Aimless

I remembered to pick up cat food this morning. Then I spent about an hour on lawn care. I showered, did laundry, and worked a little more on decorating the house. I didn't put in a full day's work, but at least I didn't waste the day.

In some ways, I now have the life I've dreamed of for years. I have less debt than I've had in thirty years. I have a big house full of cool toys. I'm a (self) published author, with eight books on the kindle store, and who cares if they sell. Younger me would be looking at older me in awe.

So why am I wandering aimlessly around the house, not sure what I want to do next, unable to focus on anything, and occasionally breaking down in tears?

That's a rhetorical question, of course. We both know why. The real question is, "Why did I finally get the life I wanted, only for fate to betray me?" I mean, this is some Twilight Zone bullshit.

She did not deserve to die. I'm no fool; I know fate is unkind. As much as we love to believe in karma, the truth is that this is an unfair world. It rains on the just and the unjust. You can deluge me with feel-good stories of fate rewarding good behavior, or jerks getting what they deserve, but that's just cherry-picking data. Most of the time, fate is random.

Supposedly, the seven stages of grief are: shock, denial, anger, bargaining, depression, testing, and acceptance. I could not tell you which I'm in right now, and I've randomly experienced at least three of them every day this month. Every day it's a different grief sampler.

But most of the time I just feel numb. I don't have the emotional energy to write, and video games don't bring me the joy they used to. I still spend a lot of time watching YouTube, more staring at it than actually watching. KJ might have passed away, but it feels like I'm the one haunting the house.

Same Planet, Different Worlds

My gaming room is really coming along nicely. I can't wait to show it off to... someone. I still don't know a single person in this town. I'm not even sure how to meet them. I suppose I'll start meeting people once I get a gaming group together. Which I'll do once I get a job, so I'll know what my days off will be.

I'm finally starting to get enthusiastic about the job search again. I still don't want help finding a job. What some people consider "help" is a lot more like pressure. But I'm finally reaching the point where I crave some manner of routine, so I have less time to wallow in self-pity.

I ran a lot of errands today. Post office, donation center, used media store, restaurant, gas, etc. The cats are mad at me because I forgot to pick up cat food, but I'll do that first thing in the morning.

I also moved some furniture up and down the stairs. I very nearly injured myself, but those are the risks of living alone. I still have a lot more I want to do, but there are some things that have to wait for a second human. And there are some things I just can't bring myself to do yet.

Every once in a while it hits me that KJ doesn't exist anymore. I mean, that specter is always hanging overhead, but now and then the fact just pops up, like some absurd bit of trivia. It sounds ridiculous on the face of it. I'd sooner believe that the moon had exploded. A world without KJ? That doesn't even make sense. How can you have a world without KJ?

There are still some things around the house I'm reluctant to change, "in case she comes back." No, I can't give away the teddy bears, she'll want them someday. No, I can't move the furniture around, she wouldn't like that configuration. On some level I've convinced myself that this is a temporary situation.

I truly don't know how to live for myself.

I keep thinking about KJ's stepfather, who I will refer to as "DM." And I will refer to KJ's mother as "SM." KJ and DM had a falling out a few years ago, right after SM died. DM cheated on SM, and SM's dying wish was, "Don't let him give my favorite jewelry to his mistress." So a few weeks after SM's death, KJ asked DM if she could come by and look for a specific piece of jewelry.

DM went ballistic. He told KJ that she couldn't have any jewelry, and that she wasn't welcome to stop by anymore unless she was invited. KJ retaliated by calling him out publicly on Facebook, exposing that he'd cheated on SM. DM denied it (note, he actually has a son with the other woman), and most of KJ's family sided with DM.

DM counter-accused KJ of not visiting SM in the hospital. Which, first of all, is a lie. I know she went at least twice, because I had to sit in the car each time (Covid protocols only allowed one visitor). She did cancel her final visit because the nurses told her not to bother, that SM was too far gone to know anyone was there. And KJ couldn't emotionally handle seeing SM in that state. So DM told everyone that KJ didn't love her mother.

Anyway, in all the time I've known DM, he never appeared to like SM. I never saw them act friendly with each other, I never saw any sort of chemistry between them, and it always looked more like a business relationship than anything. They went through the motions because "that's the way it's done."

