Yet the Roses Still Bloom...

 

“If life transcends death

Then I will seek for you there

If not, then there too”

― James S.A. Corey

Winter roses in the local tiny botanical garden

Hello, Bloggie Frens. I have missed you.

Life trundles on, not always on the path we wanted or made, but it goes on, if we're lucky.

After a very bad almost two years, my husband passed away August 14th. It was needless. Even at 88, he still had years left, I felt. But in some parts of the country, it is very, very hard to get adequate care. And it is easy to get very bad care. We do not have good doctors, or facilities. Our city turned out not to have a single surgeon capable of doing an amputation. There weren't enough nurses to open the floors of the hospital, so weeks were spent in the hallways of the ERs. And the giant border city near us -- the same. When people talk about the "hair raising up" on the back of their necks when danger appears -- it literally can happen. It happened every time I went into a hospital that looked like some kind of war zone, to a trashed out ward. It's been like living in a third-world country. We border Juarez here; I cannot describe the alien landscape properly. It's been awful. And then he died.

I can't really go into it, other than to say it was a bad end and I am still in shock. I always had sympathy for the widowed; but until you live it -- and I hope you don't have to, through some miracle -- you don't realize how awful it truly is. I am rudderless; my anchor is gone. 

"Put one foot in front of the other..." and "Keep on keepin' on." My mantras for hard times. I have a job I liked, and I still go in and robotically do what I'm supposed to do. I feed the pets, I throw the ball, I pull the feather on a string. I pay the bills -- late, because I am still confused and in shock. It is, in the words of another author, "The land of beginning again." I don't like this land.

During the past almost two years, I wanted to post, to follow along with my fellow Bloggers. We are a dying breed. Every time I would prep a post, each time I went to a blog to read, my husband's health would take a dramatic turn. It happened again and again, until I was afraid to go online at all. I know it wasn't actually connected, but I got so spooked. I was so afraid, and I was grasping at straws of what is "lucky" and what might be "unlucky." 

That's bad, I know it. That's the opposite of faith, but my faith took a big dent. It's like seeing someone I loved dying by inches zoomed out my thought about the Universe. Sometimes when driving to the hospital I would yell out to God, "WHERE ARE YOU?" 

The earth looked smaller and smaller in my mind, and disappeared, and it felt more cold and alone than I can properly express. The WWII veterans passing, the knowledge of that time, the old folks who lived through the Depression, those of the Vietnamese War -- somehow this has gotten mixed up with my personal grief. The passing of older generations, the new culture seeming so strange to me -- It's all mixed.

I just hold a hope that you are all still okay, all still there, all still treading this earth. All safe.

For 2024, that's my wish, bloggie frens. A safe and good year ahead for each of you. My wizened heart and my hermit's soul still have love for those I have met along the way, so, love to you.

Holly

The Olde Dame

.