loving, a person with gratitude and integrity.  These characters are exactly why this blog exists.  My writing will always be my mirror.  Expressing love and gratitude through my writing, regardless of the intended recipient, is always honorable.  

I feel strangely strong and confident.  It is beyond the "return" of strength; it is new strength that creates possibilities.  It is new strength that will carry me through this phase of my life with purpose and grace, and playfulness.  

I am not fearless, nor am I invincible.  I am purposeful.       

My new strength prompted me to write this letter to my husband, Eric Gilman.  

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Dearest Booh,

Two months ago I decided it was time to start organizing your personal belongings. I call it the Release.  I began releasing, what I consider, some of your most prized possessions.  Prized, not because of their monetary value, but the deep connection I feel in them.  Your iPhone; your Yellow Warrior Bike; your blue winter knit hat; and your collection of Patagonia jackets.  

The thoughtful and methodical release of these items to a select, special few is one of the most positive and definitive steps forward for my healing.  My rebirth.  

Your death put me in the worst possible bone-breaking vortex.  But as you had predicted, I refused to give up, or give in.  As you had predicted, I emerge.  What I went through with you in the last near 13 years, but especially the last eight months - your death - may be more than what an "average" person would ever experience in a life time.  I am grateful for every event, every laughter, every tear shed with you and for you.  I am who I am, and the mere fact that I refuse to give up or give in, is a direct result of what we had been through.  Facing the wind.  Together.  

You showed up in my life for very specific purposes, and made the most profound impacts on me.  Without a doubt, I was the same for you.  

I released a few jackets to Scobie.  He wore them with pride, love, gratitude.  I couldn't think of a more deserving and loving human being to wear your red fleece, one of my favorites.  I wanted so much to keep it, but I will always be held prisoner by it.  By you.  I will always try to seek you, seek myself, in the fleece.  I am no prisoner of anyone; not even you.  

I still don't know whether to call you my husband, or my late-husband.  On one hand, it's just words.  On the other, words matter.  It seems trivial, but I still need to decide. 

I miss you.  I think of you.  All the time.  I want to trace and touch your face.  I want you to hold my right hand when I go to sleep, like you had always done.  Every night.  Your blue knit hat seems to be losing your smell; that infuriates me. Yet, I must release you now, bit by bit.  So that you release me.  So that I can still live my best life. So that I can be the best possible connector that makes positive impacts to lives around me.  So that I may laugh and love:  Freely. Fearlessly. Fully. 

I love you. Without bounds.  Always and always.  Now GO. 

The lush red fleece looking swanky on Scobie

The Kite Girl Who Also Skates

I'm a late bloomer:  I flew my first kite at the ripe age of forty-something, at least one that successfully made it high up in the sky.  It had nothing to do with my skills - it was an easy-to-fly, beginner Prism box kite, gifted by my dear friend Scobie, one of the original owners and designer of Prism Kite.  The kite was so easy to fly "even a caveman could do it," as the Geico Insurance commercial would say.  The experience was one of  exhilaration and excitement.  Pure delight etched deeply in my head.  It was magical.  


The Girl Who Flew The Kite also loves to inline-skate.   I am convinced that if a clumsy person wants to move gracefully, it can be achieved through proper movements with lots of good music. And lots of practice.  I am also aware that the older I get, the more clumsy I will become.  I am determined to move through life with grace, metaphorically and physically.  And so I skate. Summer and winter, as long as the pavement is dry, I do my hour-plus skate by the beach in a tank top or a jacket.  The arrival of winter means I will need to skate in the dark, if I want to de-clumsify my body and bad posture that is burdened by the office work during the day.

Still, it is a definitively worthwhile endeavor.  

November 1.  I skated for an hour and a half in the dark on this calm evening with the exact attitude I flew my kite:  Present, care-free, magical.  Joyful.  I skated to New Soul by Yael Naim, moving and dancing along Alki Beach with the sunset, then with darkness.  Even a rock would want to dance to that song.  I skate-danced, although my technical abilities reminded me that I should stick with the basics… There were people along the beach, but I saw nobody; I didn't care if anyone was watching.  Then strangers smiled and waved.  They knew, then they caught on - there was joy on my face.  And at that moment, they wished they did, too.  

That very night, I noticed.  The Girl Who Flew the Kite has returned.  She has taken another very positive step towards emerging from her vortex. She has summoned all her playfulness to replace her seriousness.  She is getting ready for November 15, and is determined to fly her kite, metaphorically, on that day.  And the day after. And December 15.  And January 15.  February 15.  So on and so forth.

I was incredibly thankful for my friend Ken who somewhat stunned me with his question just two weeks ago: "Where's the Daisy who flew the kite?  I want that Daisy back."  I believe Ken's question expedited Kite Girl's return.

I believe she may be making a permanent cameo.  And I have Ken and my skates to thank.  

Welcome home, Kite Girl.