A note about SM. She was an amazing woman. Smart and energetic. When I first met KJ, SM had been diagnosed with six months to live. We always joked that she was too stubborn to die. She had persistent health problems for the next twenty-something years, and finally died during Covid (but not of Covid). But I never saw her lose a bit of energy.

So from my point of view, when SM died, DM finally got what he'd always wanted. He no longer had this strong-willed woman holding him back, fighting with him, telling him what he could and couldn't do. He no longer had to take this woman to the hospital, forcing him to pay large medical bills. He now has the freedom to date who he wants, and he can spend all his free time working on cars and flying remote control airplanes.

I just keep seeing parallels. We both had been forced into a caregiver position, for a spouse who was in failing health. Now we both live alone in houses too big for a single person. We're even both unemployed right now (since he's retired), so we have plenty of time to be alone with our thoughts, to reflect on our memories of our respective spouses.

But it's also so, so different. I mean, I could be 100% wrong here. DM was a difficult man to get to know, so maybe I've misjudged him. I've disliked him for a very long time. When I first met KJ, she told me DM was acting creepy towards her, and she suspected him of looking at her in a sexual way. One of the reasons we first moved in together was to get her out of that house.

So even if I give DM the most charitable benefit of the doubt in history, he's still a disgusting human being. I simply can't imagine that he mourned SM the same way I'm mourning KJ. I just don't see it in him.

I could be totally wrong about him. KJ might have been totally wrong about him. I'm just glad I'll never have to see him again.

Another Week Gone

The cliche is, "How can I do this without her?"

The reality is, "Without her, why am I doing this at all?"

For the past 18 years, whenever I was super stressed, I found quietly myself chanting, "I want to go home." I'd say this despite being inside my house. Because I knew, despite being a homeowner, that the cramped house I lived in wasn't really "home."

But once I moved here in January, I retired that particular mantra. I finally lived somewhere that felt like home. There were stresses, sure, but at no point did I find myself thinking, "I want to go home." I was where I belonged.

It's been five weeks since my wife passed away. My mom stayed up here for a month, and she was a great help. But I feel like having her here was keeping me from fully facing my grief. I was a little too comfortable with her sitting in KJ's old chair, making beads in the same place that KJ spent all her time crocheting. If I didn't look up from my laptop, it felt like KJ was still in the room.

The past week has been an emotional rollercoaster. I've had two job interviews, and I've spent a ton of time going up and down my stairs, setting up a gaming room in the basement. I've gotten more exercise in five days than I got the entire time mom was here, and that includes the day we went to the zoo.

But I've also crashed more. With higher highs come lower lows. I've spent hours watching absolute crap on YouTube, giving my eyes some candy so I wouldn't just find myself staring at a blank TV screen. I talk out loud a lot. To the cats, to myself, and to KJ.

I ate a 10-count box of Twinkies in three days. Here, let's go on a Twinkie tangent. I bought the Twinkies on a whim while browsing the grocery store. I'd been tempted for years. It's one of those things I try every decade or so. People are like, "They're not as good as you remember," and they're not wrong. That could be the product's slogan, really. "Twinkies. They're Not As Good As You Remember."

KJ and I used to eat pound cake and Cool Whip as desert back in the old days. What are Twinkies, if not pound cake and whipped cream in a convenient, hot-dog-esque form? I mean, sure, it's not really pound cake, but overly-processed sponge cake, but it's not that different. And the filling isn't whipped cream so much as... well, it's probably not wise to question the secret formula.

But it's the kind of thing that comes around again. When you're a kid and you eat a Twinkie, you think, "Mmm... creamy filling!" Then you try them again in your twenties or thirties, and you think, "There's hardly any creamy filling, did I really like this?" Then you try them again in your fifties, and you're like, "Mmm... pound cake!"

But that particular itch has been scratched. I'll try Twinkies again when I'm in my sixties. Twinkie tangent terminated.

I've been eating healthy food, too. Some of my former coworkers from Nashville sent me condolence cards with small presents (gift cards and some windchimes). A couple of them got together and sent me a bunch of frozen dinners from one of those dinner-by-mail services. They're pretty good, but my stomach doesn't always like them. They have a lot more veggies than meat, and most of them include cruciferous vegetables like broccoli. I don't hate broccoli, but my stomach isn't fond of it.

Still, it's saved me a lot of money, because I'm so depressed I can't seem to talk myself into leaving the house. I've only left twice this week, to go to those job interviews. It's also the only times I've showered. I did manage to talk myself into seeing a movie after the first job interview, so there's that.

Each day I think about getting out and doing something. I give myself a mental carrot-on-a-stick. "If you go to the grocery store, you can have your favorite fast food as a reward. Or you can go to a sit-down restaurant and get a piece of cheesecake. Or maybe you could go get Chinese!" Or whatever I think will motivate me that day.

But I don't. I mean, it's not like I'm too far gone. I did manage to go to the job interviews, and I decorated my basement, which took a lot of energy. But I also keep zoning out, bursting into tears, and talking to thin air. 

And I'm back to thinking, "I want to go home." Because a house isn't just a home when it's finally big enough to fit your stuff. A home is where your love lives, and mine has gone away.

Please don't worry about me. I'm not typing any of this to get sympathy points, I just want to get these thoughts off my chest. I'm not going to hurt myself, and I'm not going to wallow in despair. I fully intend to keep living in this beautiful house, and I will find the motivation to keep up with the housework and the job searches.

Everything takes twice as much energy as it used to. I am bone tired, and not because I took 100 trips up and down the stairs this week. Grief is exhausting. But I will come out on the other side, hopefully as a stronger person.

Alone Again

So, mom flew back last night. I think if I look at my entire life, I've only slept alone in an otherwise empty house maybe five times. By the end of the week, I will have broken my record for number of consecutive days living alone.

I hardly slept at all last night. I have a job interview this morning, so hopefully I won't be yawning and such. But it's not going to be easy.

The "celebration of life" event went well. People took lots of vials of KJ's ashes. I'm going to start a log of where/when people release the ashes, so I can track how many cool places she's been scattered. One couple in particular often travels to other countries, so I can't wait to see what they do with her.

One of the cats, Quinn, is really starting to get on my nerves. She was KJ's cat, and she's having difficulty adjusting. She drools on me while I'm trying to sleep, and she jumps on my keyboard while I'm typing.

There are a few things I'm looking forward to. I was getting a little too comfortable with mom here. It's like I was putting off facing my grief, and postponing getting any actual work done. Last night after I got home from the airport, I did a lot of little things around the house, accomplishing more in two hours than I've been getting done in a week.

Hopefully I'll be able to keep up that energy. I have a lot of plans for decorating the house, starting with my D&D room in the basement. Dare I say, it's going to be fun to decorate.

In fact, there's so much I want to do it's going to be hard staying focused. I can't wait for that challenge.

Macabre Party Favors

KJ used to tell me that when she died, she wanted to be cremated and scattered somewhere pretty. Or alternatively, she wanted to be turned into a tree. With that in mind, Mom and I came up with an idea.

This Sunday we're having a "celebration of life" event for her. We've filled little vials full of her ashes, and we're going to give them to people who want them. The idea is that next time they go somewhere nice, like maybe a local park or on vacation, they can scatter the ashes, and that way KJ will be scattered all over the world (or at least the tri-state area). Or if they plant a tree, they can pour her ashes in the hole with it.

I'm not sure if everyone is going to see it the way I do, though. I mean, handing out vials of human ash like they were party favors? It could be seen as being in poor taste. Plus there could be legal issues, depending on where they scatter them.

I don't know. But I believe that KJ would have liked the idea, and that's all that matters to me.

Filling the vials wasn't easy. The vials are very small, and the ashes contain chunks of bone. I wasn't prepared for that. I'd been putting it off for a week, because it's one thing to pack up KJ's possessions, and quite another to pack up KJ.

But today's the last day we had time to do it, so I had to get over it. I'd spent a week telling myself, "It's just ashes. It's no different than how some of the dust in the house is made up of KJ's skin." But seeing the bits of bone hit me hard. I just look at it and think, "This used to be her. This is literally her." On the whole, keeping her ashes is only a few steps removed from having her body stuffed by a taxidermist.

We had to try a bunch of different methods, using various-sized funnels, but nothing worked very well. Mom finally just dipped each vial into the ashes while I took on corking duty. It's nice that we can still find wholesome activities to do together.

So yeah, maybe this was poor taste, or maybe it's a sweet, thoughtful gesture. All I know is that it's the strangest thing I've done in a long time.

Advice Embargo

Today marks three weeks since KJ passed.

A couple of days ago I took my mom to the zoo. Most of the animals stayed hidden, but that wasn't the point for me. I just needed to get out, have a little fun, and try to enjoy life for a minute. It didn't really help. All I could think about was how much I missed doing things like that with KJ. But at least I got some fresh air and exercise. And I met a cool giraffe.

 

The nights are hardest. When things are quiet, I have more time with my thoughts. I can usually fall asleep pretty quickly, but I keep waking up too early and staying up.

Last night I was watching YouTube in bed. I found a video that KJ would have found funny, and I broke down in tears. I wanted her to see the video. I don't know anyone else who would have appreciated it the way she would have. It's like the video was made for her. I wanted to share it with her and I couldn't.

I keep coming across things like that. Like, did you know they've announced a sequel to Practical Magic? I'll probably never watch it, but KJ would have been interested, and I would have loved seeing it with her. But without KJ, that movie has nothing for me.

I've spent the last three decades living at least partially for her. I'm conditioned to look for things she'd like. Doing things for my own enjoyment seems hollow. Like, okay, who am I actually doing this for? What's the point of just me being happy?

I need more time to heal. I'm very glad I don't have a job right now, and that I have enough money coming in that I can keep being picky for a few more months. I wish my family would stop pressuring me to get a job right NOW NOW NOW. I know what I'm doing. I have a schedule. I know I can get a job almost right away if my funds get low, but I have the luxury of waiting for a job I actually want.

Plus some family members are giving me some very elementary advice, some of which I find insulting. "Did you know you can use Google to find jobs?" Wow! I never thought of that! I definitely didn't try that all the way back in January when I moved here!

And some of the jobs they forward to me are 100% scams, which I'd already looked into months ago. Or they require certifications that I don't have. Or I've already applied there and was turned down. Yes I'm on Indeed. Yes I'm on ZipRecruiter. Yes I'm on LinkedIn. And a few others as well. I've been doing this since January, and I've been very thorough.

I know they mean well, and I appreciate their help. But I know what I'm doing. I know they think I'm being too picky. But right now, a bad job is worse than no job. Eventually that will change, but not quite yet.

Three weeks ago I was about to buckle down and put more effort into the job hunt, but then KJ passed away. Now I need a few more weeks to adjust. I don't think it's too much to ask, especially at a time when I can afford it.

I don't need advice right now. I just need sympathy and time.

Feline Blue

The cats are really starting to adopt some strange new behaviors. I think it's finally sinking in that "Mommy's been gone too long, something must be wrong." Quinn used to climb on top of KJ when she was watching TV, but she never did that to me. But now Quinn has started to climb on me the same way, and she's very insistent that I pay attention to her. She also won't let me type. She's climbing on my keyboard as I write this.

But she only climbed on KJ in the living room. Quinn doesn't spend much time in the living room right now, possibly because Mom's here. But Quinn only climbs on me when I'm upstairs in my office.

Quinn's also been walking across my face when I'm trying to sleep, which I believe she used to do to KJ. But my bed is Kara's domain at night, so she sometimes makes Quinn leave.

Kara's been trying to get outside more. The new house has an enclosed front porch, and that's where KJ would go to smoke. So from Kara's perspective, KJ would disappear out that door once every couple of hours. I think Kara's been trying to get out there because that's where she thinks KJ is now. I let her out on the porch earlier tonight, and she started searching all over the place. Granted, cats are naturally curious anyway, so I could be misinterpreting the situation.

Wicket hasn't changed much. He's always been content to spend most of his time in other rooms, so as far as I can tell his routine's the same. But I still think I'm seeing less of him than before.

I'm worried that they'll finally get used to Mom just before she leaves, and then they'll feel twice abandoned.

Nightmares

I had bad dreams all night. KJ was in all of them. In some she was alive, and we interacted and did fun things, but there was a weird vibe in the air, like everything we were doing was Not Meant To Be. In some of the other dreams, I knew she had recently passed away, but I couldn't reach her.

For example, in one dream she went on an overnight trip to a casino, and I knew which one, and somehow I knew she had passed away in her hotel room. I think she actually called me and told me. So I drove the two hours to wherever the casino was, but the hotel staff wouldn't believe me, wouldn't let me in her room, and wouldn't send anyone into the room to check on her.

In another dream we were just sitting in a park, talking. I don't remember the conversation, but it was definitely a sad one. It was like she knew she had to leave, and was saying goodbye. I'm tearing up as I type this, so I'm going to stop now.